Where I Am

If you were wondering, this is where I am:

I have to be honest, over the past few days of returning back to the US, I have felt an increasing emptiness. It's a scary feeling to leave behind a place you adore and have thrown your whole heart into, but despite all I am missing, I do not return empty-handed.

I am back. With deep crimson dust on my suitcase, shadows of long hot days on my clothes, and a cluster of delicate dirty fingerprints staining my notebook and my heart, I am back. With songs in my head, laughter echoing through my soul, and selfless friendships warming my hands, I am back. With (awkwardly, and no doubt poorly-spoken) foreign words waiting on my tongue, music dancing on my mind, and boundless love spilling over, I am back. I am back with the beauty of Sierra Leone in my heartbeat, and the weight of a million precious faces - a million stories woven into me, welling up and deserving to be told.

And although I feel I have left a whole family across the ocean, though my soul still searches for mountains of trees, dusty roads, and eager eyes, though my ears strain to hear foreign but familiar greetings, rolling giggles, and deep belly-laughs, although my arms ache for just one more squeeze, one more tiny hand finding mine, one more gentle head resting on my heart, one more chance to pour abundant Love deep into so many just longing to get caught up in it, though I am weak with the anguish of goodbyes, the stain of tears, and the fear of time stealing from vibrant memories... I am back. But this is just the beginning.

Last night, I came back to my house that feels suddenly too gigantic, too quiet, and too empty of my favorite people. This morning, I woke instantly with tearful memories of a people and way of life I have barely begun to understand and yet feel so blissful whole within. Today, it is easy to start to think there is a deep empty well within my heart, but even now I am learning it's not true. I'm actually overflowing.

I am filled up with and clinging to the most beautiful thing that soothes the longing between two homes: I am clinging to hope. I have been drowning in it over the past 10 days from the excess overflow of the people who welcomed us freely, and it is sweet and refreshing like clean water straight from the pump. 

I am filled up with my Abba, with the whisper that He sees me - He knows me - and where I am is safe and secure and worth it, every moment He is with me. He is better company to the sweet hearts and hopes and dreams of those I miss than any ordinary 25yr old girl could desire to be. It will always be true and though it feels helpless, I am filled up with gratefulness. With each thread of my soul I am so thankful, for those here who have been my constant support, and for the exceedingly beautiful plans of my Savior for each of those I miss deeply and so many others I do not know. 

I am filled up with love for all the places and people my heart can call "home"; the new ones who have crept in and swept me up so unassumingly this past week as well as the ones who have shaped me to get here, who have been my shoulder to lean on, my encouragement, and my solid foundation for so long before this week.

I am back, and under all this overflow is exactly where I find myself: right here in the middle of it all. Feeling far away but far from alone, far from the end of the story, a little bit closer to finding my purpose, and so overwhelmingly thankful for a chance to love and receive love from such incredible people. As hope rises, the ocean that seems at first to divide us takes new form as a living water that connect us. With hope, the landscapes of Buffalo and SaLone are being changed, and in both places grace can be the air with which our lungs are filled. There is much we can do, here in this place where we are so often spoiled with options and opportunity but so poor in self-sacrificing, boundless love. I am back and it is just beginning. We have much to learn, much to give, much room to grow. Let's start today, amidst the overflow: live fully, love greatly, give completely.

Defend the weak and the fatherless: uphold the cause of the poor and the oppressed. Rescue the weak and the need; deliver them from the hand of the wicked. - Psalm 82:3-4