The Light Side of the Moon

Technology facilitated all this.

See, it used to be that when I took my student ministry to Mexico, it was like being on the dark side of the moon. You know...that 30 or so minutes when astronauts would lose radio contact with NASA once they got behind the moon?

We'd work for the entire week. No phone. No lights. No motor cars. Not a single luxury. It was nice to get that focused on our ministry.

Now, for better or worse, we still have cell phone contact with the outside world. The adults check up on work or sports scores when we get back to camp. The kids say goodnight to parents or boyfriends/girlfriends or stay attached to their social grapevines.

Despite my loathing appreciation of mobile phones, I took mine with me. It came in handy Sunday on the bus ride down to do a bit of problem solving with the team that came down early to set up camp. I kept it at camp in a baggie to keep sand out of it.

Checked it Monday night. Nothing.

Checked it Tuesday morning. Nada.

Checked it Tuesday evening. Text message from the wife: "Call home now." It was from an hour earlier.

I don't know about you and the dynamics of your house, but for my wife to send a message like that spurs immediate and direct action.

The long and short of it is that my mom has taken a turn for the worse. My higher-order life-liver sister Jilly flew from San Francisco ASAP (after a layover in Dallas in which her husband Shane-the-barnstorming-pilot purchased her some gaudy socks with Texas flags all over them as a gag when she said she needed extra socks) and said she'd give me an update on mom's condition. I told her that what I needed was good information--my preference would be to finish the trip, perform a wedding ceremony on Saturday for a couple I dearly love, and fly in on Saturday.

She said she'd get me that good information after visiting with Mom and her husband, chatting with the hospice nurse and the like. She'd call me when I got off the work site yesterday...which would be three or four hours after her arrival in Birmingham.

Well, after visiting Mom and her husband, chatting with the hospice nurse and the like, she called me about half an hour after her arrival in Birmingham.

The mesage was similar to the text message. It was more or less "get here now."

Cell phone calls went in and out. My sister. Work. The airline.

At 12:45PM mountain time I was standing in a barrio in Juarez watching my daughter put tar on a roof.

At 1:45PM, after a shakedown by some of Juarez' finest in which Ian (an elder in my church, by the way, which makes the story that much better) was speeding to get me to El Paso's Airport--he opted to pay the $20 "fine" rather than have his license confiscated)--I grabbed my passport and backpack at the campsite.

At 2:25PM I crossed the border.

At 3:00PM I crossed security, which took longer than crossing the border.

At 4:07PM I boarded an American Airlines flight...who gave me a tremendous "emergency price" on a one-way ticket. I'm terribly thankful for that. I felt an urgency to make the plane go faster. I'm not sure American Airlines was feeling that same sense of urgency.

At 10:00PM I landed at Birmingham International Airport. I think it's only "international" because mail goes through there--but whatever, man.

I was picked up by my barnstorming-pilot brother-in-law and higher-order life-liver sister who gave me a barnstorming/higher-order update on that day's conversations with all the necessary parties.

So, technology started all this.

And it'll help today, too. I've got to buy some clothes and toiletries and such. I'm still wanting to perform that wedding for that couple I dearly love (we'll see, though) and if it's possible that'll require all sorts of airlines and such.

But now we wait.

Which may be harder than getting from a barrio in Juarez to a bed in Birmingham in under 12 hours.