Once while walking through the dark downstairs of Les Tourades, sleepily confident of my path in the familiar hallway, I reached for the door handle too enthusiastically. The door wasn’t where I thought it was and it smacked me squarely…in the forehead. Not sure whether to laugh aloud or pout, I readjusted my blind path and walked with more caution.

One day into re-entry in the USA, ‘real life’ smacked me in the forehead.

After meaningful goodbyes to A Rocha friends, a lovely last hurrah with my dear co-worker Sarah in Italy, and smooth international connections, I landed happily in Philadelphia.

The next day, I landed in the emergency room with an ugly gash in my left leg, thanks to teamwork between a slippery path and a jagged rock. Eight stitches later, I remembered that, “a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.” (Prov. 16:9)

In transition between France and a new life in the US, I am in a hallway between two seasons. I plan, research, make pro-con charts, but God determines my steps.

I’m grateful closing doors, and for the lessons and love I carry from A Rocha to my next adventure. I’m thankful, too, for the overflowing joy of long-delayed reunions with those I love in the US. As I apply myself to ‘real life’ in the USA, and let my leg heal, I still may smack my forehead and do other ungraceful things. But He still is faithful.

There is a time for everything,
and a season for every activity under heaven:

a time to be born and a time to die,
a time to plant and a time to uproot…

He has made everything beautiful in its time.

Ecclesiastics 3:1-2, 11

Miranda Harris once showed me this poem, scrawled in the front cover of her Bible:

Willingly transplanted,

I still suffered the shock of new soil.

But I have discovered that

Rooted in Christ

I can grow in any place

This poem put into words the hearts of Peter and Miranda’s move from the first A Rocha site in Portugal to new and uncharted territory in southern France in 1997. After a year of transplant shock, recovery, and, now, re-planting, I find no better words explain my heart.

However willing the change, the shock of new soil is often very real. The process of transplanting to a new place and new job was hard last fall. Through the faithful friendship of my A Rocha coworkers, prayer, and a healing visit back home, I found my place in the A Rocha France community. My roots grew deeper as I thrived in my new season of life, and transition gave way to joy in meaningful relationships and work.

Now, a new season is on the horizon. Once again, I willingly uproot and transplant, this time to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. I am happy to have a place to live and to be in the same time-zone as friends and family. The job search continues, and the season is young. But the past year with A Rocha has taught me that “rooted in Christ, I can grow in any place.”

August 11, I fly home to Pennsylvania.  Talk about mixed emotions.  I am so sad to leave this place, these people, this meaningful work.  But I am confident that returning to the USA to put down roots is God’s next step for me.  I will be living with my best friend in the fall, looking for jobs and exploring graduate school.  I will remain close with A Rocha and continue in conservation ministry, if possible.  I can’t wait to be cool Aunt Manda to sisters’ kids and to be present in the lives of those dearest to me.

As always, I am eager for your prayers and your advice or ideas.  I’m seeking God’s next step for me and know that I am buoyed up by your prayer.

After a stomach-dropping drive around hairpin turns, we finally arrived at Les Courmettes. Les Courmettes is an old farm high in the mountains overlooking the Cote d’Azur. In such a dramatic setting, our A Rocha France meetings in June were meaningful.  We talked about the five core commitments of A Rocha: “Christian, community, conservation, cooperation, and cross-cultural.”

“Community” struck a chord with me. I live and breathe community at A Rocha. Relationships between A Rocha France and the wider community are important conversation topics. Who’s turn it is to wash the dishes is often more pressing. I live with a constantly changing group of people in Les Tourades, and basic challenges of finding personal space, communicating (cross-culturally), and forgiveness are real.

At Courmettes, our budding community center, we talked about how gracious community is the practical living-out of Christianity. How better to understand the grace of God than forgiveness in a community, where we see one another at our worst? Community, it struck me, is a dim reflection of heaven on earth. Relationships with other people are the source of joy and richness that merely reflect God’s plan for us in the future. This promise of things to come doesn’t negate the challenges of living with other people, but makes them more important.

Muriel shared that the Earthwatch team, who were at Les Tourades for two weeks in May, were talking among themselves about how strangely remarkable A Rocha is. Everyone seemed genuine. People seemed to enjoy each other, work had a purpose.  They wondered out loud if it had anything to do with us being a Christian place. The five C’s are interconnected. May the reflection only increase! ]]> http://amandamcmillan.blog.com/2009/06/24/reflections-on-community/feed/ http://amandamcmillan.blog.com/2009/06/24/garden-sensations/ http://amandamcmillan.blog.com/2009/06/24/garden-sensations/#comments Wed, 24 Jun 2009 16:05:20 +0000 Amanda The Rendez-vous aux Jardin at Les Tourades—a national open house for private gardens in France—was June 6 and 7.  Since February, we at A Rocha France has been brainstorming, advertising, facing dead-ends, and revising plans for this prominent event.  We weeded, turned compost, created watering schedules, and formed blisters in the garden.  Making a “wildlife garden” simultaneously tidy and natural is much more complex than I thought!  

