It’s Just See Ya Later

I’ve never been scared of the future.

I’m still not.

I’ve dreamt about the next part of my life for years now. I cannot wait to go to medical school. I cannot wait to be a doctor. I still get a little misty-eyed when I talk about the fact that I get to live out my dream. The unimaginable greatness of that is not lost on me.

This fall, I will embark on a journey that will test me in ways that life has not yet thought to test me. I know I will be broken down and rebuilt over and over again and that I’ll probably mess up a lot along the way and that I’ll manage my stress badly and I’ll sleep far too little and I’ll be a wreck, but man, at the end of the day, I will be doing what I was made to do and that is a gift that I wouldn’t give up if I were offered the whole entire world.

So I’m not scared of the future.

But I am incredibly, deeply, terrifyingly scared of leaving the present.

It’s a new feeling. I’m good at not missing things. I’m good at uprooting and moving on. I’m good at saying goodbye to the old and embracing the new without ever looking back.

Leaving Lipscomb doesn’t feel like just saying goodbye. It feels like leaving behind the place that made me who I am.

*

Almost five years ago, I sat in my kitchen in Little Rock, Arkansas, as my friend Cameron talked to my mom and I about Lipscomb University.

“I know it sounds weird, but trust me, it is the greatest place in the world,” he said.

I was skeptical. A Church of Christ school in Nashville? 3,000 undergraduates? I’ll pass. I wanted big. I wanted prestigious. But my mom convinced me to visit.

That’s honestly the best thing she’s ever done for me.

I remember first stepping foot on campus. By 2 o’clock, I knew that this was where I would spend my next four years.

*

God, we all say it. Every one of us:

“It just felt right.”

*

And it does.
It still does.

Not just right. Not just good. This is it.

I’ve learned more about Jesus and the world and myself and loving people and service and friendship in the last four years than I ever thought I could.

I’ve made friends who will stand with me at my wedding (in the excessively distant future) and kneel by my bedside on the day I die and laugh and cry with me at every step in between.

I’ve learned how to listen to people when they’re hurting so bad they can’t breathe, and I’ve learned how to laugh with people when life just gets to be too much.

I’ve found out what it means to be fully known and fully loved, and I’ve been taught that perfection is just a devilish illusion.

I’ve been a mess and I’ve hurt people and they’ve hurt me and I’ve cried a lot of tears but I’ve laughed a lot more.

I’ve kept a fish alive for a year and four months even though I hate animals and that seems insignificant to a lot of people but actually is very important.

I’ve spent Tuesday nights at meeting and Thursday afternoons in the square and I’ve rolled in five minutes late to every class I’ve ever had.

I’ve loved. I’ve lived. I’ve had a hell of a good time.

That’s why it hurts so bad to leave. That’s why I find myself, the stoic, sobbing All. The. Time. as things come to an end. Not because I’m scared of the future. Just because I love the present more than words could ever express.

So thanks Lipscomb. Thanks Greek Life. Thanks Singarama. Thanks Stompfest. Thanks Study Abroad. Thanks Elam and Johnson and the Village. Thanks Nashville. Thanks Jesus.

1,333 days down. 30 to go.

I’d do it all over again.