Welcome to My Little Corner of the World

Over the last several months this has become a space where I have been able to sit down on this journey, pour a cup of coffee and sort through the pieces of my heart. As well, it has caused me to remember the value and place of laughter in my life as much as my need to communicate. And, it has become a place of community and rest during a time when my soul has been most desperate for it. Welcome to my little corner of the world. Read on and offer your own thoughts if you like.

Friday, May 05, 2006

Saying Goodbye to a Season...


This has been the last week of classes and official meetings and appointments with students. Many of our students are graduating and taking steps toward trying out their degrees. Some are getting ready to spend their summers in exciting overseas worlds and experience people, food, and cultures they’ve never been exposed to before. And some of these guys and gals have decided to do life together, a fact that is proved daily by the steady number of wedding invitations in my mailbox.

Seasons are changing for many in my little corner of the world.

For me, this last week sums up the end of a season of life. Nine years ago, I never thought of my campus ministry life as anything more than a season. Other things were sure to change my season, I thought. Of course, maybe I needed to think it was seasonal because I foolishly thought marriage and family were on my horizon. Of, course, maybe it’s just that women are pretty seasonal beings – so much about our bodies and our wiring, I think, seem created for different seasons of life.

In any case, what began 9 years ago as my single campus ministry life, has ebbed into a newer and less unknown one. “What are you doing?” has been a regular question. My answer, of course, is always “I don’t know” with one of about 50 different inflections depending on the day.

Get a job?

Write a book?

Start a coffee shop?

Do all of it?

Something entirely not on the list?

It’s a weird place to be and yet not a foreign one to the people of God, right? I can think of countless persons in my Bible that had no idea where they were going when they started out. They were merely told to go, to trust, and to let Him work in and through them. Most of them didn’t have it all spelled out. At least, that’s what I keep reminding myself of when the 100th person asks me that all too familiar question. I do know that I have a deep promise that He alone knows the plans for my life. They are for good and not for harm, plans to give me a hope and a future (Jer. 29:11-12).

So, today as I say goodbye to one season, this melancholy is trying to keep it in perspective that I’m really saying “Hello” to new one…

posted by Blythe Lane @ 7:14 PM  

2 Comments:

Here's to saying, "hello!" (I'm working on dates for the summer...the e-mails are out to the people...) :-) :-)

By Blogger Jill Pole, at May 10, 2006 6:03 AM  

Hey girl, I think I have the pieces now of who you are and I do know you. I know you will have plenty of time to remember the pieces of what has been everytime you see a picture or run into a familiar place. I totally resonate with the seasonal beings thing. I have been in NE on staff for 5 years now and every year I am telling people, I don't know how long I will be here or what is ahead next year. I am excited to hear what is next for you. It's comforting to watch someone else step out with the same what if's I hold now like writing, a coffee shop, or some other random mystery job. I am not stepping out yet but I will be pr'ing for this transition in your life.

By Blogger Larka, at May 14, 2006 3:32 PM  

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