that grief girl.

Hellos really are my favorite.  Over the last twenty-four hours I have said three to very special people I care deeply for. In the next few days I will say hello again to more favorites. That’s kinda why I have been caught off guard with a strange lingering feeling of grief. Grief? Why grief when hellos are happening? Hellos to people who make my life more complete and also, I must mention with this particular group that arrived yesterday – way, way, way more fun?

So, I sat and took a long hard look at my grief yesterday, face to face. (She’s not much of a looker -that grief girl-, FYI.) And this is what I saw in her…

I’m grieving for one of the hardest realities of my existence. Transitions. (And everyone simultaneously agrees.) Moving is rough. Moving with teenagers is rougher. Leaving a place that is comfortable is hard. Leaving a place that is comfortable and has people that my arms ache to hug in it is harder. But that isn’t the sort of transition I am grieving at this moment.

I am grieving the relationship transition. To be honest, I have never really sat face to face with this part of transition before. I mean, I have dealt with it again and again -people come and go in this place like nobody’s business- but I haven’t sat and stared and examined and allowed myself to feel the ugly hurt of it all at once until yesterday.

My life is freaking rich in people. Richer than the average stereotypical American or Australian or Canadian, that is. But the people my life is rich in are never ever all within my reach. They come and go and I stay. I come and go and they stay. And far too often they go where I can’t go or I go where they can’t go… different countries, different walks and ways of life far removed. Way too far removed.

Meh, I don’t even really know why I am writing all this down. Isn’t it obvious to everyone anyways that every hello means a goodbye has come??

In five months time we will be back stateside again. I seriously can feel my heart start pumping a little harder knowing sooner than later, Lord willing, our core six will be within driving distance, hugging distance. We will reconnect; awkwardly at times cause three years away does that to ya, with so many people we love. People who have poured into our life and ministry so that we could leave when God said go. I can hardly wait! But being there means I won’t be here (duh) and while that can feel like breathing in deep, cool, crisp clean air into oxygen deprived lungs… it also sometimes feels like a dull ache for those we love here, the work we are called to do, the simplicity of our colorful life in this valley.

God created us to love Him and love others. And then for some other weird ones like us, He called us to a way of life where the others we are called to love aren’t the others of small town American life. Our others are here and there and Timbuktu. And yet, He asks of us to love them. Invest in them, even when it hurts. He asks us to say hello and He asks us to say goodbye. He asks us to be all here while we still plug into the others that are on the other side. And then when we leave here, to be all there.

Where am I even going with all of this? Transparency I suppose. That and also blatant honesty with myself. Relationships are the hardest and most rewarding part of life. This rambling mess is a call to myself to keep pressing into whoever God gives and when that grief girl pops in again – sit her down, stare at her, try to figure her out, cry with her, get mad at her, laugh at her, and then get back up again, holding her hand for a little while if she needs it.

“Jesus replied, ‘You must love the Lord your God will all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments.” Matthew 22:37-40 NLT