new

Maybe now I can start to write about a year. a year that changed my life. tears well up in my eyes when I begin to think about it. It may not seem that I would experience these kind of emotions after just another year in the city, but it wasn't just another year in the city. I was a missionary in a foreign land. Though I had lived in Chicago for years, it was never like this.

When I came back from India I remember sitting on the front steps of my parents' house and feeling this way. Wondering why there is so much poverty, and pain. Wondering why the world is this way, knowing this isn't how it is meant to be. I hope that driving force inside of me that recognizes "this isn't right" will always guide me, will always bring me to the places I am supposed to be. It is a sense of injustice, a holy discontent. We all have it, some more aware than others, some more compassionate, for some it is buried under their own pain and fear, doubts and anger.

This is a new start, new steps to take. Many of these new steps will bring me closer to who I am supposed to be, who I am created to be. I want to step into myself, and into knowing the one who made me better. Although a year ago I thought I saw the world so clearly, I feel blinded now; like I can't see at all. I can't see what is in front of me, much less how to get there.

When you live close to people who are poor and spend a lot of time with them (as neighbors and friends), who don't have much and don't do much, because they don't have any money, any family, and so don't have anywhere to go, you might start to think like that. I think I have been greatly impacted by my neighborhood. More than anything else, that neighborhood, that street, that yard, that living room, it's in me.

The trouble is, I don't know what to do next. Why do I get to choose? Why do I get to decide what school I go to, what I spend my money on and where I want to live? I have ached for freedom, I have longed for "normalcy", and I know this part of my life needs to happen. But now that I have it, now that it stretches before me, I am frozen in place.

So much of what I am leaving behind is perfect and beautiful.

Life isn't so bad, or so scary, or even so serious. It does matter though. It matters so much.

I tried describing a few of my feelings to friends late last night, and not much of what I came up with made much sense. Referencing this Coldplay song helped.

Who decides what fish we'll be in this life-pond? Us? Someone else? God? Our families? Our situations?

We're all greatly loved, and it is important we all know that. Every fish needs to be loved and know they are loved. I hope I can continue to love, and be loved, wherever these new days will take me.