God Loves Weird People...Like Me.

I’m the kind of guy that likes to watch people.

Not in a creepy stalker way, but I find myself amazed at how many people roam this earth and how each of us are uniquely different. Each of us are…well…weird.

There is no place better to find “weird people” than at an airport.

This morning Michelle and I woke up at 4:00am in Chicago and frantically rushed to the airport to board a plane destined for Texas. Our desire behind this trip is to relax, reconnect and have fun. Life has a way of getting busy and becoming overwhelming and I think it’s a good practice to get out of your routine at times (this is hard for me because I love routine) and rest.

Getting to the airport is anything but rest for me, but once we get checked in and through security and seated on the plane my mind finally allows me to rest.

While resting I in my seat next to Michelle, I began to do some human watching. With everyone that passes by my seat I’m trying to guess what they do for a living, where they are going and what their life story is. As an introvert it’s likely I’ll never ask them, but a full conversation goes on in my head.

This is my first time on a plane since Covid turned the world upside down so I was annoyed by wearing a mask, but thankful that I had no one sitting next to me except Michelle…at least that is what I thought. Just before the stewardess began giving us the instructions reminding us that there is a chance that the plane could crash and in that case our cushions are flotation devices (insert eye roll), a skinny man, probably in his sixties, sat down right next to me.

I turned to Michelle and said, “So much for social distancing,” not that I worry about it, I just wanted the leg space and my introvert bubble space. As those words came out of my mouth I turned back only to find the man drop his mask and sneeze. Now if you read my post from the beginning of Covid you know I’m not a germaphobe. I actually refer to myself as a germaphobe bully, but immediately I shot a look back at Michelle as if he had just pulled a gun on me.

About that time a nicely dressed foreign couple came rushing in to the seat in front of us with a loud active toddler and struggled to put a carseat into the seat and get the child bucked. The mom sprayed and wiped everything down with Lysol wipes and fastened her own seatbelt just before takeoff.

The “human watcher” in me was locked in by this point and I was in a zone. I watched the couple in front flop around the whole flight and listened to the guy next to me cuss at their every movement as he watched his movie on his laptop with his headphones on.

After the flight and the long encounter renting a car we were off. No set in stone plans just relax and decide as we go.

Chip and Joanna Gaines live near Waco, Texas and have some shops in town and of course had a television series on HGTV. I don’t know a lot about them, but I have watched some of their shows and have been impressed by their work and what I know of their character.

We decided to check out their shops and then I had a spontaneous idea. Let’s find where they actually live. A quick google search and I had their address and we were off. I also noticed they had books in their shop and sure enough they were on Scribd and the audio version, so I downloaded it turned it on and we headed to find their house.

The discovery of their house was anti-climatic because only part could be seen from the road, but listening to their life story was fascinating. Two people totally opposite, learning as they went accomplishing so much, and from what I know, accomplishing it with integrity.

After a quick pizza dinner and of course a Dollar General pit stop for last minute supplies ( I can’t avoid that place even on vacation) I’m sitting in this rental cabin thinking on the day and my conclusion is…we as humans are weird!

It doesn’t matter if you are famous like Chip and Joanna, an irritable plane traveler, or late Lysol spraying mom, we all have our weird quirks.

Even with all of our weirdness one thing is true and it has been on my mind all day as I watch people…God loves us. Over 7 billion people on this earth uniquely created by God and abundantly loved by God.

One of those weird people God loves is me!

Well tomorrow our adventure continues and I’m sure I will run in to more weird people and do some more weird things myself.

One thing I want to be thankful for tonight, is that God loves weird, broken people. He loved us enough to give His Son Jesus to die for us, making a way for us to have a relationship with Him now on this earth, and home in heaven for all of eternity one day. What a day that will be!