So I’ve understandably been having lots of un-bloggable thoughts these last few days/weeks. You know, the whirlwind mishmash of thoughts and feelings that even if you could slow them down to capture them on paper wouldn’t make sense to anyone else outside of your own head/heart. Heck, it’s hard enough to make sense of them yourself!
But I had e-mails in the past 36 hours from two very wise friends who reminded me that a) this is completely normal and b) it’s ok to miss a place dearly and be happily leaving it at the same time. Plus, in the car today one of Sufjan Stevens’ songs spoke to me in a new way. As a result, I’m feeling brave enough to try and blog these thoughts. Perhaps they’ll speak to someone else in turn.
Item b above has been the source of most of my un-bloggable thoughts. It’s been a month since my last groovy sister reserves trip so I’m having some symptoms of withdrawal from the amazing community of Sisters I have come to know and love. In the mean time, I’ve been immersed in this wonderful community of friends here in Portland as I wind down my life here and say goodbye. And I only have 3 days left here!! I love this place and these people. I have had a good life here. Grown, learned, loved, served, laughed, cried. Life. So why am I leaving for such an unknown future??? Especially since I’ll be heading East soon for Novitiate, where I will be with Sisters, who while equally as groovy and part of the same community, are not the ones I have come to know and love these past 2 years. So it’s like I’m leaving two places/sets of people dear to me for a third unknown and not yet loved place.
One of the wise friends shared his experience when he left his community of friends to enter his novitiate all those years ago. “Here I was, going off to become part of a community, and I had one right where I was all along. What was wrong with me? And would I always be chasing the ‘greener grass’?” Good questions, and ones that I find myself asking myself several times a day lately.
The other wise friend said this in response to my last post about the Gospel story about the rich young man: “Unlike that poor soul, you have the grace to know that all you love in Portland still wasn’t quite enough. If this path was easy, everybody would be dancing down it....but with all the hard spots, there’s abundance of joy, even in New Jersey!”
There lies the rub. As wonderful as my friends are, as wonderful as my life here has been … I know it’s not quite what I’m meant to do, how I’m meant to live. I get glimmers of my future with the groovy sisters, glimmers of what a life centered on the Gospel would be like, in community. My friends are great, but they have lives and families of their own. I so yearn to be part of a community of faith that lives and works together joyfully. And I sense that with the groovy sisters.
Which takes me to the Sufjan Stevens song “Chicago.”
"If I was crying
In the van, with my friend
It was for freedom
From myself and from the land …
You came to take us
All things go, all things go
To recreate us
All things grow, all things grow
We had our mindset
All things know, all things know
You had to find it
All things go, all things go"
The thing is … what I sense is in a way freedom from myself and from the land. I’m slowly moving on this journey from “me” to “we”. I’m letting go of the cosmic grip I’ve had on this particular place called Portland, Oregon in the beautiful Pacific Northwest. I know I can be me here … the question is, can I allow my loving God to recreate me? Can I remember, can I know, can I embrace the fact that all things grow and all things go?
We’ll see what happens, but at the moment I’m feeling better having blogged some of these thoughts, thanks to the help of my wise friends.
8 comments:
God speed! As someone who also left Portland recently to follow a call, I had many of those same feelings. And I've gotten a lot of , "You left Oregon? To come HERE?" Explaining about calls and ministry doesn't seem to convince those folks that you are any saner--in fact it probably confirms their opinion that you are not in your right mind.
It is difficult to make that move into community, and you feel like you're going to step on the water and maybe fall in. Just remember that the Lord is the one doing all this, you're just acting in faith. If it all made sense, we wouldn't need faith! Also remember that in terms of your friends, part of your going is for them. There you'll be your best self and be able to pray for them in ways you can't do without community. So blessings to you!
Susan, it is indeed a challenge to move from having a career into living one's vocation. It is a big change no matter how you spin it. Even though we have lived in vaious communities all our lives, this new "religious" community is so different - it is based on the call of Christ and it is an intentional community, meaning that the members are drawn together by something other than friendship. We don't choose the members of this new comunity but we have all been chosen to live this life. Anyway, many blessings on your entrance to the Novitiate and my prayers are with you as you begin this new life journey. Peace! BTW, my email is "stph8" at yahoo (dot) com. Keep in touch. ~Rich
Hi Susan,
You wrote " I’m slowly moving on this journey from “me” to “we”, and it really struck me. It sounds very similar to the feelings one has before starting another vocation - marriage.
I think it would be weird if you didn't have these feelings before leaving a place you love.
Hang in there, you'll do great! I'm praying for you - and all entering the novitiate and seminary - every day.
Perhaps the article (p. 5) I wrote the summer I was leaving might ring a bit more true now. And I left suburban Washington DC for the Middle of Nowheresville Indiana. The Potomac, the Bay, the Beach .... traded in for cows? Smithsonian for scent-filled swine?
Following up on purechristianthink's "confirms that you're not in your right mind" .... see it as a confirmation that this is God's doing. Cuz small-town ruralness is definitely not what I would have chosen for myself!!!
Give a holler anytime you need .... been there, done that!
Peace out to you, my friend.
Okay, not the same thing, but when I left to go cross-country to Philadelphia for graduate study, I was packing. And crying. And packing. And at the same time as I was praying, packing, and crying, I told God, "I know it's ungrateful and that you have wonderful things for me in Philadelphia. Thank you for all the gifts to come and for the things you're giving me." I heard, clearly, in response: "Don't thank me yet; you haven't seen Philadelphia."
I loved Philadelphia. It was also a wonderful growing experience. But I think God has a great sense of humor about the whole thing. He knows that doing the right thing doesn't always *feel* like the best gift. And yet we follow.
thanks all ... you rock
how wonderful to have SO MANY wise friends.
Hmmm...I know what you mean. It's like now if i had to write anything about what I'm doing on my dissertation, odds are I probably couldn't. Nothing really comes close to the experience.
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