May It Be So

I hope you don’t mind how much I untie or unpack not only the African journey but the main journey as a whole. I don’t think you do so that’s why I try to revel as much of my thoughts the best I can...good and bad. I have been all over the place physically and emotional which has been very strange indeed. I find myself in one frame of mind one moment and in the next instant a trigger of some sort, an African meal, a picture, a chair, an afghan made by Nancy’s hands.....throws me into that dreaded place of being numb yet feeling such intense inner pain. Once it passes I then try to move on with (what one friend of mine called) the maintenance of life. Thanks Steve Geyer....I have stolen that from you and used it many times!

Case in point, I’m sitting in the home of the Weichardt’s Friday afternoon (today) waiting for Lizzie to come home to go grab a bite. I am watching some news and decide to change the channel. I hit the forward button...and of all freaking things to pop up on the screen is.........Pahappahooey Island. This was the kids program that Nancy wrote all of the most incredible funny lyrics for. It was kind of a crazy gift she had that even she didn’t even know she had. I would write crazy music and she would throw on really brilliant but funny play on words and sometime just nonsense but it worked really well. It used to play on some networks in the states but I hadn’t seen it in a while. For it to come bouncing into the room blew my mind.....i started spinning out but then i decided to write this and for some reason i came back to center.

I have come to realize something and I believe it came from the Lord. Nancy and I had been living 2 lives. One in Nashville, one in Cape Town. Each with its own personality and circumstances, its own set of promises and friends. I believe that’s why this trip has been unusually difficult. Again, I didn’t see it coming. (I think I must be the most undiscerning human being on the planet.) So....the truth is that not only must I walk out the grief attached to everything in Nashville, I must also walk out the Cape Town path. I thought that on the last trip with the Revive team in Jan 2011 I had crossed most of the mountain but I was with people all the time. This time I had to go through it alone. People are living their lives here...busy just like when I am home so there were several days where I was pretty much by myself and that left a lot of time for thinking, mourning, laughing, praying, reading, and feeling very alone and isolated.

But these things are necessary and what I have to endure. It’s what God has ordered for me for whatever reason.....and I still argue with Him about it but I always know in my heart that I must trust Him. It’s a fight...everyday.....it’s awful right now but I never give up hope that someday it will be tolerable and that I will come to a place of resolve and peace with the rest of my life. May it be so Lord....may it be so.