My life has just begun. My life has just begun.
I need to keep reminding myself of that as I sit in solitude and weep, realizing that my World Race is over. I’m here. In America. I’m completely alone (I’m allowed to be alone now!) at my friend’s place in Brooklyn, NY and I can’t believe I’m not with my team or L Squad and I’m not abroad on this crazy adventure anymore. One day I was there, and the next I’m not. With big changes like this, the fleeting moments in life seem even quicker than they should be. Waves of sadness keep hitting me.
I’m revisiting my Google calendar for the first time in who knows how long. Eating my first breakfast alone in forever. Thinking about how weird and sad those goodbyes were at the airport yesterday. Overdosing on everything chocolate, which actually melts and breaks easily now because it’s summer here. Embracing the warmth and freedom to wear shorts and a t-shirt comfortably once again. Taking a hot shower without worrying about the hot water running out on me. Using conditioner for the first time in months. Killing a giant cockroach in the bathroom (haha some things never change… well, at least I can kill them now!) Using fast and free wifi in the luxury of my friend’s house. Being surrounded by her pictures of our college years and mutual friends, all of whom I’d left behind and parted ways with a year ago- first at graduation and then when I left for the Race… wondering just how different a person I truly am now. Predicting and hoping that I’ll ache to be on the mission field again rather than plummet into complacency. Being overwhelmed by all of the people, both friends and strangers, that I want to meet in my short time in NY and NC before I move to Georgia. Not having access to a guitar and not having a room full of Racers to lead in worship.
This is the weirdest feeling ever.
A year ago, I was afraid and somewhat mentally exhausted at the thought of having to explain myself to a group of strangers, not yet family. And now, I sit here after the best, most life-changing year and am thinking the exact opposite. I’m missing my family—who now understands me, the missionary life, everything about the Race—and wondering how to possibly explain my new self and the Race to the people I’d left last year. I wonder how different relationships and conversations will be because I’m a changed person. And no matter how many stories I tell and pictures I show, nothing will capture what this year was for me. Nothing. You have to experience it for yourself, and even then it’s a personally tailored journey designed by God just for you, so my experiences hardly predict what yours will be like.
I can only pray that I walk confidently in the new person I am, even if I still don’t completely know who that person is. I want to keep ATLing (asking the Lord) my way through these next weeks and months. Maybe not having a phone and a home and not being able to settle anywhere until September in Georgia is just another way to rely on the Lord in a more tangible way. This is the new normal for me, and I’m glad He’s keeping me on my toes. More excitement in the unknown and more things to testify about later. I hope you’re expecting more stories, because I certainly am!
But I also want to rest. I want to simply be. Not turn so quickly to planning mode.
I do want to make the most of every moment, seize opportunities to reunite and share about my experiences.
Yet in all this, the Lord says the most important thing is to make the most of my private time with Him.
I feel Jesus saying, Come, come with me. Rest in me, talk to me. Stop planning and filling your schedule. I’ll show you where to go, how to get there, with whom to meet. I’m not fazed by change. I’m still right here, waiting for you. I knew about this moment before you were born. I’m here to help you find your bearings in this once familiar but now strangely foreign place.