As the date for the Rendez-vous approached, we constructed “five senses” stations in the garden.  I was happily in charge of the “gout” (taste) stand.  Verbena, mint, and lemon balm teas anyone?  How about some oregano herb butter?  Apparently, my choice of garden-based goodies, as well as my accent, made it clear I was a foreigner.  A passer-by asked me where I got my ideas for my station, I laughed and responded, "My Mom…?”   

On Sunday, June 7, we joined forces with some local churches and hosted a church service in the back yard. While turnout was surprisingly low (no thanks to Sunday being Mother’s Day in France!), families and friends of A Rocha folks attended the service.  Bird songs joined the flute and piano, and the message by a local evangelical leader was short and sweet. 

We breathed a sigh of relief when the final “five-senses” stand was dismantled.  The weekend, while not well-attended, was engaging and interesting for all.  And the garden is being quite ignored now, likely to its relief.

May was indeed glorious, but the month has disappeared like the poppies in the fields.  June has come with a sluggish heat, but there is little rest from the full schedule.  Within the past month, A Rocha France has (take a deep breath, now!)…

1. Celebrated the wedding of our administrator Priscille to our former handyman, Pascal

2. Hosted our first EarthWatch team – eight fantastic Americans here for eco-tourism/volunteerism; 3. Pulled together an educational presentation to fulfill the last-minute request of the nearby elementary school.  We waited for years to connect with this school! 

4. Baked cookies, weeded gardens, painted signs, and finally hosted visitors for the national Rendez-vous aux Jardins

5. Welcomed my dear friend Becca from the USA.  Visitors are always an encouragement!

6. Travelled to our other A Rocha France center, Les Courmettes (near Nice), for A Rocha meetings and a quite, um, ‘vigorous’ hike up the mountain.

Soon the heat will force us to slow down, but… the calendar doesn’t know temperature.  Travels for Peter and Miranda continue, and two more EarthWatch teams are coming.  In French, we’d call this summer “Très chargé!” In British, we’d say, “it’s been quite full on!”  And so it will continue to be!    

-          Saying, “op-la” each time you nearly drop something feels like the most appropriate response

-          You stare aghast at visitors innocently drinking white and rose wine at room temperature

-          You start calculating if it’d be at all possible to go grocery shopping in Pennsylvania on your bike, envisioning your personal herb garden (on a windowsill), and wondering if eating locally is possible in Harrisburg in December. 

-          You eat an ice cream cone while cycling through tourist mobs near the Roman Arena in Arles. You don’t consider yourself a tourist.

-          The man at the shop near the Arena waves each time you pass, the same Moroccan man haggles you at the market, and the young beggar across from the bakery smiles a greeting

-          You can’t think of the English sense of a very appropriate French idiom, and you mess up the syntax in English sentences with French word-order

-          You find yourself mixing languages.  “la dishwasher est proper.” “I am malade.”  And your theatrical skills have vastly improved.  You can now act out the fall of the Roman empire using the skeleton of your French vocabulary to fill in the gaps.

Yesterday: wake up with a sore throat. Discuss the possibility that it’s just the changing weather with Sonia and Martine. Research Blackberry/Outlook sync problems for Peter, and come to a dead-end with Orange/France Telecom account preferences. Help Martine with lunch. Cut and prepare 14 grapefruits. Write a letter while waiting for the very, very late group to come back from field research for lunch. Eat a late lunch, translating French jokes for the EarthWatch team members.

Jog downstairs to catch a skype call with Barbara in Scotland (our incredibly important A Rocha administrator). Find an A Rocha poster that Barbara in Scotland needs by August. Call my mom.

Cycle into town to post the box with the poster and some A Rocha France mail. Mail the post. Cycle to the train station and buy tickets to Paris (to see my housemate Anne June 19-24) and to Italy (to go back with Sarah as our last hurrah the first week of August). Drop of a DVD at the library and choose another, and get a glare because I’m checking out a children’s DVD and I don’t have the right library card (how do I explain to a scowling librarian that I want to watch the old Black Stallion in French as my language level’s that of a child’s!). Cycle to the copy shop and pick up two color copies of a map of Christians and biodiversity for Peter.

Arrive back at Tourades pouring sweat, and nervously notice Peter’s car. I find out that he is going to be interviewed by the French TV station today, not tomorrow, and needs the maps… do I have them? I pull them out and hand them smoothly to Peter. Escape before the TV crew interviews me again.