Right now I’m sitting in the Big Apple at JFK Airport writing to all of you! We’re about to board for Dublin in a few hours, and after that, I don’t exactly know what’s going to happen. The past two days have been absolutely crazy. Between buying and packing all my last minute stuff, to visiting friends for the last time, to spending quality time with my amazing family and celebrating Christmas in August, things have been going ninety miles a minute! In fact, so much has been happening that I really haven’t had time to process ‘goodbye’. Most of my goodbyes were not emotional at all, and the only goodbye I said where I really felt out of control was to my mom at 4:45 am this morning.
“What in the world have I gotten myself into? Do I even know what I’ve signed up for? This seemed all spectacular and earth-shaking at Training Camp, but am I really ready to leave her for a year? An entire year? More than the span of time in which I human life can be created and delivered? Seriously??”
I’m glad my teammate, Ashlee, was with me, because she calmed me down by just being there. As I boarded the plane and took off, I thought, “This is it! The beginning of the year! A YEAR? FOR REAL? A YEAR!! What have I done?”
At the Atlanta airport, we ran into Jodi, from our squad, and Jennifer and Matthew, from K Squad. Seeing them made me so excited! All of a sudden, I was like, “YEEEEAH! Let’s do this! We’re gonna shake the world and turn it inside out for Jesus!” This feeling amplified as we arrived in New York and saw Aubrey, Audrey, Monica, Patch, and Aaron. “THIS IS WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT!! I’ve missed these people, my family, for two months and now we’re reunited and it feels so goooood!!”
Then, as I went to get my pack, I realized my tent was hanging to my pack by a thread. I started freaking out, “I’m too irresponsible to do this trip, I’ll lose everything and never even realize it until I desperately need something. Someone will steal my identity and ruin me forever because I’ll never be able to keep up with my passport!”
Believe me, these emotions have been wrecking me all day long. I’m like a ping pong ball, bouncing back and forth between different freak-out extremes. This is no longer a video on the World Race website, it’s no longer a blog from someone I’ve never met, it’s not just an amazing itinerary, this is REAL, folk!
My journey has begun. I’ve already slept in places today I’ve never slept in (On top of an air conditioning vent and then in a dirty corner outside of the airport) and I plan to be assembling my own tent in Ireland tomorrow and living out of it indefinitely. I’m surrounded by other people I dearly love, and today we’ve already hiked together (JFK is huge) and sweated together and experienced how thirty five people strapped to packs as big as themselves can attract the attention of an entire room!
The fact of it is, whether I’m ready or not, D-Day is here. I can’t imagine what God has in store for each of us, and I’m sure there will be moments when we stop and think, “This all started because I visited a web site… How does something this epic and life-changing and nasty and heartbreaking and beautiful come from visiting a web site?
Keep us in your prayers. We may be grown men and women, but we’re World Race babies! Pray for us, that God reveals Himself miraculously each and every day, that walls are torn down, that relationships are cemented, that lives are transformed. Believe me, you’ll be hearing about this journey every step of the way. I love all of you!
