Susan LaffertyUntracked land. Most vivid on days marked by change. Upheaval.
When planned schedules sit. Unattended. Calendars, set aside.
And we enter unknown spaces.
On such a day, I remember the quote. Handwritten on a scrap of paper years ago. Placed on my desk.
Amy Carmichael’s words.
My mother’s response when things didn’t go as planned?
I can hear it now.
“The best-laid plans of mice and men…” her voice trails off. Not completing the quote from the poet, Robert Burns.
But I know. And the words run through my head.
“…often go awry.”
It hit me in a different way that day.
The gathering of family and friends to commission this latest group of sent ones. Newly trained. Now on their way. To places all over the globe.
It hit me when I saw the expressions. On parents’ faces.
Pride. Joy. Grief. And for some—uncertainty. Perhaps, even anger.
The time had come. For releasing their kids and grandkids. To travel across oceans and borders. Into a new and different life of serving in another culture.
