Visiting

It’s a lost art, for “paying a visit” is seldom practiced anymore. Yet last night a couple phoned and asked if we’d be home for a while. They wanted to bring over some homemade soup. Bill and I washed the supper dishes, brushed our teeth, and soon welcomed our friends.

We had a nice visit in the living room. The conversation started with a comment about our couch made by a friend in Kentucky. From that opening, we talked a bit about Bill’s piano teacher, how she was a part of the Coker family. She ate Sunday dinner with them most every week, and when she moved into a nursing home, she gave the Cokers several items of her furniture, some of which we now possess. Then our talk went back and forth, sharing family memories.

Now we did not schedule this visit nor did we plan ahead what we’d talk about. In fact, when I hung up the phone I gave some thought to questioning why our friends were coming. Yes, the soup was a nice gesture, but did they have something on their minds that was important to tell us. I don’t think so. It was an unplanned visit, something we rarely do these days.

I thought back to our former neighbors and how we would pop in unannounced. Bill did not knock, but would walk through their unlocked back door and holler out, “Hello, the house.” The lady of the house would appear in the kitchen and ask us to sit and have some coffee. We paid frequent visits and always felt welcomed, assuming that we had not interrupted anything important. For meals we would plan the day and time, usually after the men had a good catch of fish from the ponds.

Back during our pastorate days in Mississippi, these home visits were often labeled as “pastoral calls” on the quarterly report, but we did not plan them as such. We only wanted to share our lives together. And when we have returned to those circuits we have always been welcomed anytime and for any length of time. I miss those casual visits with country folk, for our lives felt comfortable, honest and safe.

Now we visit even our family members via the tech world – cell phones, texting, emails, Facebook and other social media sites. It’s good to stay connected anyway we can, but those home visits, casual and unimportant as they seemed at the time, make me homesick in a good way. Call (or not) and come visit. You are welcome (most) any time.