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TITLE: Escape (i) | Previous Challenge Entry
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01/04/06
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Escape was the driving force that dipped deep into the family savings and rented a cottage at Maumee Bay State Park that first week of June. Months of stress and uncertainty needed release, and all I wonted to do was get away. The need had grown from desire to necessity and God provided the way.

Maumee Bay State Park is in northern Ohio just outside of Toledo. From our home in Cincinnati it was a four hour drive that we stretched into six, taking scenic routes through back roads. Our family doesn’t take many big vacations. This was a real treat our daughters Barbara and Jessica had been looking forward to for weeks.

The first evening I stood on the edge of Lake Erie and felt the calming waves drawing the stress from my aching, warn out soul. Our younger daughter spent six days that past November in the hospital having dozens of seizures a day. She’d had Epilepsy for the past 10 years, but nothing like this. Jessica was twelve and her early journey into womanhood sent her seizures out of control – taking months to gradually calm. The family was physically weary and spiritually drained.

We rented a cottage three quarters of a mile from the lodge. It was beautiful. The kitchen was a narrow hallway. Two bedrooms and a bath were built on one side and a combination dinning room/family room on the other. The loft overhead had a small bedroom just perfect for our two girls. There was a screened in balcony off the dinning area for outdoor eating and a large open porch across the back. The family room had a TV with cable and a gas fireplace that became very handy on two stormy days.

Even those stormy days were full of renewal as we escaped the business of our lives and spent hours working puzzles and giving each other outlandish hairdos while watching old movies in front of the fireplace. We curled up with books and watched animals peak out from the woods through large windows that encircled every room.

One morning I went walking and scared the family. Leaving the cabin after breakfast with binoculars I forgot my watch and the time. There were evenings running along the beach and cookouts. Some meals we walked up to the lodge and ate in a beautiful dinning room overlooking the lake. God’s handiwork was everywhere and my weary soul drank it in like a man who has just found his way out of the desert.

Two days we took short road trips.

The first was to meet a boat my husband rented for the day. Tom loves to fish, but since he is blind and I have no knowledge of such things he doesn’t get the chance very often. The skipper and captain treated us like royalty. We brought home quite a catch and a thirty inch walleye now mounted over the piano.

The second was a tour of Marblehead Lighthouse. I’ll never forget the feeling of standing near the top of the lighthouse looking across Lake Erie or climbing along the rocky shore below. “The name of the Lord is a strong tower. The righteous run to it and are safe.” -Proverbs 18:10 (NKJV)

Most of the time, it’s in the private chamber of our prayer closet and through the study of God’s Word that we are renewed. That first week in June God knew I needed things I could grasp with my physical senses. I needed to hear and see and feel my Heavenly Father’s love and care through the mighty wonders of His creation. That week I needed to escape.

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