Tuesday, September 11, 2012

The Present Ache

Sometimes I can stay busy... most of the time I stay busy and never have to think about it. I can go days at a time, but it always catches up, that familiar feeling. The ache, as I refer to it.

I am used to this ache. For the past three years, between living in a new city for school and leaving my heart in a country an ocean away, this ache has been pretty familiar.

It's like living with a hole in your heart. Some days, it is a small hole and can be ignored, or it only hurts a little. The pain is bearable, like a mosquito bite.

Other days, the hole is big. It's all you can think of, and it hurts.

In the past, it came on birthdays, days when little ones were hurting and I could do nothing from where I stood, days when life got so monotonous and I couldn't feel alive anymore, days when they were walking and talking and I was missing it.

Now, it still comes on birthdays. Days when the family vacations, the weddings, the ball games, the Sunday lunches, the daily life comes and it's one more picture you were absent for.

It comes on days like today, when life is hard, the work is overwhelming, and I just want to sit at the kitchen table with familiar food and the people who know me. I want to bury myself under a comforter on the familiar couch I fight over with my favorite three people.

I have been accused of being flippant... of not taking others seriously when they say they miss me or want me home. And I know I come across that way. I don't mean to do it.

But that's what I have to do to hold it together.

Because, how do I explain? How do I convey what it means to constantly live with your heart divided? To call two places, and possibly one day a third or fourth home?

Because, home isn't a house anymore. It's people, and I am a part of two different families, and for the rest of my life, I always will be.

I try not to think about it, but I know that soon, I will step foot on the place that is so familiar, but it's not my normal anymore.

I don't feel American anymore, and I am not sure what to do or how to respond to the questions. The thought fills me with a little anxiety. How do you go from a home of 100 you haven't left for more than 2 days for the past 9 months, to a home of at the most, 5?

Will I be glad to be in America? Yes, but only because of the people.

When will I be coming back again? I honestly don't know. I just want to cherish this... these 30 days I am given to rest, to love and be present.

My life has become one of inevitable good byes. I say good bye to those in America, I say good bye to my little ones here, and I live with the knowledge that being with one part of my heart will mean separation from the other.

This is what He called me to, and I said yes.

Is it worth the pain? Absolutely. This is my life, and I love it. He is worth it.

But please remember that when I said yes, and I said yes knowing there would be cost.

So if you ask me a question, and my "This is what He said to do" sounds flippant, dismissive, please remember there is a heart behind those words trying to hold it together.

Because sometimes the pain is intense and I feel like I might fall apart, and those responses are all that will hold me together.

I don't like to think about it... this separation, knowing that the choices I make mean pain for someone else. I want my family to know my family. I want to be present in both. And I can't. And one day, I will have to leave this country and move on to a new country with another family.

He will call, I will say yes, and the pain will still be there, probably even stronger.

I wish there was a way to keep them together, everyone I love within a 2 mile radius.

But I can't.

So on days like today, when I wake up, work, study, and go through my daily routine, when my heart aches for physical presence, I give it to Him.

I have to. And He comforts, knowing what it is like to be separated from who He loves because of their own choices.

And He is present.

And we ache together.



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