The beginning of the end

Every Tuesday night, I join a small group of young adults from Silverlake Community Church, where I have been attending regularly since October, for dinner and a time of fellowship, worship, prayer and discussion of the previous Sunday's sermon. It is one of the many "communities" that I have become a part of during my time in Hollywood. This past Tuesday, I shared with them the excitement I've been feeling lately as I'm finally nearing the end of the long discernment and decision-making process regarding where I will attend Seminary in the fall. Implicit in my excitement was the obvious fact that by the 3rd week of August, I will have left Los Angeles, and with it, Silverlake Church -- along with the other many communities and social groups I've become a part of over the past 7 months.

After our prayer and discussion time was over, a few of my friends from the group approached me and asked me when I was leaving. They told me I would be missed. They lamented the fact that people always leave LA. They talked about how fast the next four months would fly by.

I remember the exact same comments in Spanish, which started almost exactly a year ago.

"Hermano, ya te vas a ir, no?" (Brother, you're going to be leaving really soon, aren't you?)

"Hermano, te vamos a extrañar mucho." (Brother, we're really going to miss you.)

"Hermano, el tiempo esta corriendo! Ya te falta poco para irte." (Brother, time is flying! You barely have any left before you leave.)

When I started having those conversations with people in Lima last year, I thought they seemed kind of absurd. Because time-wise, I'm actually only about 2/3 of the way through my term of service. And in terms of actual "stuff to do," I'm sure the final third will include much more than the previous two. But in the end, they were right. The time flew. The last four months were amazing, but they went by incredibly fast.

However, even having the knowledge of previous experience of year-long term of service in Peru, I found myself responding to my friends on Tuesday in the exact same way that I did to my friends and family a year ago in Peru (I even used some of the same hand gestures that I tend to use for some reason when I talk in Spanish). I told them that four months is plenty of time. I said that I don't want to think about leaving. I said that LA/Peru is really starting to grow on me.

As in Peru last year, I find myself finally growing accustomed to things. I feel like I finally have acquired the skills and understanding to do my job at PATH well. I'm starting to take initiative and really understand the way things work. I'm really getting attached to my coworkers.

Our neighborhood ministry has also developed its core group of "regular kids" for our tutoring and hang-out time. The kids feel more comfortable with us and are actually starting to respect our rules (and they, too, are starting to ask us how much time we have left before we leave).

The intentional community I have with my fellow YAVs/Dwellers still has "a long way to go" (assuming we have a destination?), but as evidenced by this blog entry by Matthew, we've made much progress that one can occasionally catch glimpses of.

So for the second year in a row, I find myself buckling down in an effort to make the most of my last four months as a Young Adult Volunteer. The days are lengthening here, just as they were shortening a year ago in Peru. The temperature is climbing, in the same way that it will soon be dropping in Peru. Flowers I saw in full bloom here in September are beginning to bud again. And if I think about it, I can feel the light mist that characterizes the winter months in Lima, from May to November, blowing right in my face as I approach with wonder and anxiety a totally foreign bus stop.