So, at 23, I packed up my stuff, and my college roommate and I moved into a charming little house, in charming little Hastings in the summer of 2009. I knew exactly 2 people, and I didn't really have a plan except for not living at home anymore.
Turns out, though, it's probably not the best way to plan your adult future. Also, I should point out that we were "house sitting" for people who were deployed in Iraq and were living there for a stupid cheap amount, not the best way to budget how adults really lived.
But, it was lovely. We had a beautiful back yard (where we caught a woodchuck..or something) with a fire pit, we had a back porch we used to sit in and talk about God and watch the rain. We'd drink coffee and teach ourselves how to play piano on a gorgeous grand piano that sat in the front window.
It's here where i first met Sam and Julia, not know then how much they would be a part of my life. It's everything you'd ever want for your post college apartment, living with your best friend, and living the dream.
Less than a year later, we'd pack our things again and move to St. Paul. In a perfect old apartment with crooked hardwood floors, and a great view a downtown, and the chime of the Cathedral bells.
We rented a truck and drove 700 miles in one day. I moved my bed out of parents house. I stared at my empty childhood bedroom and hug my entirely family goodbye....not really realizing the importance of that...the fact that they were all there. It should not a be a surprise, i'm horrible at goodbyes. We all laughed about how i should not be the one to drive the moving truck...because...well...i was kind of terrible driving in my younger days.....We got 40 miles out Green Bay when I lost my shit. All the tears...I'm a repressed human...i know, i should be in therapy. I've heard it a million times. But... my roommate grabbed my hand, promised that everything was going to be great and if it wasn't....we could always go home....
and what's the exact when i let my heart be in two places. We moved in. So many beautiful people who did not know me very well...but would soon become some of the people closest to my heart....helped us move boxes, and boxes, and boxes of our things. It took four of us and my neck nearly broken to get a king sized mattress up those tiny stairs and into our tiny-ish apartment.
Decorated in hand me downs sprinkled with new things from Target and Ikea...we were on our way.
And what a way it was. I fell in love with St. Paul. A city whose heart beat, is in sync with mine. A city who wraps me up in her quaint and quiet charm and makes me fall in love with life again and again.
Our tiny apartment was full of mischief and love and most of the time at there was at least one other person there that didn't actually live there. And we loved it. Outside our back window was a parking lot where Hans parked cars for events at excel. He was the first person we met, we offered him the rest of our dominos pizza that we walked all the way downtown to get. (side note: we had no idea what we were doing)
Pizza Luce delivered to us. Two kids who need to feel loved and a safe place to land, landed on our couches. We held meetings, small groups, and birthday parties there. Boys broke our hearts, we were the best of friends and the worst of enemies and nothing could prepare us for the transition that lay ahead. The roads we had to pave on our own.
Then, 3 years later, I packed up my stuff again. It's hard to stay good-bye to something that you loved so much. It's even harder to do with with the pieces of our heart in your hands. But the thing that Minnesota does is give me people who love me far beyond what i deserve. So, while my heart and life were in pieces, there were people helping me put the pieces back together.
And about year later, I moved out of St. Paul and into the grove. It's been a whirlwind. I don't understand love or grace or why people who offer it so freely to me, Especially since this last year and half has been the hardest....and I've been the worst version of myself...and even i don't love it.
I'll never understand. I don't have words for what i feel about this place, and this time and how much it means to me. Brad used to say " you're a good thing" but one time he said " You're a good thing, go where you feel the most love" and that's right here. It's the scariest, most heart exposing love i have ever known this side of the Mississippi, and i don't understand why at all. I just know that i get little glimpses of who Jesus is, and what he wants this world to look like, here.
I've needed glimpses of Jesus lately. He feels far away and like we are speaking totally different languages. So, today, when I realized that it had been 5 years....i saw the years like a flipbook, a playlist of memories, and i was completely overwhelmed.
My roots are firmly planted in the Wisconsin ground, But, the branches, Minnesota, belong to you. They are stretching out and growing leaves, i don't know what direction their go, but i'm so thankful for them. If you cut the rings open, they tell a special kind of love story.
The kind of love story you can only tell when people have loved you as much like Jesus as we can possibly fathom this side of heaven.
This has been a rambly mess, but tonight as i sat with two of my small girls, who just happen to be best friends. I was, again, over come with thankfulness. For being able to understand what it's like to have a best friend who loves you in a way no one else does.
Minnesota the most important thing you've given me is my people, and a deep appreciation for community and standing in the gap for the people you love.
How very special to be "worth it" for an incredible group of humans.
I literally have to wake up in 5 hours, and i'm the dummy still trying to make sense of what my heart is telling my head to say.
Thank you for loving me. I don't have words. No, i suppose they'll come much later, they almost always do.
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