It already seems like a distant dream. Less than a week back home and the memories of cycling through Kenya come from an entirely different consciousness, it seems.
While the images are fresh and the recollections are easy, our team is journaling, sorting photos, sharing stories, and trying to get back into the swing of daily life. It's not easy. As much as I value normalcy, part of me does not want things to resume as "normal." I want what made an impression on me in Kenya--what moved me there--to impact my life here, now, today.
Part of that must be an appreciation for the vastness of the Great Rift Valley and its rich diversity of life. Like these pelican and leopard at Lake Nakuru, everything we encountered seemed way beyond our expectations and we had little to compare it to. No zoo we've ever been to can approach the expanse and wildness of Lake Nakuru's natural habitat of life. One just looks in every direction and back again in sheer awe.
At some point early in the journey, I let go of comparing everything to home and America. "You're not in Kansas, anymore, John," I began to say to myself. As I let go of comparisons, I began to be able to take in and receive what Kenya was and is, what it offers one's soul, one's senses, the world. Letting go of comparisons to home makes it possible to enjoy what is occurring all around without reference to one's framework of value, priority, etc.
It's an incredible feeling to turn that corner, to open up to a place and people in that way. But it makes getting back to "normal" rather difficult. Instead of getting back to "normal," my prayer for our team--and those who were our hosts and companions on the journey--is that we will all live a new normal: with a wider perspective, with a fuller heart, with a ready compassion, with an awe at the unexpected, and with gratitude for what is possible beyond the horizons we see at the moment.
-- John Franklin Hay
1 comment:
Love your description of the "new normal". Once you experience Africa you leave part of your heart behind and it will always draw you back. I've found that Africa and it's people changes a traveler in profound ways. We shouldn't resume our American lives unchanged. We need to let God use these wonderful opportunities to build His bigger vision of the world in us, as you've described.
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