I have had this thought at different junctures in my life, at different times, and I realize I am on the cusp of having another such moment.
Its weird, the World Race. You get all ready and you say good-bye to you friends, your relatives, your best friends, and finally at the airport your family. You give them a big hug and you know you won’t see them for almost a year, and you say good-bye. A tough time no doubt.
Then every month you say good-bye. You say good-bye to new families, new communities who have taken you in. Many who have let you live in their house, these people feed you clothe you, pray with you, love you, and no matter how quality of a relationship you have, at the end of the month you say good-bye. I never realized how taxing so many good-bye’s in one year would be.
I don’t know if people are really meant to say that many good-bye’s. The sad fact is that I will never see 98% of the people I met this year, at least in this life time.
But I am approaching the hardest good-bye of them all. For 11 months 40 people and 80 if you include both squads have been around me no matter what. 5 in particular, and whether I wanted them there or not, there they were. Two of largest constants of the year have been, your team is generally within 15 feet of you and your parents are on the other side of the world.
These things are about to get drastically re-arranged, because I’m heading home. We fly out of Bangkok, exactly 50 hours from when I am writing this. And after all this practice all year, I will get to say one final good-bye to these people I have been traveling with. This is a hard good-bye because I realize that in all likelihood, this could be the last time these 40/80 people are ever all together in one place. The last time we pray together, share a meal together, the last time we are all there to just hang out. There are times this year when I literally would have given you all the money in my bank account (which probably amounts to about 7 bucks) to make this year be over, and now I find myself wanting time to slow down.
Because I am sick of good-bye’s.
They are necessary and they are a reality, but they just stink.
However, I suppose fighting reality never really gets us anywhere. A wise man once said, “Life is simply a series of hellos and good-bye’s.”
So maybe instead of being tired of the good-bye’s I can just be thankful for the hellos. The fact of the matter is I just had the opportunity to travel the world with some incredible people…INCREDIBLE! To my supporters who are reading this, it is one of my deepest regrets that you don’t get to meet these people because they are the reason I made it this year. These are the people I laughed with, cried with, argued with, worshipped with, prayed with, and slept next to. They are great, and they are family.
To those of you reading who were with me, thank you, from the bottom of my heart, thank you. For both teaching me and putting up with me. I am sorry we have to say good-bye, our time seems so short now that its at a close, but I am thankful that I got to say hello. It has been an honor and a privilege to spend this year of my life with you, and I feel confident that I will never forget a single one of you.
