Homesick in Boston
Dear Mosaic Family,
Yesterday, I heard a nice lady ask a room full of New Englanders: “how long do you have to live here until you’re a New Englander?” She had just moved to Maine with her husband and two children from Minnesota.
How long do you have to live in Boston, till you're an official Bostonian? 3 years? 5? 7? More? How long till the homesickness goes away?
Is it a matter of learning to love Dunkin Donuts? Is it a question of memorizing the names of the players on the Pats and Sox? Is it a matter of learning to strategically drop a few r’s and leave them where they don’t belong (“sorry officah, had no idear I couldn’t pahk heah”)?
As a resident of Boston/Brookline for 12 years (and if you’re about to make the case that Brookline isn’t Boston, you might be a Bostonian... but it’s on the wretched Green Line, so what’s more Bostonian than that?), I feel like I’m well-equipped to be the gatekeeper, handing out keys to the city like they’re admission to Harvard.
Here’s my super simple criteria for becoming a New Englander: is this home? When most people move to Boston, especially if they move here in late summer/early fall, they enter the honey moon period. There’s so much to do, so much to see, so many people to meet. Once you’ve done most of the things, been to most of the places, met enough people, things begin to change, rapidly. Suddenly, you start waking up to 40-degree weather and utter darkness. Then it starts getting dark before 6pm. Then you realize, the people you’ve met are just as busy as you are, if not busier. Community doesn’t find you like it did back home. Speaking of home... oh man, I really miss home, and Thanksgiving weekend is still a month away.
Then you get home. This is where you really find out if Boston is home. Do you want to stay home? Has the home-sickness dissipated? Once you’re a Bostonian, the trippiest thing happens when you get home. You begin to miss Boston; you begin to miss...uh...home? Welcome to the team, you are officially a New Englander.
Home is where the heart is. Why is the heart there? Because you love being there. Because your loved ones are there. Your beloved is there. Join us tomorrow as we look at 2 Corinthians 5:1-10, where Holy Scripture teaches us to cultivate home-sickness for Heaven.
Praying for you!
Pastor Jan
This Week's Announcements
Baptism Seminar
This Sunday, October 3rd, 1:00 pm
Want to be baptized? The first step toward baptism at Mosaic is to attend our baptism class. For more information or to sign up, visit Brookline.MosaicBoston.com/Baptism.
Worship Night
Saturday, October 9th, 4:00 pm
Join us in celebration of Mosaic Boston's 10th birthday for a night of thanksgiving to God for his faithfulness. A time of food and fellowship will follow the service. Please RSVP here.
Quarterly Members' Meeting
Sunday, October 17th at 3:00 pm
If you are a covenant member of Mosaic or have been notified that you are being voted into membership, please join us for our next quarterly meeting!
Songs for Sunday
If you would like to know what we'll be singing on Sunday, you can find the playlist here.