Thursday, August 29, 2019

The Difference Two Years Make

Two years ago we left the wilderness of southern Saskatchewan for the temperate climate and spectacular libraries of Cambridge.

The trip was a real growth experience. This photo was taken in mid-August 2017, shortly before we left:

And here we are at the beginning of August 2019, a few days after we returned:

In other respects too, our trip was a success. (See this post for why we were there.) But even an academic’s paradise can seem arid and sterile after a while, and I confess to being glad to have left the Cambridge bubble behind for the real world of our isolated little prairie college town.

It’s nice of course to be back in our own comparatively large house with our own stuff, but I also missed the face-to-face interaction that teaching provides as well as the sense that what I was doing—aside from being a husband and father—mattered.

Call it late summer idealism, if you will. Classes begin next week and I know the thermometer will dip as low as -20 in November. At the moment, however, I am grateful to be back in “a community of learning that calls students to seek the kingdom of God, to be shaped profoundly by the scriptures, and to be formed spiritually and intellectually for lives of service.“

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