Midwest Living Sucks

 I have lived in Nebraska for 21 of my 26 years.  More specifically, North Platte, Nebraska.  Most days I don't mind it, but lately it has been really difficult.  In the past six months, we have lost three sets of friends to bigger and better cities/jobs.  We have taken on the responsibility of trying to keep a handful of middle school and high school kids Christ centered in an ever unbalanced world.  I started school.  My life was tilted off its axis quite a bit earlier this summer.  I started training for a marathon. We planned (and are about ready to execute) a mission trip. Sam started playing softball with another church in a league here in town.  We have traveled up and down the whole United States playing soccer and visiting and going to weddings and seeing family and running races and helping people. 

But it has not been enough.  Midwest people can never give, do, provide, work, or be enough.  For the most part, it is an excellent idea to want to better yourself and your community, but sometimes, it is exhausting.  The worst questions I get asked on an almost weekly basis include:

-"When are you going to start bringing your nice young couples to church on Sunday?"

....Ummm....we have no friends.  Thank you so much for reminding me, again, that we sit home alone together and watch Family Guy and Downton Abbey because we don't really have any friends under the age of 40 in this town.  I had completely forgotten how lonely we were until you brought it up....again.  But here, let me put on a sandwich board and walk up and down Jeffers asking for "nice young couples" to join us for a morning of worship. 

-"Have you started thinking about babies yet? The church nursery looks pretty bare.  I'm sure your dad would just be over the moon if he had a little redheaded grandbaby to carry around.  I bet you and Sam have the cutest little redheaded babies., etc."

I get it.  You want me to have a baby. But it is my uterus and my business.  What if I am not able to have children?  Did you ever think of that?  (I don't know if my body is able to or not, but it is something that I worry about frequently and you asking about it makes me worry all the more.)  And when was the last time you had to pay for maternity insurance?  If you would like to pay the extra $180ish a month in the hopes that I might get pregnant, be my guest! And how do you know what God's plan is for my life and for Sam's life?  He is moving and changing things in my life right now and I am not really in the place to be bringing a child into the world while going to school and working full time and leading a youth group and teaching Zumba and cleaning house and spending time with the love of my life.

-"So what are you doing with your life now?"

Absolutely nothing. Squat.  and at the same time, everything under the sun.  To some of my "more famous friends", I am sure my life looks mundane and boring compared to the glamorousness that they live on the coast, but I am making a difference where I am doing what I can with what I have when I can at this moment in my life.

-"Can you help with....donate to....lead the...."

Currently I am trying to live my life with only joy, strength, love, compassion, laughter, wisdom and hope. As a culture, the Midwest demands that you work at your job all week and then work all weekend doing the things that you can't get done during the week because you are too busy working.  Sometimes I say no to you.  Not to be mean or snide, but so that I can mold myself to my couch and watch something dumb on the tv with my husband on Saturday afternoon or so that I can actually cook a meal instead of feeding him tatertot casserole...again.  I say no to you because I choose to use my limited cash flow to support causes that are important to me. And I say no to you because I do not believe that I am the kind of strong, intelligent leader that you think I am. 


Frankly, Sam and I have no desire to move out of the South Dakota, Colorado, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Missouri region.  But there are those days, the days when the string of requests and prying questions seems never ending and the list of good, dear friends within a 30 mile radius is shorter than my softball career.  Those are the days when I wish and dream and hope of a life in a big city where we have a small group of good friends but no one outside of that circle knows my maiden name.  It may sound odd, but I want a life on anonymity and intimacy at the same time.  It is probably unattainable, especially in a community where everyone seems to know you peed before you have even flushed the toilet, but I am trying.  Please, just throw me a bone here.