drum roll please... :)

Hola, hola! So here it is, the grand return. HA! So...I wrote this a few weeks back but am just getting around to posting it. I will post an update on how thing are currently in the next couple of days. Until then...enjoy friends.

First off, for those of you who the news has escaped…I am now here in San Salvador, El Salvador. To say the least it was hard and yet another emotional transition to leave Nebaj and also to leave Guatemala. However, now that I’ve moved and said the actual goodbyes things have gotten a lot “easier.” I’m not good at goodbyes; they make me really sad. I often wish that I could just take the people with me that I am leaving behind, or that I can go with those who are leaving. My most recent goodbye was to my new co-worker Rosemary. Although we had only worked together for two weeks, she left a great impression on me. For her despedida (goodbye party), I wanted to share a quote or reading about transitions. This is what I came across and it’s quite fitting considering Donald Miller is one of my favorite authors:

"And so my prayer is that your story will have involved some leaving and some coming home, some summer and some winter, some roses blooming out like children in a play. My hope is your story will be about changing, about getting something beautiful born inside of you, about learning to love a woman or a man, about learning to love a child, about moving yourself around water, around mountains, around friends, about learning to love others more than we love ourselves, about learning oneness as a way of understanding God. We get one story, you and I, and one story alone. God has established the elements, the setting and the climax and the resolution. It would be a crime not to venture out, wouldn't it?

It might be time for you to go. It might be time to change, to shine out.

I want to repeat one... word for you:
Leave.

Roll the word around on your tongue for a bit. It is a beautiful word, isn't it? So strong and forceful, the way you have always wanted to be. And you will not be alone. You have never been alone. Don't worry. Everything will still be here when you get back. It is you who will have changed."
— Donald Miller (Through Painted Deserts: Light, God, and Beauty on the Open Road)


How beautiful. While intended to be a comfort for Rosemary, I also found solace in Donald’s words. For the last five years my life has been full of leavings and some comings home. As I have become more acquainted with my true self and dream about the life ahead of me, I can’t imagine this pattern changing much. Sometimes I wonder if my desire to trot the world is actually me running away from something. Getting absorbed in this line of thinking can be quite discouraging, trust me. But, I have to say, there have been too many good experiences, people to love, tears to shed, lessons to learn and too much beauty to see for me to believe that where I’ve been has been an escape rather than a trust-fall into the present. I don’t know where I’ll end up, what I will be doing, or who I’ll be with, but I trust that every step of the way is preparing me for what is to come. Always remember: only one life to live. Take good care…until we say hello again.