Today is my last day in Romania. It's a simple sentence with what looks like a simple idea. Well, it is a simple sentence but it can't hold all the feelings that I have about this country, this region, these people.
Before I came here, I was focused on doing something useful during my 8 week sabbatical. It quickly became apparent that I would receive so much, that I would meet people who would become very important to me, that I would settle into an apartment and imagine living in it for a long time.
Before I came here, it seemed like I would have so much time.
I was so unprepared. I am far richer as I do laundry and pack today than I could ever have imagined.
Folks at my church recorded video greetings, a simple wonderful video that I watched late Sunday night after flying back from Timisoara. (Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udUI_bd1irs) My friend, Bess, took a video camera and walked around the Fellowship hall at church giving people a chance to greet me. It came at exactly the right moment. I was feeling sad and gloomy, thinking of people I don't want to leave thousands of miles behind me. That video reminded me of all my people I want to see who are in front of me. Today, I exist in a kind of limbo, caught between two worlds, both of which I love. On two sides of the world, I have a home. That is cause for quiet joy.
Florin and I will fly to Malta at 6 tomorrow morning. I know I will have a good time there until I fly home to the States on Monday, a week from today. But today feels like the end of my sabbatical. Who would have ever thought it would be like that?
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