What apples can teach us about the seasons of reentry. And a note of Farewell.

My transition back from living overseas landed me in an apple orchard. At the time, I found it to be a necessary evil. Returning to the family business for a job that would pay the bills. I assumed that season would be brief, but 12+ years later I still work there and actually like my job {that is a whole other story for a different time.} Looking back I wonder if the apple trees haven’t been teaching me more about reentry then I realized.

When you work at an orchard, you sign up to have your life dictated by the seasons. You spend 10 months preparing for the six weeks in the fall that will pay the bills and hopefully leave you with enough to get you through to the next year. One of the most common questions I get in the off season is “so what do you actually do this time of year?”

So even if fall harvest is the Instagram worthy moment when we visit the orchards of the world, the reality is you gotta have all four seasons to grow an apple tree. Including winter. One of the things I find interesting about fruit trees is after the apples are picked and the leaves fall off the tree, the tree must go through a period known to apple growing nerds like my brother as “chill hour.” {yes, there’s a whole other apple grower nerd language}. The tree has to experience at least 600 hours typically of temps below 45 degrees. {this is my simplified definition the science is a bit more complicated…but for our purposes this is the general idea}. To quote one fruit tree nursery website, “If a fruit tree is grown where winter cold is insufficient to satisfy the variety’s chilling requirement, blooming and foliation will be delayed and erratic; fruit set and fruit quality will be poor. Conversely, if a tree is grown where winter cold satisfies its chilling requirement too soon, the end of dormancy and loss of hardiness caused by a warm spell could lead to late-winter freeze damage to the tree and/or a too-early bloom.” {Dave Wilson Nursery Website}. In short: if you don’t have the right amount of winter….you won’t have apples…and your apple trees may not live for long.

As someone who hates driving in winter, I don’t like this. I would prefer two weeks of cold around Christmas, and the rest of the year be a mix of spring or fall. But if that were the case I would be out of a job. And we would not have many apples because the trees need not a little bit of winter….but a whole lot…to be able to produce more apples.

This is one of those lessons that is so simple that I almost miss it. God has designed things in life with the need to have a season of winter in order to thrive. And even though it’s a question I don’t want to ask because I might not like the answer, I wonder if you and I were designed to need a season of winter in our lives in order to thrive too?

As I look back over this 12+ year process of re-entry for me, I can see that there have indeed been seasons. I don’t think I was always aware of what season I was in at the time, but looking back there is clarity to see some of the seasons I experienced:

Seasons of Pain & Wrestling

I remember in years 1, 2, 3, and even 5 having strong feelings of will life ever feel “normal” again? Longings for freedom from the constant internal turmoil. Days I just wanted to wake up and embrace my new life without feeling like my overseas experiences were still influencing my current reality. Seasons of wrestling with doubt. Periods of grief and tears and mourning the loss of so much. Days of longing for friendship. Seasons of depression. Hoping someday to be able to travel internationally without feeling triggered. The reality is there have been some hard seasons in these 12 years. Winter seasons where I wondered: “will the hard part of re-entry ever end?”

Seasons it Felt Like Nothing Was Happening

There were also a lot of days where it felt like nothing was happening. Days and weeks and years where I got up, went to work at a job I wasn’t sure I was meant to be doing forever, and it felt like nothing much ever changed. Seasons that felt a bit like those chill hours for apple trees in winter…where maybe something is happening deep inside, but it’s so deep I’m not even aware of it, all I can see is another day of cold, cloudy skies, and monotony.

Seasons of Small Celebrations

There have also been small celebrations. In the beginning these were the littlest things. Not always having to think about whether I should flush the toilet paper. Figuring out how to operate a dishwasher again. Days I wasn’t so exhausted that I had enough energy to have coffee with a friend. The time I could finally sit through a church service without feeling triggered and wanting to run for the nearest exit. Days when I found myself actually enjoying my “new normal.” Aha moments in which something would finally make sense five or six years after it had happened on the field. Moments when I felt like my faith was beginning to find hope again. Realizing I was beginning to build new friendships. These moments of celebration were often small, sometimes so subtle I missed them. They were not huge jumps forward, but rather they felt like three days forward, ten days back. But slowly over time as I look back, I can see all of the little celebrations adding up to a beautiful picture of growth, self discovery, healing, rebuilding my identity, adjusting and finally embracing a new normal. It’s amazing how much growth can happen even while we feel like we are still very much in the middle of the muddled.

Seasons of Giving & Grace

Most recently there have also been seasons of giving and grace. This blog has been the biggest part of that. When I started writing these posts, it was because I just kept running into people who seemed to be struggling and alone in reentry, and I found myself saying someone should write about this. Someone should normalize what these people are experiencing. And eventually, I said, OK I guess I’ll start writing.

What I realized maybe a year into blogging was that the process of writing had become the next season of the reentry journey for me. It provided a place for doing some final processing of some of my experiences, and a space to begin to see that sharing our story can sometimes provide some hope to others.

And so there was a season where I saw some redemption for my reentry story. I saw my years of wandering in the winter provide some hope for others who were finding themselves in that season as well. I don’t think it’s by accident that that season didn’t come until maybe 10 years after I landed back in the USA.

