A lighter hearted post...
Tuesday evening we headed back from the UK to our home in Granada after a few days of wonderful time with friends in the Oxford area. We took the train from Pangbourne to Reading, enjoyed a half hour break with some wonderful enormous coffees and took the hour and half long train to Gatwick airport.
After checking in, and walking through security, we saw our plane was delayed a half hour. I had planned that we would arrive mostly on time and have over and hr to pick up bags etc, and then take a cab to the bus station in the South of Madrid, and then the 5 hr overnight bus ride home. Yes, it was the slow boat to China as my aunt Debbie says, but it was cheap, and that saved us over 150 dollars to do it that way.
Needless to say,we were delayed out of Gatwick and arrived in Madrid at 12:45 in the morning and we had only 45 minutes to get out of the plane, get our two bags, grab a cab and then make the last overnight bus at 1:30 in the morning.
AS we descended from the plane on steps to a waiting bus, Andrew groaned, "We aren't going to make it." I was already on the handy Blackberry chatting with my mum in the States asking her to help me find out exactly when the last bus was and which one of the two major bus stations it left from. I groaned when I realized it was the south bus station, about twice the distance from the Avenida America station closer to the city center.
We grabbed our bags as soon as they came out after having run ahead to go through passport control first. I told Andrew "RUN" and we ran through as fast as we could to the front of the Taxi Cab line. AS we threw bags into the trunk, we breathlessly asked the cabbie at 1:17 if he could get us to the bus station. He in typical Madrileno fashion, said, "No pasa nada, 10 minutes."
He drove so fast we laughed most of the way there from sheer nervousness. I had to pay him with a credit card, so I threw Andrew out and I paid whilst Andrew ran into the bus station to buy the bus tickets. It was a machine and Andrew is horrible at such things, and the security guard was patiently coaching him through it by the time I burst through the stations doors. We bought the tickets, clattered down the steps and RAN across the bus station to clamber aboard the last bus that night to Granada. The driver was having his last cigarette so we had a moment to throw the bags underneath and then madly climb aboard.
For the next half hour we laughed at the impossibility of it all. But to me, it was just proof that God really wanted us home that am, so we could rest and start back up again. Sometimes we want everything to run perfectly in life, no delays, no running madly across half of Madrid to get the bus. But I think sometimes God likes to keep us on the edge of our seats, waiting breathlessly so we don't miss His miracles, small or big. Those were small miracles, but all together they formed a big one to show me, He's in control and I'm not.
Tuesday evening we headed back from the UK to our home in Granada after a few days of wonderful time with friends in the Oxford area. We took the train from Pangbourne to Reading, enjoyed a half hour break with some wonderful enormous coffees and took the hour and half long train to Gatwick airport.
After checking in, and walking through security, we saw our plane was delayed a half hour. I had planned that we would arrive mostly on time and have over and hr to pick up bags etc, and then take a cab to the bus station in the South of Madrid, and then the 5 hr overnight bus ride home. Yes, it was the slow boat to China as my aunt Debbie says, but it was cheap, and that saved us over 150 dollars to do it that way.
Needless to say,we were delayed out of Gatwick and arrived in Madrid at 12:45 in the morning and we had only 45 minutes to get out of the plane, get our two bags, grab a cab and then make the last overnight bus at 1:30 in the morning.
AS we descended from the plane on steps to a waiting bus, Andrew groaned, "We aren't going to make it." I was already on the handy Blackberry chatting with my mum in the States asking her to help me find out exactly when the last bus was and which one of the two major bus stations it left from. I groaned when I realized it was the south bus station, about twice the distance from the Avenida America station closer to the city center.
We grabbed our bags as soon as they came out after having run ahead to go through passport control first. I told Andrew "RUN" and we ran through as fast as we could to the front of the Taxi Cab line. AS we threw bags into the trunk, we breathlessly asked the cabbie at 1:17 if he could get us to the bus station. He in typical Madrileno fashion, said, "No pasa nada, 10 minutes."
He drove so fast we laughed most of the way there from sheer nervousness. I had to pay him with a credit card, so I threw Andrew out and I paid whilst Andrew ran into the bus station to buy the bus tickets. It was a machine and Andrew is horrible at such things, and the security guard was patiently coaching him through it by the time I burst through the stations doors. We bought the tickets, clattered down the steps and RAN across the bus station to clamber aboard the last bus that night to Granada. The driver was having his last cigarette so we had a moment to throw the bags underneath and then madly climb aboard.
For the next half hour we laughed at the impossibility of it all. But to me, it was just proof that God really wanted us home that am, so we could rest and start back up again. Sometimes we want everything to run perfectly in life, no delays, no running madly across half of Madrid to get the bus. But I think sometimes God likes to keep us on the edge of our seats, waiting breathlessly so we don't miss His miracles, small or big. Those were small miracles, but all together they formed a big one to show me, He's in control and I'm not.
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