Goodbyes

I started this blog to show my journey and a huge part of the journey that I would like to completely cut out and ignore is the part of the actual goodbye.  I had fooled myself into thinking that saying goodbye wasn't going to be that hard, I was the one going on the adventure, I am the one thats supposed to have excitement to temper the sadness….but its not working out that way at all.  

Lets be honest, I have a lot of friends, but I don't have a ton of friends that I let into my life enough for it to be hard for me to say goodbye to them.  But there are a handful of them and those select few have been incredible friends that I cannot begin to describe how much I am going to miss.  The only thing that makes it easier is that they are all starting a new chapter of their lives as they are getting married and starting sweet little families.

I went out to dinner with one of my most precious friends, Lisa, last week and she got teary when she talked about how this was probably our last dinner together for a long time and I was totally emotionless until halfway through dinner she was talking about some things going on in her and all of the sudden, it hit me, this was it.  Our dinners had become less frequent, but she is one of my few friends that I completely unload on her and she unloads on me, we share advice and I truly, deeply value her advice.  I couldn't say goodbye.  I don't know how to say goodbye to her.  I don't want to say goodbye to her.  But I have atleast put that goodbye off until Sunday night, we found one more small opening right before I leave…but watch out water works…we have been through a lot and I value her friendship so much.

Then theres my family, tonight as I wrapping my nieces birthday presents, I finally thought about saying goodbye to my family.  We have so much change coming up.  There are so many goodbyes ahead of us.  I think I have a change phobia or a goodbye phobia because literally I feel paralyzed at the thought.  I remember being Sarah's age and taking my dad to the airport because he had to take business trips semi-regularly.  Back then you could actually walk up to the gate (for some reason that blows my mind that that was ever even possible) and when he would get on the plane I would stand at the window and literally sob, like I couldn't even function, uncontrollable sobs…..and he was coming back in a few days.  Now, now I am leaving my family and realize I wont see them for months and after a few months, I wont see them for maybe a year.  HOW DO PEOPLE FUNCTION LIKE THIS?  It seems unnatural.  It seems unnatural to love people and then not be apart of their lives like you used to be.  I literally feel like my heart might truly rip right out of my chest.  It is going to be so intensely painful.  And yet people do it.  My friends that live down there did it.  They packed up and left.  Do I have some strange, unusual attachment to my family?  Probably.  I don't know if this is true or not, but I have heard that once you have experienced the extreme grief of a significant loss that things just hurt worse.  I don't know, I don't remember what it felt like to say goodbye before my dad died, because that grief overshadows any pain I ever felt before that point.  But maybe it is just overshadowed and I have always been this big of a cry baby….thats more likely!  

So as I sit and cry about how sad this is for me, I am reminded what makes up life…. and all that I am worried about right now, isn't it.  Its not about being in the same state as my family and friends and everyone I love.  Its about having faith that is so set on Christ that as I get out of this boat, I am walking on that water.  I believe that the Lord has a plan and if its His plan….its gonna be good!  And as  I walk away from all that is familiar and comfortable is when He can meet me face to face and truly walk beside me.

(and one a side note, I think going through this has helped me be a little more gracious to PJ and Emily as they look towards moving to Africa….I tend to not have the world's best attitude about it….and yet they are leaving behind so much and headed to a much more difficult future then I am!  I am going to live it up in Dallas (for the Lords sake of course :) ) but they are headed to a completely new culture to do some real incredible stuff with 2 small children.  They kind of have the bigger challenge, I guess :)  Obviously they do!)