Monday, August 11, 2014

The Voice of Summer

And it all lays quiet. Not a person is stirring and all the buildings are asleep for a nap. We all take a sigh of relief because summer is over.

A still, small voice is saying, "I love you." A voice that I searched for, hoped for, and yearned for this summer. And voice that some days was hard to understand and hard to be believed.

Because this summer was one of absolute chaos. It was the summer of ending a year internship, but the beginning of transitioning into a full-time job. And it was the summer of having fifteen new friends come into our home. It was the summer of applying and interviewing for a job and then anxiously awaiting to hear. It was the summer of loving Colorado, but missing North Carolina. It was the summer of living in limbo and trying everyday to love twelve high school girls that worked in the washboard. And it was a summer of searching for the voice of truth... for the voice that comes after the clouds clear and after the tears have been shed.

session one buttons: mary margaret, katie, jordan, taylor, hannah, mia, abby, meg, sarah neal, grayson, gretta //
bosses : cara & robyn 
second session buttons: stelly, jessica, deanna, ashley, ashia, kinsey, sarah, laney, olivia, lauren, alise, lizzie //
bosses: hannah & lindsay
third session buttons: gabrielle, morgan, brooke, abby, mc, claire, jade, leah, lauren, izzy, kendyl, lucy caroline // bosses: kaylan & cassidy

And that's hard. No one can ever really prepare you for the amount of transition you experience that first year after the college, and well probably not for the second either. No one tells you that one morning you may wake up feeling completely alone, only to go to sleep feeling so incredibly loved... or vice versa. No one tells you that just when you think that you have met all the best friends that you could possibly have, that there are still more to come. No one tells you that tears are the words you just can't put together. No one tells you that heartbreak comes in more than one fashion. No one tells you that some days feel like shit and the next day feels like heaven on earth. No one tells you because it is hard to feel that anything is stable and that any day is going to be the same as the one before.

And in all of the chaos, the voice still speaks. The voice never stops speaking. Some days the voice feels far away, but it is always still full of truth and beauty.

Colorado summers show you that. When the snow melts, there is abundant moisture and green fields to frolic in. While some days you feel stuck in the valley, the mountaintops are proof that there are high places.

I needed to know that this summer. I needed to know that I am not stuck in the bottomless pit of transition. I needed to know that the Lord still loved me, even though I didn't love myself every single day. I needed to know that there is beauty in the ashes.

And the Lord showed me that in days spent playing outside, in sweet new friendships, in sunsets, and in adventures.

:::here's to a summer that I will absolutely never forget:::

{dominguez canyon backpacking}
{fly camping with these girls}
{packs for days with the best}
{tip top of a fourteener in sandals. we do weird things}
{carnivals on carnivals}
{mountaintop fourth}
{rainbow promises}
{washboardt captain laughter}
{meet new longtime bestie, hannah}
{hearing this girl's testimony at work crew night}
{table panoramas for days}
{devil's thumb hiking adventures}
{forever friends}
{playing in fields}
{sunsets in rocky mountain national park}
{rooftop love}
{granby ranch}
{crooked creek ranch summer interns 2014}

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