Oh, January, Oh

Again, I have been captivated by my radio and I am going to share with you again.
This month of January in Grantham has been unexpected and although not my original plan, I have been where God wanted me to be and he has affirmed that.

So come the silent things.  Those tidbits that you store up in your heart, unspoken worries and people that you wish you might have found the right words to tell them how you feel about them, the things you take for granted, the times your heart already aches for missing, like snowflakes, then little things fall on you, piling up, and chilling you.

The opposite seasons are already playing with me.  Here I am in winter in the Northern Hemisphere.  The promise of Chilean summer is right around the corner.  Although I have missed out on Chilean Spring and it will soon be shifting into fall there, the spring in heart will come in newly formed relationships and newly explored territories.
In Chile I will not only be in an opposite season of my peers physically, but I will also be in another season of my life.  As my friend Sarah said to me so simply, "Tu experiencia va a ser tu experiencia," or "your experience will be your experience."

I think what has really hit me is that though I know this experience will be formative and transformative, it will also be completely my own.  I'm leaving this place until August, the longest time I've been away from Central Pennsylvania since we moved here.  After Grandma Sherian leaves, everyone is unfamiliar, every experience is new, and everyone familiar is "back home," or at least in one of the places I have called my "home."

Messiah, if I've held back, I'm sorry.  If I've said too much or grown too attached, I'm sorry.
Goodbye, Grantham.



And, familiar enough that my heart could have accidentally communicated to them into a song, some lyrics of wisdom from the Decemberists:

January Hymn:

On a winter Sunday I go
To clear away the snow
And green the ground below

April all an ocean away
Is this the better way to spend the day?
Keeping the winter at bay

What were the words I meant to say before you left?
When I could see your breath lead where you were going to

Maybe I should just “let it be”
and maybe it will all come back to me
Sing oh January oh!

How I lived a childhood in snow
And all my teens in tow
Stuffed in strata of glow

Hail the winter days after dark
Wandering the gray memorial park
A fleeting beating of hearts

What were the words I meant to say before she left?
When I could see her breath lead where she was going to

Maybe I should just “let it be”
And maybe it will all come back to me
Sing oh Janu…
Oh January oh