Today was an amazing day.
Nothing unusual or out of the ordinary happened, it actually started kind of frantically with me waking up at about 15 until 8, when I need to be at work by 8. Man did I scamble- no shower, but I guess I need to get use to that right:)
I love my job. I love my boss. I work at a soup cart called Savor Soup House in downtown portland, and it is so much fun. www.savorsouphouse.com. I get to learn how to make incredible food, with not too fancy schmancy of recipes so I can make it all at home again, and again, and I get to wear what I want ( basically), and meet the coolest people! People come from all around the world to visit Portland, way more than you would think, and they are enamored by the food carts. We are cart town. SO anyways, it just hit me today that i have everything I wanted several months ago. I wanted to work full-time with nancy at savor, Monday through friday, 8-5, walk to work, living with my sis downtown, start getting involved in a great church, make some amazing girlfriends… the list could go on. All the things that i was praying for have come to fruition, and now I am preparing to leave. Isn’t it funny how things work out.
I also realized today that there is a real sadness in my leaving Portland. It’s not the same as when i left Raleigh. Similar, because then i was leaving for our big road trip adventure, and now I am living for a huge around the world God in your face type of adventure, but there is a real sadness I can’t describe. I am soo excited to be a part of the World Race and how life transforming it will be, but I am sad to be leaving as well, because Portland has become my city. My home. A friend said today that what i was going to do was bigger than Portland, and that Portland would still be here waiting for me, counting on the rapture and the world ending doesn’t occur in the next year. Who knows? But I don’t know if i agree. Yes the world as a whole is bigger than Portland as a city and the things I will experience will be far different than what I will experience or be exposed to here, but Portland is just people just like everywhere else in the world. Portland has needs, Portland has poor, sick and widowed- Portland needs Christ- there are so many people here searching for something and they are wandering and wondering clueless as to what it is.
I cannot wait to see what this year unfolds to. I cannot wait to see where I will be next year. I don’t know If God is going to call me to stay in a specific country, or if I will be lead back here to Portland for a time. But there is just something inside me that knows I’ll be back here, at least for a season. Portland and I just clicked, from the first time we came to visit we had chemistry. I think Portland and I have a long relationship to come, and it could just be city changing:) As much as I hope my friends and family will be in prayer for me as I am gone, I will be in prayer for them, for you all- prayer that I will be coming back to a place so changed by the power of prayer and people caring. I have to go to bed now the sun has set – tomorrow is friday and I get to make Babushka’s Borscht! It is going to Rock- Shalom
