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Last December, when an invitation to speak at the 2010 International Mothers of Preschoolers (MOPS) Convention arrived, I was pretty pumped. With about four or five thousand young moms attending the August 5 – 8 event, the convention would be a great place to hawk A Different Dream for My Child and connect with parents raising kids with special needs.

When two BFFs agreed to road trip with me to Nashville, stay at the Grand Old Opry Hotel, and help sell books, I was even more pumped – at least until last spring when Nashville was smacked with a devastating flood. Life changed dramatically for people along the flooding river. I can’t imagine what horrors they endured and are still enduring. But I do know the effects of the flood flowed far beyond the Tennessee shoreline. One small ripple made it all the way to Iowa and left me with a MOPS mess to tidy up.

The convention planners moved the event from Tennessee to a conference center in Kissammee, Florida, just south of Orlando. My BFFs said it was too far for them to travel. My daughter can’t come because her new in-laws are hosting a reception for the newlyweds that weekend. My new daughter can’t come because she just started a new job and doesn’t have any vacation time. My husband can’t come because he’s used all his vacation time on weddings, Family Camps, and man-of-steel hikes in the wilderness with other men of steel.

So I’m going to Florida…alone.
I’ll be minutes away from the happiest place on earth…alone.
I’ll be counting out change and signing books…alone.

In the grand scheme of things, it’s a tiny disappointment. It’s a teeny-tiny mess compared to the flood in Nashville. It’s still a great opportunity, and I’m eager to learn why God is sending me there all by myself. What will happen on the way? Who will I meet? What opportunity awaits? When I think like that, my MOPS mess looks tidier by the minute.

But what about the people in Nashville?