Lookout! It's a special Monday edition of Natalie's blog. Woohoo!
So, I'm here in the computer lab with Jason because he's researching this big paper. His recent devotion to his class as it's ending has inspired me to finally start my independent study class. So far, so good. I'm thinking I can knock out a lesson in about 2 or 3 days, depending. So, there's only 10 lessons...I'm sure I'll be done before fall semester starts. But, on to more interesting topics.
So, I've written in earlier blogs of the irony I've faced in coming to Nashvegas. I wanted to leave COMO so badly I almost couldn't take it anymore. I'm gone for about 2 weeks and I'm realizing all the wonderful things I have there, or really I should just say friends. I've had crazy roommate adventures thus far in Nashvegas and my roommates in Columbia are some of my best friends. I have the one man I truly and utterly love here, but I have no females to share with, to laugh and cry with, to be accountable with in this relationship or my faith. I have so much there, and so much here. They're equally important, equally wonderful, equally needed- these girl relationships and Jason- yet I currently cannot have both. So, I'm torn. I'm not as I was in Columbia, itching to leave and find bigger things, but I'm not settled in Nashville. I can't ignore the massive hole that is the lack of my dear friends in my daily life. Phone and email just aren't the same--that's why I'm in Nashville with Jason! I guess right now I just can't have it all- but I want to!
It's taking me back to my first semester of college. It's a time when everything is new and different and you're meeting so many people all at once. I remember sitting back and deciding who of all of these people I was meeting seemed like the kind of person I could really connect with and develop a close friendship with. I chose a few and then started the adventure and sometimes greuling process of getting to know these people. Friendships take time- a lot of time if you want them to be real and meaningful, and I'm all about real and meaningful relationships. Relationships are all that truly matter in this life. Effecting other hearts, other souls, is the only truly eternal impact one can have. Friends are worth more than all the riches in the world. Okay, I now think I've reached the point of rambling.

Basically, I miss my friends, I feel like a freshman in college again, only now I'm not meeting people at Crusade and in the dorm. I've got the fellow Ted's servers and cooks (yes!), a church bible study (potential) and not all that much time to make those "meaningful" relationships. The scariest and most challenging part is that this truly is practice for what lies only 6 months away. I tell myself it will be different then, things will be more permanent then, I'll be done with school and so will Jason, we'll be married and living together-but will it really be all that more permanent? Will I really have more time to make these friends than I do now? There's no time like the present right? It's a tricky situation. I'm learning a lot. It's painful and slow and at times painfully slow, but all good things come with time.

I'm excited by the future and all the challenges it holds. I'm even excited by the challenges I'm facing right now, because I know how much stronger and better of a person it makes me. And, I have amazing people at my side-even if that's only through a phone call or email. I'm going home this weekend. I think it will be a great break from all of these challenges and a chance to regroup and refresh. Two more days. Until next time...