Leaving Atlanta, Final Part

It’s 5 PM. There are seven of us left. Dan, the cop from Denver’s flight got delayed until 9:30. He is lying on the floor listening raptly to one of the women who is sharing her story. When I first met these people only 10 days ago we talked about vain, superficial things like what church we go to and what kind of worship music we like, but now, 10 days later, we are sharing the most painful hidden secrets of our stories. 

Hers is a story marked by divorce, sexual abuse, addiction to marijuana, her mother’s abusive boyfriends, the masks of perfection she wore at school and work (even while high), and a lot of other craziness no child no matter how old should have to deal with. I feel privileged to be here, in this moment, privileged to be invited in to the dark parts of her story. We will grieve the darkness together.

It’s time. Joel packs up his little laptop. I pack up mine. We give our brothers and sisters a final embrace goodbye. We get to security, get through security, get to the subway which takes us to our terminal. Only we are not in the same terminal and on different trains. We hug. “See you in two months.” Goodbye.

I came to Georgia alone. Like a newborn child, I came to this airport alone. Like a child, here I met family. I got to know my family. Together we, grew up. 

But ashes to ashes, so we must leave everything we grow to love. 

~

My plane lands in Denver. It’s 7 PM here, but already 9 PM in Georgia. It is overcast, and on the horizon the sky is blurry with rain. Denver’s high plains are flat and green, but in the distance I can see the giant Rockies, still capped with snow in June. They are grey and blue and white and the clouds open up just next to them, creating a brilliantly bright shot of sunlight. It turns the clouds the color of a Georgia peach. I miss my team.

~

I sleep the whole way from Denver to Santa Barbara. The flight is like a dream, a whole lot of darkness with little bits and pieces of light and memory. I know the man next to me is reading a magazine, and then a book. I don’t catch the title of it. We don’t speak. I sleep.

Then, the plane lands, pulls up to the terminal, stops, and I wake up. I don’t feel anything when we land. I wake up, and I am home.

Home. “How odd,” I think. “Wasn’t I just here only a few days ago?”

Brett pulls up, smiling in his little VW Jetta, as I am getting my pack and helps me put them in the backseat. It is a cold, dark night. It is overcast. He drives me home.

Brett! I wish you could have met them. I wish you could have been there as we were broken (because we were), as we were cracked like eggs with thin shells, and mixed together until our yokes blended with our whites, and we were one mucusy mess. You’re still my family Brett but I wish you could have met my family there. You would have liked them. You would have loved them, too. 

I don’t say this to Brett. There would be no point.

Ashes to ashes, and all of life is leaving it. All of life is leaving it to find it again in something else. “See,” Jesus says to me, “don’t I make all things new?” But what he means is, Don’t I destroy all things to ash? Just when you’re learning to love, don’t I take it away, burn it, and smear it on your forehead in the shape of a cross? 

See! Don’t I raise all things up again! Even from ash!