In 70 years I’ve never loaded and unloaded suitcases as often as in recent months.

Last December it was off to Florida to welcome grandchild #11, Nelson Aaron. After 10 days in babyland, I flew home in January, using every minute of two days to unpack and re-pack for Kona, Hawaii.

Emerald needed a nanny for a couple of months, and I was the lucky winner.

From Kona I flew to California to spend a delightful 8 days with my cousins and their families, after which I winged my way back to Hawaii to participate in Nelson’s pastoral ordination weekend, a thrilling milestone.

From there it was a red-eye flight back across five time zones from Kona to Michigan,

where I unpacked and re-packed to head back to Florida for another busy 10 days. Joining in with Linnea and Adam’s lively little ones, as well as with Birgitta and Emerald, I was thankful I could keep up at all!

From there, it was another flight home, where I’ve been unpacking and re-packing again, this time for a trans-Atlantic flight to England on Monday. I’ll join Hans and Katy’s family of 7, renewing relationships after 18 months apart.

We’ll celebrate three birthdays, and I’ll work at adjusting to five time zones in the opposite direction of Hawaii’s.

Eleven days later, I’ll fly home along with the sun, back across the Atlantic to unpack once again…. and put my suitcases away. My guess is, I’ll be ready.

When flying, I always select a window seat where I can watch the landscape go by, far below. While we zoom along at 650 mph in air temperatures of 50 below zero, I marvel at how small our world seems. For example, two of my kids live half-a globe apart so that when one is waking up, the other is going to sleep. Yet in the time it takes me to read a good book, take a nap, and eat a meal, I can get to both places. The world is shrinking.

Often I wonder how God views our planet. Even thousands of years ago, before Google Earth and 767 jets, he looked down and saw our world as small. In Scripture he likens it to a footstool. Yet his opinion of Earth’s occupants is so grand that he paid an enormous price to be sure we could live with him always.

I don’t understand it, but I sure am grateful. And though flying 30,000 feet above the earth is the perfect time to ponder this mystery, being grounded for a while is nice, too. When 18 weeks of “go, Granny, go” morphs into “stop, Granny, stop,” it’ll be ok with me.

This is what the Lord says: “Heaven is my throne, and the earth is my footstool….” What is man, that thou art mindful of him? O Lord our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth! (Isaiah 66:1, Psalm 8:4,9)