all the feelings

 I’m scared. I’m scared to move back to the  United States – which are seemingly far from united. I’ve got that churn-y feeling in my stomach when I think about it too much. I want so badly to hug my mom, and see my dad build a fire in the fire place,  and watch my parents cook together, laugh and watch Friends with my sister, and tease my brother and brother-in-law. I can’t wait to dance in celebration and grief over all the things that have happened this past year with the people I love. I’ll get to hold my friends’ babies, gab about nonsensical pop-culture happenings, cry and laugh, and eat burgers and cheese and biscuits, but I’m still filled with a deep sadness when thinking of leaving this life in Bangkok.

I’ll be ushered back into the States in the most perfect of ways: smack-dab in the middle of Fall, my favorite season. There’ll be pumpkins and mums, cornhusks and festivals, spiced cider and pumpkin spiced everything. I’ll wear my favorite sweater with my Bean Boots and the prospect of a sweaty forehead and damp hair will be a million miles away – but man, it will hurt. It will be beautiful and painful. I’ll ache for my life in Bangkok. I’ll miss hearing rapid-fire Thai spoken all around me. I’ll miss eating 25 cent bags of cutup watermelon 3 times a day. I’ll long to hear my roommate, Olivia shriek with joy and hear my Thai name yelled at me from across the market by my Thai mom, Tukta. My friends’ faces who are in the detention center will run through my mind while I’m trying to decide which yogurt to buy at the supermarket, and I’ll start weeping, and my hand will come to my chest because my heart just quivered, and my breath will stop for 4 seconds or so. I’m grieving the ending of this time and, will continue to do so – and it will be hard. 

It’s a gift, isn’t it, to be sad about leaving a place – to dread it a bit. That means that there’s been love and joy and roots and laughter and friendships. There’s been a fair amount of chaos, and lots of unlearning and learning. There’s been hurt feelings and hard conversations and clipped words and unhealthy communication. I’ve had to put my big-girl panties on and own my feeling and thoughts and story.  I’ve had to stare in the face my proclivity towards comfort and my tendency to live out of scarcity – believing time, love, food, sweat rags, books, money, hope, or fired bananas are scarce.

So many humans have given me the gift of being apart of their lives. I’ve gotten to cheer on the kids who are apart of our education program as they grow in knowledge and confidence. I’ve heard stories of horror, fierce perseverance, grave disappointment, and sheer joy from refugees and asylum seekers in the detention center. I’ve gotten to dance and laugh with my students and friends and colleagues and strangers. People from all over the world (40ish countries) have come to my rescue in someway or another – from offering friendship to doing emergency translation – folks from every continent (except Antartica). 

The world is huge  – there are so many people and cultures and languages -but the more I journey on, the more the truth that we are all connected is reinforced. No matter where I went in Bangkok, from language school with affluent business associates to the detention center with prisoners – everyone, all of us, yearns and aches to know that we are the beloved – now and always.

I am so grateful for my time with Creative Life Foundation. I have vacillated between being adamant about staying in BKK, and holding hope for what could be next in the States. They’ve weathered it all with me. That’s what we need – people to weather it all with us – people who stick around when we’re crabby, confused, and tearful. We need people in our corner and at our table. I’ve had that – and man, has it been good (like old testament, right-relationship, Genius – good). 

My primary mode of processing life is through my feelings. I’m a feeler. So, in a couple weeks if you see me crying at the grocery store or in your church or at your dinner table it’s because it hurts like hell (sorry, mom) and it was so, so good. I am not perfect, and this past year was not perfect. It was messy, but I was alive. So, I’ll fight to be alive in the States. I’ll fight to keep my hands and my heart unclenched, and I’ll fight to open my life, and my home (okay, my parents home), and my exceptions of vocation. It’ll be all the things – hard, messy, beautiful, sometimes ugly, and full of dancing. 

This is my favorite prayer, lately. It’s from Common Prayer: Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals. 

Lord, help me know to unclutter my life, 

to organize myself in the direction of simplicity. 

Lord, teach me to listen to my heart;

teach me to welcome change, instead of fearing it. 

Lord, I give you these stirrings inside me, 

I give you my discontent, 

I give you my restlessness, 

I give you my doubt, 

I give you my despair,

I give you all the longings I hold inside. 

Help me to listen to these signs of change, of growth;

to listen seriously and follow where they lead

through the breathing empty space of an open door. 

Amen. 

Thank you.