A New Chapter

As I write this, we are ending our first month back in Lakeland after our rather laborious move (I am really getting too old for this!) and we are starting to get settled in.  It has been 13 years since we last lived here, and a lot has happened during our exile in Pinellas County.  However, the important thing is we got out, PTL!!!  Therefore I just wanted to spend a little time catching up on things tonight.

I wanted to first off share a picture of a very beautiful little country church we discovered on the west side of town on US 92 heading toward Plant City, and hope you will enjoy it:

The name of this little church is the New Beginnings General Baptist Church, and it is part of a small denomination, the General Baptists, that is located more in the upper Ohio Valley and the Ozark region than in the eastern part of the country.  I saw this picture though and just wanted to share it because it is gorgeous. 

Our move back to Lakeland was something we planned for some time back, as we were really seeking direction as to where we wanted to move as we knew our time in Largo was about up.   However, due to some unforeseen circumstances, we had to move a week sooner and therefore had to rent this huge Budget truck, and maneuvering that monster was fun in itself (Barb took out our old mailbox as we were pulling out to leave the old place - actually, the word pulverize would be a more apt description!).  Then was the packing - oy vey! - which we did by ourselves and I am still recovering from almost a month later.  To say the least, I am very happy that the actual move itself is over!

The new place we live in now is a 3-bedroom place, with both Barb and I having our own private offices, both of which we are still trying to get arranged and organized to suit our needs.   I hope to post a good picture of it later for you all to see, as it is a nice place.  There are a few kinks to work out yet, but all in good time.

That being said, although it was the biggest relief as well as the greatest challenge getting out of Pinellas after living over there 13 years, that doesn't mean that all was bad there.  Our years in Largo, in particular, were fruitful, as it was there I discovered my family roots and recovered a lot of lost stuff from my past that was good.  Also, in general, I was able to refocus myself, and that opened the door to move back over here.  Now, as a result, I can go back and finish my graduate degree as well as getting our spiritual lives back on track - the opportunities are golden for the latter, and thankfully Lakeland is more conservative than all the radicals, weirdos, and wackos living in Pinellas as well as parts of Tampa - it is refreshing, for one thing, to see a little paper called The Orange Peel Gazette, in most businesses rather than that anarchist/socialist rag they have in Tampa and St. Pete called tbt - the latter is published by a bunch of marijuana-influenced disgruntled former hippies with a lot of time and nothing to say on their hands.  Thing is, however, there are people actually stupid enough to take what that damnable paper says seriously!  But, that is neither here nor there.

I will be glad to write more later, and will do so as I get more settled and can provide some good pictures of the new place.  Until then, take care.