Warm hello, special humans!
If you already know me, chances are, you know me as your tall, gregarious, cake-baking, smeared-ink letter-sending, dark-beer-loving, and very Christian _____ [fill in the blank]. Likely we met at work… or in church… or when I responded to your Craigslist ad.
If you don’t know me yet, I’m so glad you found your way here! I hope you’ll find my words to be those of a fast friend.
I am a moth to the flame of chances to mingle, eat, drink & be merry. I love flying on airplanes. I embrace the middle seat. I am a coffeehouse bum. I would waste away all my days just being alone, together, listening to the click clack of keyboards and the chatter of new and old friends gingerly pouring from their teapots and hearts.
I began properly "working" in hospitality at 15 years old. But before I was old enough to get my teen working papers, it was lemonade stands on the front lawn. Messily frosted cupcakes proudly offered in the classrooms. Spring onions pulled from the backyard dirt, served up in bowls sculpted from the mud. From my earliest years, I've found a satisfaction in watering people.
Now in my thirties, I can count well over 30 different businesses at which I've taken up employ to do just that. I’ve given out my social security number like it’s a piece of candy.
I can count 20 different addresses where I've made my home. And I can count more than 40 different roommates who I've come home to.
The paper trail of my life wants to tell a story of a woman who could never find satisfaction Anywhere- not in a job, not in a zip code, not in a man, woman or child. But that's not true. I've loved them all!
I love to play the hostess. If I could have anything I wanted in this life, I would have a big house, with plenty of free rooms, and a rack full of spare keys at the door. I would host foreign students, and visiting friends, and rogue travelers passing through. I would perfect my techniques for baking scones and simmering lemon curd, and my sun-filled sitting room would never want for guests reclining with teacups in their hands, and peace in their eyes.
But alas.
I am, as yet, "poor".
The industry that I chose is not a lucrative one. Not always a stable or steady one. Often, not even a respected one.
I don't have a house. I don't have a savings account. I don't have insurance. But no one can say that my life isn't rich.
Without hesitation and without exception, I believe God when He says, "Those who trust in the Lord will lack no good thing." Psalm 34:10
And so from rented rooms, with borrowed money, on borrowed time, I have aspired to welcome, and to lavish that "no lack of good things" on the wanderers of the world.
Will I have a "proper" home or a "respectable" salary some day? I hope so. But I hope, if and when I do, that I will still live as Richly as I do today.
As a hospitality worker, It's been my privilege to spend my hours amidst the celebrations of life, and my days in the company of the world's liveliest, loveliest and humblest people. As a wanderer, It's been my delight to share both the momentous occasions and the ordinary days with treasured friends, far and wide- those special ones who always leave their doors unlocked for me!
And it's been a more thrilling adventure than I would have ever planned, to take one brave, long-legged step after another, as one securely in the care of a Most Hospitable God.