not yet home...

i fired up the laptop to capture a few notes before heading off to bed and ran across this. it's a snippet of an email that i was writing to a friend months ago. i ended up cutting this text and sending a much shorter version. but i liked the thought and figured someday i'd flesh it out.

i haven't done that yet, but the core notion still resonates with me. so here's my baby idea. somedays i feel so homesick for a place i've never been...

~~~

i realize that not everyone in the world would agree w/ this take, but here's mine.

we were created for intimate relationship. god created us, male and female, to complement one another. and so the absence of that sort of intimate, knowing relationship will certainly manifest itself in heartache and longing. it's ok to yearn and dream and hope.

i know and believe this yet i constantly have to remind myself.

that being said, there is still plenty of grass on both sides of the fence to enjoy. there is a certain kind of ache associated with being single and yet desiring marriage. and yet there is an equally strong, albeit different, ache associated with being married and counting the cost of that sacrifice--the freedom, the independence, the endless possibilities of "other" choices that could have been.

those are just two aches out of the many that we humans might experience. i myself have languished in both, among others. i'm sure there are many around me who can tell tales of aches far greater.

i'm beginning to begrudgingly admit that these aches are just part of humanity. they are inescapable. anesthetizing one will only create another. perhaps many others.

further, i wonder if our aches aren't really shades of our One True Ache, our longing and yearning for Home. we must always remember that we are not yet there--this is just a stop along the way.

oh, sure, there is joy--great, abiding joy and wonderous experiences here. and it's ok to long for some of those that we've not yet been immersed in. but even if we were to be in the presence of all the good things this world has to offer we'd still not be home.