Dear Keren #10 - The Last Supper

Dear Keren,

After a full-day of sitting out in this ridiculous heat waiting for people to show up to the least-attended garage sale so far, I'm completely spent. But I still spent the last 2 hours doing the prep work for dinner tomorrow night. Why, you ask?

Well, it's one of the last suppers.

Tomorrow night, Paul, Debbie and the rest of the gang get home and I'll be done house-sitting. The last time for a while, I guess. Tomorrow night, I return Paul and Debbie the key that I've held on to for a long while "just in case they needed me to check on Fritz." Tomorrow night, we sit and visit with Matt, Tamara, Keira and Judah, and Jenny.

Which makes me wonder, was this what Jesus went through that night of the Last Supper? He knew he was going to see those people at the table again in one of the many rooms in his Father's house. "If it were not so, I would have told you." I'm becoming even more convinced that his anguish about the cross isn't just about the physical pain, but the emotional pain of between the cross until the next time.

And yet, in the midst of all this preparations for the end of this chapter, there's nothing I find myself desiring more than a sense of normalcy. This summer has slipped by way too quickly, and has been a little too spontaneous for my liking. I've greatly missed the intimacy of friendships that normalcy provided. I miss sitting in the SOT computer labs whining about the latest of someone's theological development that is making us wince, or the Charlie Sheen scandal. Instead, I'm being swarmed with questions about how the preparations for New Zealand are going, when all I want to do is scream, what about my soul? Do you care more about the things I'll be doing in New Zealand than about my soul? But if I don't have a soul, I wouldn't be able to do the things in New Zealand anyway.

But to be fair, I don't want to talk about my soul either. Because I'm afraid if I start, I won't be able to stop crying. As it turns out, leaving Anderson is much harder than I thought it would be.

I wonder too, if this was what that whole deal about going into the city, and meeting the man carrying the pitcher of water. I mean, Jesus' disciples were already used to his riddles and mysteries by now, so perhaps getting them to do another ridiculous thing was just another part of this creating normalcy in the midst of the chaos and the internal storms that are brewing.

What was it like for you, in those last moments before the truck got too close? Did you have those internal storms too, in the moments between then and when they finally pulled you off life-support?

Dear Keren, I hate endings, but I love beginnings. I love going, but I hate leaving. I crave normalcy, but I'm also desire adventure. And there's only eleven days left. And I miss you for being my first sense of home in the land of displacement between cultures. And...

In the words of Regina Spektor, "I'll come back when you call me, No need to say goodbye."

Love,
Me

It started out as a feeling
Which then grew into a hope
Which then turned into a quiet thought
Which then turned into a quiet word


And then that word grew louder and louder
'Til it was a battle cry


I'll come back
When you call me
No need to say goodbye


Just because everything's changing
Doesn't mean it's never
Been this way before


All you can do is try to know
Who your friends are
As you head off to the war


Pick a star on the dark horizon
And follow the light


You'll come back
When it's over
No need to say good bye


You'll come back
When it's over
No need to say good bye


Now we're back to the beginning
It's just a feeling and no one knows yet
But just because they can't feel it too
Doesn't mean that you have to forget


Let your memories grow stronger and stronger
'Til they're before your eyes


You'll come back
When they call you
No need to say good bye