Dear Georgia,
I wasn’t expecting you. and I definitely wasn’t prepared for you. But wow, did I fall in love with you.
You were probably the furthest thing from my mind when I thought about what my life after high school would look like a year ago. I never thought I’d love living in the south. (Apparently you’re not “the south”, but anything below Kentucky is the south to me.)
And I’ll be honest with you, I wasn’t too happy when I first found out about you. I was disappointed and angry that the plans I made were falling apart, and I didn’t understand at the time what God was doing. But now, I honestly couldn’t be more thankful for you.
You taught me to let go of expectations, to let go of fear, and to let go of insecurity. You taught me endurance and steadfastness, you taught me to roll with punches, and you taught me to trust in God’s plan over my own.
You forced me to live a slow life. To live simply. To notice things more, to not rush, to not fear stillness and quiet. To let go of comforts, and find beauty and joy in so many new things. To spend time in the Lord’s presence, without an agenda. To listen more, and to rest more.
You showed me that God’s love isn’t conditional, no matter how ‘perfect’ of a Christian I think I need to be. You showed me that He wants all of me, the broken, messy parts that I’d rather hide as well as the good parts.
And you showed me that I have a part in His amazing plan. That I have a future, and a purpose. You showed me I had a voice, one that He gave me, one that deserved to be heard. You showed me how to walk in boldness. You showed me how to be a friend, a neighbor, and a leader. And you showed me that His love always, always makes a way.
But the best part about you might be the people I got to share you with. The people who stopped at nothing to build others up. The ones I shared countless church services, laundry days, movie nights, and spicy uno games with. The ones I grew alongside and got to see God working in. The ones that became my family, and showed me what it means to love out of a place of being loved.
I probably will never get your orange clay out of my white shoes. And I’ll probably never get rid of the scar on my leg from falling down your hills my first day here. And hopefully, I’ll never lose the memories I made and the lessons I learned here.
I’m so sorry we had to leave so abruptly, but please just know that you’ve changed my life. I might be accidentally calling you “home” for a while. And I know I’m going to take a little bit of you wherever I go next.
Until next time,
Love,
Kenzie.