Seasons are by Design

In reflecting on apple trees and 12 years of reentry, I feel I can safely say that seasons are by design. I also think that seasons are necessary. As much as the pain of the seasons of winter and spring are incredibly hard and I would not wish them on anyone, I really do feel after living it and walking with others through reentry that winter is a necessary part of the journey. We cannot get to the seasons of celebration and giving until we have set for a good long while in the winter: the winter of pain, grief, and longing, and the winter when it seems like nothing much is happening.

Recently I heard Suzanne Stabile say about Enneagram 3s {of which I am one}, that 3’s will never experience significant growth in their spiritual life until they experience failure. {or something to that effect}. And in that moment I looked back at the last 12 years and said, “Thank you God for failure and winter because for me that has really been true.” {If this Enneagram language makes no sense to you, I would highly recommend the book A Road Back to You. I have found it very helpful.}

We live in a world that does not embrace seasons well. Just this week at work {in the Midwest we still have freezing temps at night and snow last week} I had an email from some wanting to know if they could come and pick apples this weekend {there are still no leaves on the apple trees…so definitely no apples}. And although we laugh a bit in the office and try to think of a nice way to write back and so no, I’m sorry you have the wrong season for apple picking, the reality is we so often do this with the seasons of our lives. In our modern world we are used to getting apples in the grocery store all year long, and we have lost the opportunity to give our-self permission to live through different seasons.

I realize how often in the winter of my re-entry I just wanted to be in any other season. I was not very good at giving myself grace to just remain in winter for a while.

So this post friends is me giving you permission to acknowledge that in the midst of re-entry you may very well be living in winter. This is permission to give yourself grace to live in that season. Living well in winter is not living in denial or trying to numb our pain rather it is letting ourselves continue to ask the hard questions, continue to wrestle, continue to process, continue to grieve, continue to just keep getting up and doing life again the next day. Sometimes it means intentional times of silence and solitude as these can help us to notice what can be going on below the surface. Sometimes it means seeking some professional help and wisdom. Sometimes it means just being faithful even when we feel nothing much is changing. Sometimes it means being kind to ourselves and saying…today…I only have the capacity for self care. Sometimes it means choosing to not make major decisions while we are in a season of winter. Sometimes it means say it is OK to just be cared for rather then care for others during this time.

Often I hear: “How long does reentry last?” Honestly it really really depends. For some it is months for others it is decades. But maybe a fast reentry is not necessarily the best reentry. I know that sometimes that is our hope…what we are really asking when we say, “how long does this last” is “when can I get out of winter and move on to a new season.” I am beginning to wonder if maybe the fastest way through reentry is not necessarily the best way. Maybe a reentry with a longer season of winter is ultimately one that will be for your best. Please know I am not say that we should not pursue reintegration into our home cultures or healing or new friendships or a new sense of normal. All of those things are very healthy. But I do hope we will sit back just for a minute and ask if maybe we can relax into the season of winter just a little bit and trust that maybe even if we can’t see it happening there is work happening deep below the surface…and the more that we can create space for that work to happen and pursue growth in the midst of the winter season the more we will appreciate this season later.

I hope friends that you would find this hopeful. I really do believe that great things come out of the seasons of winter. As incredible hard and challenging as they can be it is those seasons where the deepest work of our lives happens and where we eventually reflect with a fondness not because of the pain but because we can see that hope was born out of trial. And where we eventually get to experience the beauty of fall again and another harvest.

And now a new season for me…

You may or may not have noticed that I have not written much for a while. Almost two years ago due to a sudden death in our family I found myself launched into a new season of leadership and responsibility at my job….and into a new season of winter. It was not something I was looking for. Just before it happened I felt like I had finally come to what I would describe as a “really good place” in my journey. But, in the Father’s wisdom he saw fit to launch us into a new season of grief and growth and pain. Now two years into that season, I am beginning to see signs of spring, and along with those signs I am beginning to make decisions about what this next season of my life will hold.

The reentry journey for me now feels like a part of my past {a sort of beautifully hard part} that will always be a part of me, but is no longer a part of my day to day. And I have come to a place of realizing that at least for now my season of writing this blog is coming to a close. I don’t feel I am at a place where I am dealing with issues of reentry on a regular enough basis to be able to write well about them. I am so thankful for this season of journeying with you through reentry, but as I look around today I see many others writing on this topic and so many more resources then there were when we began Rocky Reentry. And sometimes in order to embrace new seasons, we must leave behind things in order to make room for new…even if we don’t know yet what the new will be.

So on this official first day of spring, I am writing this – my last official post on the Rocky Reentry blog. I plan to leave the articles archived for those who would will find them helpful. I also realized there are several almost finished articles in my drafts folder that others might find helpful so I will go ahead and post those over the next few days. {Interestingly enough I am noticing that many of the unfinished ones were written in seasons of winter for me…where I had words to express the frustration but was having trouble finding words of hope or wisdom to end the article…so some I may publish just as they are…because sometimes in the midst of winter we can’t see the other side…and that is OK too.}

As this is my last article for Rocky Reentry, I want to take this chances to say thank you so much for faithfully reading and being a part of this journey. It has been life giving and healing to be able to journey with you.

Blessings friends in whatever season of life you find yourself!