A Stranger in a Strange Land
By Annmarie Miles
(From the April - June 2020 issue of VOX)
I love Ireland!
I love being Irish. I love the culture I come from. I grew up surrounded by a mix of generations. Life was loud and busy with music, stories and a houseful of relatives. Every time I fly home from the UK, I look out the window for the coastline of Ireland and a huge beaming smile fills my face when home comes into view. So why don’t I live there? I love Ireland with all my heart, but I’ve made somewhere else my home for now. There’s a song I love to sing from Susan Ashton’s album, A Distant Call. The chorus goes,
You move me,
You give me courage I didn’t know I had
You move me
I can’t go with You and stay where I am
so You move me *
The beloved and I worked out that we have moved 11 times in the 20 years we’ve been together. We have packed and unpacked a hundred kitchen utensils, a thousand books and a million fridge magnets each time, sometimes for only a few months. The above song became a bit of an anthem. We’ve had our current address just over four years. Only one other of the many addresses lasted that long. The church still seem very happy to have us, which is great, not least because packing is not something I want to do again any time soon.
I remember being very homesick when I first moved to Wales. It was 20 years ago, way before we were all on Facebook. No WhatsApp for group messages and no Instagram to share our photos. I did have a mobile but it cost me £2.50 to text anyone at home. I’d ring my mother once a week and she’d spend most of the call telling me how expensive it must be and trying to get me to hang up. After a year or so of living in Wales, a friend left and went to the Middle East as a missionary. We spoke on Skype and she shared how she was homesick for Wales, and there was I in Wales, homesick for Ireland. I wondered why God moved us, when our hearts seemed always to pine for home.
If I’m honest, even when I lived in Ireland, I was never 100% comfortable in my own skin. I’ve always been big and a bit awkward, often masking insecurities with humour. Since I started to follow Jesus, 25 years ago, it’s been more acute. There’s a constant ache for something and somewhere else. There are days when it’s hardly noticeable and days when it’s unbearable.
“I am on my way and until I get there, until I get to heaven, I will never really be home.”
Over the years I’ve imagined it was missing Ireland, grieving for children I never had, frustration with the career that didn’t take off. I’ve had a lot of time to think recently and it occurs to me that it is none of those things. I don’t feel at home because I am not at home. This earth is not my home. This crumbling body is not the final me. I am on my way and until I get there, until I get to heaven, I will never really be home.
There’s work to do in the meantime, and I want to do it. But I do it with a work permit, a temporary visa, which will one day expire.
What a blessed relief that we take nothing with us. I couldn’t bear the thought of packing – again!
* lyrics by Gordon Kennedy, Pierce Pettis
Annmarie Miles is originally from Tallaght and now lives in her husband Richard’s homeland, Wales. As well as VOX articles, she writes short stories, and is working on a book about her journey with food, weight gain, weight loss and God. Visit her blog at www.auntyamo.com. On Twitter she is @amowriting.
