Today we said good bye to Mr. Tymen. I love this picture of him with Veronica and all my kiddos -- even our dogs. Opportunities for good photos like this don't happen very often in our crazy casa!
Tymen first came to us from the Netherlands in January of 2017 for a month. He then came and spent another week with us before leaving for home. We thought that was the last we would see of him, but he had the opportunity to come back at the end of August. His initial plan was to visit other farms too while he was here, but we were so glad he decided to just stay with us for his entire three month visit.
It feels very weird to have both Jacob and Tymen leave us. We have had one of these two guys with us nearly non-stop since exactly this time last year. They were a "constant" wwoofer -- a bit different from the usual flux of one month visitors that we have had previously. While it can be more challenging to have people long-term in some ways, it is always really wonderful in other ways. It's nice to have people who know the system and know what needs to be done and who want to treat your farm just like their own.
The girls absolutely adored Tymen. He was only 19 but seemed a lot older in maturity and attitude. The kids loved to play games with him, and I enjoyed our ping pong competitions. He got along fabulously with all the members of our family. I truly hope that my boys can grow up to have the attitude and outlook that Tymen has. His parents should be proud.
We are blessed that Jacob is now staying just 90 minutes from here and can come visit us now and then. And we are hopeful that Tymen might have another opportunity to come visit us again (or many times in the future!) These individuals truly become like family to us.
This weekend as I left on Saturday to take Abigail to ballet, there were actually five different volunteers hanging out on the farm. Veronica who spends most weekends with us, Jacob (who was back visiting), Tymen, our Turkish wwoofer Duygu, and Annie who lives in Knoxville and often comes to help us on the weekends. It was amazing that all these people like to be at our house.
I've spoken about this previously, but I want to say it again. I am done with worrying about our big world. I will vote and pray and write my congressmen if I think I should, but in the end, I don't feel that that is where I should spend my energy. I can't control the big world. But I can control my small world. I can raise quality humans, and I can invite individuals here to see how one family is doing life together. We can share our home and our faith and our culture and our love for all people and for the Lord. We can recycle. We can take care of our land. We can treat animals with respect. We can raise meat and vegetables the way we think they should be raised.
That is what I am going to spend my energy doing. I don't watch the news anymore. I don't comment on people's opinions about what our president is doing right or wrong. I really don't care. When I need to, I check into a story to educate myself. But I am done with worrying about things that are out of my control. It doesn't bring me joy or peace. Instead I am focusing on my small life here and how I can make a difference here. I know that we've only had about two dozen people here for visits. I know this isn't a tremendous a lot of people. But I think it matters. I think they know they are family now. And that they always have a home in Tennessee. I'm honored to have met them and loved them and broken bread with them.
I digress ... as I often do.
We were so blessed with Tymen. (It's nice to have a guy here when JB is gone to help with big emergencies that require strong people!) I still have Duygu here for another week, and then we'll be taking a short WWOOFer break until January.
Please keep Tymen in your prayers as he travels back. I really think God has great plans for this young man's life!
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