I know. I've lived in Athens for 17 months...far from new, right? In all of my recreational blog reading, I stumbled across this post from a fantastic blog that I read. I'm just saying that if I lived in Nashville, I would work really hard to make this girl my friend. In a nutshell she is new to Nashville and writes a lot about her transition to a new town. Reading her blog often leads me to think about my own transition. The truth is, I moved to Athens with the mindset that this was just a brief little stepping stone for me that served as a means to some end. I would earn my advanced degree and move on to a place where the skies were much bluer and the air much less smelly. Because I've had such a narrow focus I really haven't taken the time to invest in important things here...like people or a church or the community. And now 17 months later, I'm starting to realize that maybe one day I'm going to regret my decision not to make these investments.
Yes - I have friends here. But not the kind that I feel like would call me up if their world was falling apart and they needed someone to help them drown their sorrows in a vat of cookie dough. You know, like the ones I have scattered all over in places far from Athens. Yes - I go to one church regularly. But it's not a church where I feel really at home. It's huge and very impersonal at the corporate worship level, and I, being the "temporary resident" that I've deemed myself, haven't taken the time to get involved and do something service oriented there. Heaven forbid that happen. I might make even more friends. I might do some good for the world. I might put the gifts and talents that God has given me to good use.
The truth is I made the conscious decision to move my life here. Even though the decision to do so completely forced me out of my comfort zone. But the older I get, the more I understand that life isn't always about being comfortable. I'm thankful for free will and that I have the freedom and resources to make such decisions as well. I think that often we take the ability to do these sorts of things for granted while in reality we are given so many liberties that much of the world will never know. Well, I can't speak on behalf of the entire citizenry (is that a word and am I using it correctly) of the United States, but I often take these kinds of things for granted. It doesn't matter that I only plan to be here for a little while. Often times I get very caught up in thinking about the future that the present just flies right by without me taking notice. I imagine that I have missed out on some great opportunities in all of my forward-thinking. It's time that I focus on the here and now. In other words it's time for me to settle. For a little while, anyway. Until it's time to settle elsewhere.
"He put your feet on a wonderful road that took you straight to a good place to live. So thank God for His marvelous love." -Psalm 107:7-8 (The Message)
2 comments:
We can SO be real friends. :) Go dawgs.
love that mindset. i never truly settled in NC cause i knew we were eventually moving. well i thought we were. and i was right. but in hindsight i shoulda' settled better.
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