Nervous?

Today our countdown to our trip to the States is down to 15 days!  We are going for a month and will visit friends and family and enjoy some places and foods we have missed.  So, obviously, we are excited!  But, I've also been finding myself feeling a bit nervous, which seems strange, and I couldn't really explain.

Things will be different than what has become normal for us here, but it's been less than a year since we left, so it's not like I've forgotten how to act in America.  (Well, I guess you can confirm the truth of that with friends and family after we've been there!)

Definitely I'm nervous about the LONG travel with two active little guys who resist sleep, the youngest of which slept about 3 hours during the 34-hour journey moving here!  Trying to block that part out of my mind.  But, it wasn't really what was going on inside me with this feeling.

We have been concerned about how the trip will affect Isaiah.  He has had a harder adjustment to living here this year and asks often to live where there is a McDonald's, and we have been praying that he won't have major setbacks when we return in the fall.  So, that makes me nervous, but there was still more.

Today, I pulled out a scrapbook that a dear friend had put together for us before we left.  She had gathered notes and photos from some other dear friends.  I have to confess to this being the first time I've actually sat down with it and read all the notes.  That seems so bizarre to even admit because it is sweet and wonderful, but I had set it aside when we first moved here so that I wouldn't get homesick right away.  Then, I came across it in the middle of a hard stretch this winter and teared up just looking at it, so I decided it didn't seem wise to dive into it in its fullness and kind of hid it from myself for later.  Today, as I was trying to finally organize some boxes of things here, I sat down and read it, and I realized this nervousness that I had been sensing that I couldn't explain.  

I feel nervous about how much I will miss everyone all over again when we come back.

Nepal feels like home to me now.  I have been realizing recently how attached I have become to the idea of living here for a long time.  We have amazing friends, an incredible opportunity to be part of a great business and vision, and I am happy here.

But, the distance from family and dear friends who have known me and been a part of my life in deep ways, some for a long time, is hard.  I think I have sort of kept myself from thinking too often or too deeply about how much I miss them.  While that is probably partially healthy in order to really be "all here" mentally and emotionally this year as we got settled, I think I have been in a bit of denial of the emotions of it.  Facebook helps me stay delusional in feeling connected to still to my friends and family and what is going on in their lives.  And, I kept thinking, of course I feel excited to SEE people, but I kept wondering why I was MORE excited and what that nervousness was, and today split it wide open:  Actually seeing those people will be wonderful but also remind me how much I miss them.  To connect to the full joy and special gift of this time ahead, I have to be willing to open up to the pain of leaving again and face how much I have truly missed them.  

So, there it is.  Nervous.  Praying to let it all open up and be all the messy fullness of smiles and laughter and hugs and tears.