epilogue

Has it really been almost six weeks that I've been back in Maine? It's hard to believe. I thought I was going to walk away from this journal for good once my travels were done, but it only seems appropriate to end with a "where is he now?" episode, so to speak. To answer that question, I'm sitting in a McDonalds, enjoying a hot cup of coffee on a cool, rainy day. I can partake in this sort of an afternoon indulgence for two reasons: (1) I have a McDonalds gift card (thanks Jesse!), and (2) I'm still unemployed, which is starting to become a source of frustration. More on that later.

The first couple of weeks that I was back I took it pretty easy... rest, recuperate, relax and record were my goals, with the 'record' part referring to typing up and editing this journal. That proved to be a much more tedious, difficult, and heart-wrenching task than I had anticipated. It was good, but also weird and difficult, to re-immerse myself into the events of the summer. Sometimes I would get so overwhelmed with memories and flashbacks that I would have to go out for a walk to let my mind settle back down. I found it hard to maintain the feel, tone, and intent of what I wrote while also trying to make my hasty scribblings comprehensible to others. If I were to do a word-by-word comparison, there's probably about an 80% correlation between what I wrote and what ended up being transcribed here, but I think that the tone, intent, and overall feel of what I originally wrote is more or less intact (and hopefully enhanced).

All in all, I'm glad that this project is almost done and ready for "public release." I'll admit, I'm more than a little hesitant to let a wide range of friends and family gain some pointed insights into my cluttered brain,; it's the classic dilemma of whether or not to let people get a glimpse of the "real" you, for fear that they might not like you. It's much easier to keep a deflector shield up, making sure others can only get so close and that they can only observe the perfectly engineered facade that has been designed for maximum likeability. In that sense, I'm probably a lot like China: it may be common knowledge to the world that I'm pretty screwed up, but I still try my darnedest to keep up a good public image. So, this is a little step out of my christian-camouflaged shell, saying "This is me; this is part of who I am, what my life looks and feels like from the inside."

My shoulder is getting better. The collarbone seems to be fully healed and hasn't given my any pain in a couple of weeks, but my shoulder is still hovering at around 75-80% strength, which is a little frustrating. it is getting better, just slowly. I'm not sure whether the lingering soreness, stiffness and lack of strength is due more to the month and change of little-to-no use, or the blunt force trauma of the collision itself - but either way, these last few rungs on the ladder of recovery are proving difficult to get past. I have been able to surf, bike, and hike in the past week or two, which has been great. All things considered I'm recovering well, but I can't wait to be back at 100% - anything less than that frustrates me to no end.

Speaking of frustrating... unemployment is starting to lose its luster (actually, I've decided to start using the phrase "on sabbatical" instead of "unemployed;" it has much more positive connotations). It's only been in the past 2-3 weeks that I've started to search in earnest, and so far nothing has come of it. I've had one interview, which actually resulted in a job offer... which I ended up turning down, for a variety of reasons. Now, of course, I'm kicking myself, since nothing else has turned up... but at the time, it just didn't seem like a good fit. To be honest, part of me wishes I had taken it if for no other reason than to be able to say "I have a job! Hooray!", rather than writing a conclusion to my journal that leaves more threads loose than tied up.

But after all, reality isn't the stuff of novels, with carefully crafted resolutions and conclusions that are both satisfying and compelling. Life is weird. Life is messy. Life is "live forward and understood backwards" (Kierkegaard). Someday, whether in this life or the next, we'll reach a point where everything makes sense. In the meantime, my only calling is to "seek first the Kingdom of God." Frankly, I've found myself becoming lazy and sloppy in my spiritual disciplines over the past couple of weeks. That's changing, but it's been a wakeup call to keep my sights firmly planted on my true calling: to become a fully devoted follower of Christ.

That is my calling

That is who I'm meant to be

And that's who, with God's help, I'm on my way to becoming










(p.s.- below are some pictures from the summer. it's a conspicuously limited sample of everything that happened this summer; i'm absent-minded when it comes to taking pictures. if anyone else would like to share their photos from the summer, just drop a link to them in the comments or send it to me and i'll post it here. enjoy :)