Transitioning

As I write I am sitting on a very comfy couch in my apartment in Gearhart, OR. By apartment I mean the basement of a house close to the Young Life camp I now work at. I got here on Monday. The last week has been a whirlwind of people and packing and crying and praying desperately for God to make my car work and unpacking and repacking and driving and more people… a whirlwind indeed. I am tired.

I left school. It’s official now: all finals done and just waiting for my final grades to be posted. I left my apartment on Friday and drove away, my car so full I couldn’t see out of any of the windows except the front ones. I drove away from school. I want to say for the last time, but it seems as often as I make it sound like dropping out is official there are people who insist I will go back and finish. I want to say for the last time. There is nothing in me that wants to go back to school to get a degree. I would love to go back just to be with my friends. I do not want to be in school, though.

Leaving was hard. Transitions are hard for me all the time. Naturally that makes leaving school hard. Transitions make me cry and puke, or at least feel sick to my stomach. They make me irritated and lonely, wanting people yet unable to let people near. Transitions suck, and the suck the life out of me. Packing last week and trying to say goodbye to people felt like leaving Uganda all over again. It was the same panicked racing of my heart, the same random bouts of sobbing over small things, like needing to jump my car a couple times. It was the same heaviness in my heart and tiredness in my bones. All-to-familiar emotions that scared me and caused a great desire to sit down, like a donkey, and refuse to move any further.

I had little time during the last week to actually understand what was happening and recognize what my soul was screaming for. It needed rest and writing and good tea. I couldn’t give it that because there were not enough hours in a day. If only Africa time existed here. I could then have stopped and done just that because who needs to be on time and stick to plans anyways? Obviously there is something innately bred into me that does, because another part of me was screaming the importance of sticking with the plan and not resting until it was over.

I also had moved to a place of caring for other people. I know, that doesn’t sound like a bad place to be in. It actually can be for me, however. In that space others are much more important than I am and I give and give, and give nothing to myself because I am giving all of me to other people. This also sounds like a good thing to me, like what Christians are supposed to do, but it isn’t how it works, at least not for me. I need care, I need to be recognized by myself and paid attention to by myself. If all my attention is going to others I forget that I exist in it all, I forget me. I am important too, though, and I need to not be forgotten. This weekend at home I sort of forgot about me. It seemed like a good thing at the time, and it wasn’t all bad, because I had fun and played with my siblings and friends. It just wasn’t what I needed at the time. At the time I needed rest and space and time alone to understand the aching of my heart and the grieving of my soul.

I left a season of life. It was a hard, dark and shitty season, but it was also full of learning and growth and wonderful people. It isn’t that I am not learning or growing or surrounded by wonderful people now, but it is all new and unfamiliar and unknown. I miss the people who knew me and knew the growth that had taken place. I miss the people who understanding that part of me, because it is most of me I think. The growth and learning that happened took place near the core of who I am, a depth that cannot be seen in a snapshot or a sentence or even a chapter of a book. This takes years of storytelling and observing and spirits communing with each other.

I also know this can be done in a matter of months because of Uganda. I know it won’t be long before I once again find those wonderful deep friendships here as well.

Love you all :)
Joy