23. It’s not a particularly fabulous number, especially not in any sense of a landmark birthday. Honestly, from here on out there are only a few special numeric age-markers left for me to experience. Those of which include; the year I get to rent a vehicle, my Golden birthday, 30, 50, and God-willing and forbid, 100…
In any case, I may have found myself at the unspectacular marking of another year in the continuous march of time that is my life, however, it will be the least un-extraordinary year that my life will have so far. It’s another year with another life-altering adventure that the tips of my feet are preparing themselves to step into. As with any state of transition a human being finds themselves in, expectations of what is to be have begun to spring up within my mind and take root.
A dear friend of mine brought to my attention the beauty and importance of bringing those expectations to the forefront of your conscious. So, when they are broken (or in some instances met) the impact they have upon your emotional well-being is of less significance. Writing them down helps to address the dissonance that will play itself out when what is expected does not happen. In-as-much, here are 23 (out of many I have written out) expectations I have for this next step in my life:
1. I will be pooping outside in a hole in the ground, bathing in a bucket, and sleeping on a straw mat.
2. Kiswahili will be extremely tough to learn
3. It will take a really long time (if any) to see any outcome from my work
4. My home-stay family will be awesome, but difficult to get close with for some time
5. I will experience God in unimagined ways
6. I will be sick/irregular a lot
7. People I become/am close with might die
8. It will be difficult to share my faith/find a solid community
9. I won’t do well at keeping daily quiet times, but when I do have them they will be phenomenal
10. People will forget about me/move on
11. Important stuff will get stolen
12. This experience will help me come to a decision/find direction for my career life
13. I will love being free from some modern conveniences/distractions (i.e. cell phone, tv, regular internet)
14. Not having regular access to be able to create music will kill me
15. I will come to understand and find security in my identity
16. I will do really well in the beginning at regular journaling and slowly fade into hardly journaling at all
17. Not being up-to-date with new music is going to make me extremely sad
18. I will find solace in creativity
19. Soccer will continue to be a love, and also an enemy (since I will not be able to compete with the Kenyans)
20. Becoming out of touch will popular culture and "the new" will be inevitable (and a God-send in some senses)
21. I will get to see wild African animals up close and personal!
22. I will get Malaria =(
23. People will do really well at written correspondence for a while but I will slowly begin to see regular letters
fade over time
"Call to me and I will answer you. I will tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know." Jeremiah 33 v. 3
