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I am sitting in my car in a parking spot outside of a Panera with Aaron’s laptop so I can use some of their free wi-fi after hours and get online for the first time in days.

We won’t have internet at our new house until this Saturday! That’s just crazy talk. We haven’t got phone service until then either. I actually now own a cell phone, me, the homebody who never goes anywhere and never needed a cell phone before now. Though, actually, buying a van last month so we’d have enough passenger space for 6 when Jelly bean is born was the first step in this direction. Now I do actually go places. Sometimes far more often than I would like. So getting a phone in case I needed it was the inevitable next step.

Other than the total disconnect from the rest of the world I am loving our new place. Actually, I’m not minding the disconnect either. It’s a nice change of pace to only be doing what is physically present in front of me. Of course, all the work piling up will come crashing in again once my computer is up and running and has a hi-speed connection once again.

There’s something I wanted to tell you about and forgot, what with the sudden death move and all. Less than 5 days between finding a house and moving into it. My mother was right. See that mom, you were right. Enjoy that one. I cannot begin to describe how amazingly blessed I feel. We got packed up, moved, and halfway unpacked and I barely lifted a finger between all the friends and family who came to help. I owe my MIL an even bigger debt of gratitude than I did before. She organized everything moving day, and cleared our old house out. Her exact words, “This is work that anyone else can do. Only you can keep that baby inside of you long enough for it to grow as much as it needs. So, I know it’s hard to delegate, but you are going to need to sit down and let other people do this for you.”

But that’s not the something
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Two Saturdays ago I went to an Abolitionists Breakfast here in San Diego. It’s a gathering of people who are actively working in various ways to stop human trafficking. The different organizations take turns hosting it. There were people who go out on the street every Friday to find girls who are selling their bodies and try to rescue them from pimps and madmas. I talked to a lovely nun who lives in a recovery/rehabilitation home for women who have been trafficked. (One of the only in this county, sadly, when the need is so much greater.)

The Charis Project was the only group there working on the prevention side of the problem, trying to prevent children from ever being trafficked at all, which was really interesting. One word I kept hearing over and over again was “rescuers”. It caught my attention because my friend Adam called me a child rescuer on twitter the other day. I haven’t really thought of myself in those terms but I guess it’s true. What we do rescues children; from poverty, slavery, and exploitation. Those words fit. They are true. They are good.

I came away from that morning feeling so encouraged. It’s a unique experience being in a room full of people who really, really care about the problem, enough to put themselves on the line. There were guys there who have gone into brothels and rescued girls while guns were being pulled and baseball bats employed to stop them.

What I realized though is that if it’s accurate to call myself a child rescuer, it’s also accurate to call a lot of you the same thing. Those of you who have followed on this journey, who have given; time, money, and skills to helping us take care of these orphaned children, you too have participated in rescuing a child, or many children.

Please be encouraged by that. Daily life can be so grinding and wearing that we wonder what it’s for and why we’re here. I want you to remember that to 40 kids in Thailand you are somebody. You are one who cared when they didn’t have anyone who did. You are amazing.

Bless you all.

(See you Saturday when I have internet again.)