Do you know what today is??

I woke up this morning at 6:15 am. Which may not seem early to you, but it's early for me. I had to pack, shower, eat breakfast and help load the car. I sat down at the table for my last waffle and began to think about my day. Chapel at 8, class at 8:30, no lunch, class should end around 1:30 (though I wish it would be 1). Grab lunch at Taco John's, drive for 6 hours, get home, crash and burn...

Before I leave, I need to turn in my lunch card...oh wait it's packed away...I'll mail it in.

I need to see Jason one more time...

I need to go to chapel, in case there is something I need to hear about...

But today is the last time I'll be on this campus, in intensives, in the Residence Inn truly enjoying community.

Today was my last chapel. Today will be the last time I see Jason until next March (I promise, I'm coming).

Today is the last day I'll be here and be a student.

When I arrive on June 10th (126 days from now), I'll be arriving to don a cap and gown and walk down an aisle and receive a degree that I have worked my ass off to receive. I've cried more, laughed harder, thought more, stretched myself as far as I thought I would go. And of course I'm sad.

When I arrive back in Chicago tonight, I will be on the down slope of my program. 4 more months. Out of 3 years in which I have changed so much that I don't even recognize myself at times, I have only 4 more months. The thought alone makes me want to throw up. I have no idea what is next. I have inklings of what is next. I have fear about where I will be and where I want to be. I have fear around losing the best community I will probably ever experience and whether or not I will ever find it again. So, I'm leaving Bethel today, only to arrive back and graduate. I need to make these last 4 months count...I need to make them the best....I need to reach those desires...perhaps Tennyson says it best:

Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean. Tears from the depth of some divine despair rise in the heart and gather to the eyes, in looking on the happy autumn-fields, and thinking of the days that are no more-Alfred Lord Tennyson