Rain
I’ll be honest, I just want to feel something like I did in July of 2006.
Or maybe it was August.
I can’t remember.
I brought big questions to a small town in West Virginia.
Fresh off crutches from a torn meniscus and damaged cartilage in my right knee.
Or left.
I can’t remember, but neither of them work as they should today.
I hadn’t been outside of Orlando in months or off the couch in weeks.
I had been stuck, a place I find myself more often than I’d like to admit.
There was a heaviness I held in my heart and I couldn’t help but believe my young life was already falling apart.
Dramatic, I know.
All I wanted was to believe everything was okay and that life wouldn’t always feel this way.
Before we left, they said this trip was meant to serve and love and care for those who needed help, but I soon realized that this small town in the Appalachian would serve and love and care for me.
No matter how many fences we painted, lawns we mowed, or smiles we brought to children's faces, I couldn’t help but believe they were helping me become me.
Thursday night we read from John 13.
Before Jesus goes to Calvary, He washes His disciples feet.
Even Judas, which is wild to me.
He came to serve and love and care and that’s what He did.
After we read they said, “tonight we are going to wash your feet, just like Jesus washed theirs.”
I sat on the floor with my knees to my chest and watched the dirt mix with the warm water.
She told me He loved me and that He would do this for me.
She told me this is what love was meant to be.
She told me it was going to be okay, He has a better way.
For the first time I felt like me and I felt free.
Changed by the water; I had finally been seen.
We left on Friday and found ourselves somewhere outside of Chattanooga, Tennessee.
I remember the sound of the rain as it hit the tin roof above our heads.
I remember waking up hours before the rest, climbing in the dark out of bed.
I remember the call of the outside, inviting me to stand by the river to watch God push the sun over the mountain's jagged edge.
I remember the morning dew beneath my bare feet, grass baptized by the summer night.
I remember exhaling into the dark, like this was the first day of my life.
I remember feeling like me and feeling like I was free.
I remember believing everything was going to be okay.
With hope,
Tanner