Several months ago, at the peak of new projects, the beginning of summer, and all that life entailed (wedding, cousin's son newly diagnosed with cancer, etc, etc, etc) someone wrote me an email.
It was ill timed in so many ways. I came home excited on a Sunday evening, jet lagged from my sisters wedding (so on a high and low from both the wedding and coming home) and also just juiced to be part of a new project here in Granada when it comes to "church". And...someone wrote me a letter...and I had the audacity to open it before I went to bed.
This women is not a friend, but still wrote me, expressing emotion, but at the same time trying to solicit my own feelings. At one point she expressed concern stating that , "you must feel alone in Granada because of a 'family situation'".
I don't think she meant it as an offense, but I was offended. Me? Alone? I was so excited that after an incredibly intense year of friendships, everyone was leaving for the summer and I would have alone time!!!!!!!!!!!!Andrew and I are social butterflies, and we love people....but we had had a lot go on, and we needed down time.
But as everyone trotted off to other parts of the universe, there were moments that that letter rang true, and I felt alone. When everyone that we loved came back, you could feel the change in the air, and things ebbed and flowed, and not in a bad way, just different as we all began to see new things appear in our lives.
And then,August rolled around. It's supposed to be the quietest,loneliest month, but everyone was here, or stayed, or came back.We spent hours with friends, on the beach, swimming like 12 year old boys at local water reservoirs. Suddenly, we had a new bunch of friends, and renewed relationships with others and BAM....I really didn't feel alone. Never have I had so many fiestas as we did this fall. Birthday parties, parties just because, new friends at church, new meetings, new challenges. New moments of "WHY AM I DOING THIS!??" and YES I CAN"T BELIEVE I JUST DID THAT!
We dined, drank and danced with new friends this year at Christmas, and it was really a change from 6 months ago. Old and new friends together. New Years was with new friends as we gulped our Grapes to mark New Years.
But for me, New Years was a little dim as Andrew was ill. Not serious, just needed a hernia operation. And we had been waiting, for what felt like forever. To our relief, this past Monday he got the Phone Call. Yesterday they operated.
And in that one day, that old wound, of "because you are alone in Granada" was completely swept away. For in the most powerful and briefest of moments, Andrew and I were swept up and carried along in a current of love and friendship more powerful than we have experienced in a while. Messages, calls, visits, real promises of "YOU NEED HELP WE ARE HELPING".....and last night before we went into bed, someones last message of YOU CAN DO IT. WE LOVE YOU GUYS, pushed me over the edge. I couldn't stop weeping from joy when I realized in the midst of all of the change, pain and waiting, I was healed.
You see Love, in its truest form, comes from God, no matter who gives it out. And in the moment of Love, I realized again, "with His wounds, we are healed."
In the massive outpouring of Love yesterday, I realized two things. 1. I am never alone in Granada, in fact, far from it and 2. Love heals. Not just kidney stones and hernias and sore muscles and strained backs, but that stab in the back, GONE. HEALED. In the vernacular of my Spanish friends. TOMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. Take that wound, Love healed you.
It was ill timed in so many ways. I came home excited on a Sunday evening, jet lagged from my sisters wedding (so on a high and low from both the wedding and coming home) and also just juiced to be part of a new project here in Granada when it comes to "church". And...someone wrote me a letter...and I had the audacity to open it before I went to bed.
This women is not a friend, but still wrote me, expressing emotion, but at the same time trying to solicit my own feelings. At one point she expressed concern stating that , "you must feel alone in Granada because of a 'family situation'".
I don't think she meant it as an offense, but I was offended. Me? Alone? I was so excited that after an incredibly intense year of friendships, everyone was leaving for the summer and I would have alone time!!!!!!!!!!!!Andrew and I are social butterflies, and we love people....but we had had a lot go on, and we needed down time.
But as everyone trotted off to other parts of the universe, there were moments that that letter rang true, and I felt alone. When everyone that we loved came back, you could feel the change in the air, and things ebbed and flowed, and not in a bad way, just different as we all began to see new things appear in our lives.
And then,August rolled around. It's supposed to be the quietest,loneliest month, but everyone was here, or stayed, or came back.We spent hours with friends, on the beach, swimming like 12 year old boys at local water reservoirs. Suddenly, we had a new bunch of friends, and renewed relationships with others and BAM....I really didn't feel alone. Never have I had so many fiestas as we did this fall. Birthday parties, parties just because, new friends at church, new meetings, new challenges. New moments of "WHY AM I DOING THIS!??" and YES I CAN"T BELIEVE I JUST DID THAT!
We dined, drank and danced with new friends this year at Christmas, and it was really a change from 6 months ago. Old and new friends together. New Years was with new friends as we gulped our Grapes to mark New Years.
But for me, New Years was a little dim as Andrew was ill. Not serious, just needed a hernia operation. And we had been waiting, for what felt like forever. To our relief, this past Monday he got the Phone Call. Yesterday they operated.
And in that one day, that old wound, of "because you are alone in Granada" was completely swept away. For in the most powerful and briefest of moments, Andrew and I were swept up and carried along in a current of love and friendship more powerful than we have experienced in a while. Messages, calls, visits, real promises of "YOU NEED HELP WE ARE HELPING".....and last night before we went into bed, someones last message of YOU CAN DO IT. WE LOVE YOU GUYS, pushed me over the edge. I couldn't stop weeping from joy when I realized in the midst of all of the change, pain and waiting, I was healed.
You see Love, in its truest form, comes from God, no matter who gives it out. And in the moment of Love, I realized again, "with His wounds, we are healed."
In the massive outpouring of Love yesterday, I realized two things. 1. I am never alone in Granada, in fact, far from it and 2. Love heals. Not just kidney stones and hernias and sore muscles and strained backs, but that stab in the back, GONE. HEALED. In the vernacular of my Spanish friends. TOMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA. Take that wound, Love healed you.
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