Merry Christmas 2022 – What a year!

2022 took a little unexpected detour. It’s been a hard adjustment but I’m so grateful that we are where we are. The past 2 Sundays of Advent the candles representing Hope and Peace have been lit during the service at a beautiful little 120 year old church that we have started attending…and I know as the Advent season continues we will be reminded of the Joy of this season as well. Drew and I currently live a much simpler life than we did a year ago. We live in a little town in Wyoming on the edge of the Sierra Madre Mountain Range. Our home is a 600 square foot remodeled mobile home that we have affectionately named The Love Shack. It’s a sweet, quiet season that I never saw coming.

January 2022 started the year out with Drew and I traveling to be with our Gap i squad in Guatemala.  Our base was in a beautiful secluded setting near a volcano.  The trip was full of some wonderful one-on-ones with the racers, times of teaching and worship – our racers had grown so much!  We took a day trip up a volcano on horses and roasted marshmallows over the hot lava.  It was our first time in Guatemala and it was amazing.

February flew by with me working like crazy making up for lost time at MPHA.  Drew was working at Astonia for the winter.  March found us flying back to Guatemala to join Gap i for another debrief – this time we were at the AIM base near Antigua and Lake Atitlan.  It felt a little rushed with our time connecting with our squad but we did cram a lot into a short amount of time.  Worshiping together with these young adults in an empty pool under some amazing stars was a highlight of our time.  Our adventure day was spent ziplining through a nature reserve at heart stopping heights.  We also spent St. Patrick’s Day at Hobbitenango with some of the racers – what a day.

Once we returned to our “normal” life we got an invitation to consider joining my step-brother and his wife in moving to Wyoming.  It’s been a dream of theirs for years.  We joined them in April to scout out the area that they would be building on and see if we should join them on their adventure.  We weighed the pros and cons and in the end decided that if we didn’t try it we would always wonder what we had missed out on.  Right now our kids are all over so why not join them.  Ellie has signed another year contract to teach High School English in Qingdao, China.  Kyle is a leasing agent in Seattle and his band “Convent Bonfires” has quite a following.  Chris and Lindsey are settled in their home in Big Lake, MN.  Levi and Liv are still newlyweds and will be moving into our house in Minnesota in January.

April to June was spent preparing for a move but also just living our life.  We hosted our friends from Kingdom Interruptions,we flew to Texas for a wedding of a previous squad leader,  we flew to Georgia for final debrief with Gap i, we hosted small groups with young adults, we sat in our hot tub and worked.  I was waiting to hear from my job to see if I could continue working remotely  from Wyoming (the answer finally came and it was a “NO”)

The first weekend of June we joined our friends on our annual “Camping With the Krussows” at Jay Cooke State Park – although we cheated and got a hotel room.  It was good weather and good company.   On our way home we stopped to see my Dad and Step-Mom and could see that my Dad was much weaker than the last time we had seen him.  A few days later Dad had to be taken by ambulance to the emergency room.  All day long they ran tests as we waited for a hospital bed.  The tests showed that he was in the end stages of cancer.  He received wonderful care at the Methodist Oncology Wing and less than 2 weeks later he had passed away.  I spent a lot of time with Maggie and was so encouraged by her faith – she is an amazing woman.  My Dad would have been 90 years old on the 4th of July (missed it by just a couple of weeks).  

Our plans to move to Wyoming got pushed back some as there were things to get done in MN.  It all seems like a blur at this point.  On August 5th, Drew and I both worked our last day at our jobs.  I remember riding together to my work going away party that night, freaking out a little that we were both unemployed!  My Dad was buried at Fort Snelling National Cemetery on August 9th.  That same day we got a phone call that a 19 year old racer from our squad had died in a motorcycle accident in Georgia.  Our hearts were broken as this young man had such a zeal for life and a love for Jesus.  My heart hurts for his parents and Gap i as we all walk through this grief.  Even so, our hearts have joy as we picture him in the throne room of Christ worshiping his savior. 

With little time to process the grief of lives cut short and just the loss of all that we were walking away from, we crammed in some last minute farewell parties and prepared to leave.  I took a job as a cook in the local school so that I could meet people – which meant I had to leave earlier than Drew for the start of the school year.  Adjusting to small town living has been harder than I anticipated but I feel like I’ve turned a corner.  We’ve met some wonderful friends who have been so inviting and kind to us.  I play Mahjong with some older women at the local library – they call me the young one.  I’ve met a few young people but they are few and far between.  I miss the energy of being around young adults but I’m embracing this season of having my eyes open to all that is right here.  My drive to work is breathtakingly beautiful, I daily pass by deer, antelope and sometimes elk.  Drew and I have so much time together and we both are enjoying how simple life is.  Drew drives up the mountain to work each day and loves all the snow.  We are a 3 hour drive from the Denver airport, an hour from the nearest Walmart or hospital, 3 hours from the nearest Trader Joe’s (we have become those people that stock up with hundreds of dollars of groceries), the road to the west of us  closes from November to May, our town has about 500 people, our church has about 20.  We were able to join some dear friends in Colorado for Thanksgiving so that was so sweet.  I don’t miss traffic, but I do miss my friends and family.  My eyes leak sometimes when I get my eyes off Jesus – He really is my source of Hope, Peace and Joy.  I often find myself asking Him – “What are You doing?”  I know our story isn’t over and that gets me excited as I trust the One who is writing it.  Look us up if you’re ever in the area – we would love to show you around.

May you be blessed in this season,

Much love,

Marie and Drew Petersen

310 McCaffrey Ave.

Encampment, WY 82325