Kim Wilbanks

My “Twosday”

I had my blog post ready to go last week. It was a light-hearted piece about the significance of Tuesday, February 22, 2022 for me and my husband. You probably saw many memes about “Twosday” on social media.

I was going to share how we would always remember Chapter Two in our marriage because the beginning came on Tuesday, 2/22/22. That was the day we closed on a condominium in our beloved mountains of North Carolina, something we have dreamed of for many years. If you know me or you have been reading this blog you may remember that our family sold our cabin in the mountains last summer. You can read about it here.

I was going to share about the “one day” dream we had talked about since the early days of our marriage and how we would always remember the day it was realized because of the unique date. 

But then Thursday came.

Somehow, sharing news about a vacation home didn’t seem so relevant while half-way around the world Russia was invading its neighbor, Ukraine. 

When compared to world events, it truly isn’t that important. But it’s part of our story. We are so incredibly grateful to have a place in the mountains where we can pull away from the busyness and chaos of the world and fellowship with friends and family and we look forward to the times we will be able to spend there, if the Lord wills (James 4:15). An added treat was that we were able to meet our new next door neighbors and they seem very nice. Perhaps a life-long friendship will form.

But back to the Russia/ Ukraine situation.

When History Repeats Itself

You may not know this about me, I don’t think I’ve mentioned it on my blog, but I’m writing a book. I’m writing my friend’s story for her. It’s a story of her family’s escape from Poland as the Russian army approached the border in January of 1945. Sounds eerily familiar to current world news, doesn’t it? 

A couple of weeks ago, I was working on the part of the story where her mother had thirty minutes to gather everything important and get on the last train out of Lodz before the Russians arrived. Her father and teen-aged brother had already been conscripted into the German army so they were on their own. As I imagined what it must have been like for Mary, her one year-old brother and her mother, I wept. The enormity of what they went through struck hard.

Then Thursday happened. I couldn’t help but think about all of the mama’s trying to get their babies to safety. We’ve all seen pictures of the miles long traffic jams and crowded trains. We’ve seen pictures of women, children, elderly people and even pets huddled in subway stations to escape the bombing. We’ve heard how men between the ages of eighteen and sixty are not allowed to leave the country because they are needed to fight. The fear is almost palpable, the helplessness too.

The events of my friend’s story and the events of this week are nearly eighty years apart. I keep asking myself “how can this be happening again?” Like much of the world, I am praying for a miraculous end to the conflict. Most of all, I pray for all the mama’s like Mary’s mom and children like Mary who are leaving everything behind, beginning the life of a refugee. May God have mercy on them.