farewell chattanooga
its tuesday.
there isn't anything significant about that except that i am leaving chattanooga today. all of the past two and a half years is packed into boxes and sits in the living room of my apartment.
its strange, to move. and it is even crazier to watch God mirror the physical with the spiritual. i am moving -- on. honestly, living here has been one of the oddest, most challenging experiences in my 24.83 (how'dya like that?) years of existence. you know, i was just thinking, isn't there a writer who writes of a city as a "friend-type" character? might sound cheesy, cliche, or just stupid because this thought is probably way over-done, but i think one of the saddest parts of leaving is leaving this city.
i guess it has become a character in my play and arguably my closest friend during this time. it is this city that i knew before i met any of the people who lived in it. i spent saturday nights with it -- running on the pedestrian bridge over the tennessee river. running downtown throught the new additions by the aquarium and the fountains and along riverside parkway. sitting on the benches over the river. sitting in each and every local coffee shop until i started to get embarassed and decided it was time to rotate somewhere new. running the woods and then overlooking the entire city and surrounding area from atop lookout mtn or signal mtn. sitting on my balcony, feet propped, laptop in my lap, coffee to my right, writing about the full moon that is sitting just above the tree outside my window. i spent more time alone with this city then i ever did with one single person. and it wasn't just filler time -- i spent real time: time when i was empty and time when i was full.
wow. until right now, i never thought about it this way, but i think i just hit on something undeniably true -- and real to me. and i know that i will miss this place. sure, i could stay. i could live here. granted, it would be a little nicer to live here once i have a real income. i would get an apartment downtown -- probably one of those on market street that overlook the river. gosh, that would be amazing. i could step out my door every morning before work and go running. and then i would get to buy that run-down building that i want -- the one that is empty and covered with graffiti down on the slightly sketchy end of market street -- the far other side. it is a corner-shaped building with maybe three floors. i found it the first year i lived here. it would be my non-PT job -- a coffee shop. this town has plenty, and i have long brainstormed what would make it different. or instead of the apartment, i could look into buying a house over off mccallie -- and start renovating one room at a time. that makes me smile.
but life is different than this -- and God has given me a vision that right now, isn't here in chattanooga. you know. some people feel like God holds back blessings and good things because being a christian means to suffer -- and because i think that i want this, this, and this for my life -- then God is going to withhold each of those things from me. not true. i hope in Him. nadyezhda. nadyezhda. nadyezhda. my life is not my own. i am leaving chattanooga because my life is His. and He has a plan.
... as always, i guess he'll fill me in on that plan on a need-to-know basis. but for now, the plan is this: submit and obey.
so, i guess this is goodbye.
as hard as living here has been, i have really grown to love this place. and to leave it won't be easy.
there isn't anything significant about that except that i am leaving chattanooga today. all of the past two and a half years is packed into boxes and sits in the living room of my apartment.
its strange, to move. and it is even crazier to watch God mirror the physical with the spiritual. i am moving -- on. honestly, living here has been one of the oddest, most challenging experiences in my 24.83 (how'dya like that?) years of existence. you know, i was just thinking, isn't there a writer who writes of a city as a "friend-type" character? might sound cheesy, cliche, or just stupid because this thought is probably way over-done, but i think one of the saddest parts of leaving is leaving this city.
i guess it has become a character in my play and arguably my closest friend during this time. it is this city that i knew before i met any of the people who lived in it. i spent saturday nights with it -- running on the pedestrian bridge over the tennessee river. running downtown throught the new additions by the aquarium and the fountains and along riverside parkway. sitting on the benches over the river. sitting in each and every local coffee shop until i started to get embarassed and decided it was time to rotate somewhere new. running the woods and then overlooking the entire city and surrounding area from atop lookout mtn or signal mtn. sitting on my balcony, feet propped, laptop in my lap, coffee to my right, writing about the full moon that is sitting just above the tree outside my window. i spent more time alone with this city then i ever did with one single person. and it wasn't just filler time -- i spent real time: time when i was empty and time when i was full.
wow. until right now, i never thought about it this way, but i think i just hit on something undeniably true -- and real to me. and i know that i will miss this place. sure, i could stay. i could live here. granted, it would be a little nicer to live here once i have a real income. i would get an apartment downtown -- probably one of those on market street that overlook the river. gosh, that would be amazing. i could step out my door every morning before work and go running. and then i would get to buy that run-down building that i want -- the one that is empty and covered with graffiti down on the slightly sketchy end of market street -- the far other side. it is a corner-shaped building with maybe three floors. i found it the first year i lived here. it would be my non-PT job -- a coffee shop. this town has plenty, and i have long brainstormed what would make it different. or instead of the apartment, i could look into buying a house over off mccallie -- and start renovating one room at a time. that makes me smile.
but life is different than this -- and God has given me a vision that right now, isn't here in chattanooga. you know. some people feel like God holds back blessings and good things because being a christian means to suffer -- and because i think that i want this, this, and this for my life -- then God is going to withhold each of those things from me. not true. i hope in Him. nadyezhda. nadyezhda. nadyezhda. my life is not my own. i am leaving chattanooga because my life is His. and He has a plan.
... as always, i guess he'll fill me in on that plan on a need-to-know basis. but for now, the plan is this: submit and obey.
so, i guess this is goodbye.
as hard as living here has been, i have really grown to love this place. and to leave it won't be easy.
posted by rebekah at Tuesday, December 20, 2005
1 Comments:
well, andy, i am surprising chattanooga later this week with a visit. it'll be short -- but worth it i am sure.
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