Safe Landing

My skin is dry, I see as many Mormons as one would see candies in a candy store,  and my hair has stopped sporting its obnoxious, humidity-induced waves... hmm. I must be back in Utah! Okay, try nearly three weeks back in Utah. Where do I possibly begin this tale? Coming home from my mission in Quebec has enveloped me in a whirlwind of good, bad, and ugly emotions, and at times an absorbing state of pensive gloom. In spite of the emotional whirlwind I have passed through in a matter of a few weeks, I can only look to the future with happiness and hope for what life has in store for me. ...And then I think about Quebec and how much I miss everyone there... dang it. The feelings are still fresh! Letting go of ruminating on the past one thread at a time, I suppose. 

On my last full day in the mission field I awoke to a 101° fever, a chain smoker voice and nauseating anxiety. Obviously I wasn't going to let anything stop me from visiting my loved ones in LaSalle and enjoying my last hours of missionary work, but my goodness was that an ill-timed flu. Saying goodbye to the ones that I love felt perhaps worse than the day I left on my mission, but I couldn't quite wrap my head around the fact that I was actually leaving. Wasn't singing EFY songs with Jordan and eating Filipino food at the Morales's just like any other day? Wouldn't I be making tamales at the Lahache's house and listening to my ward mission leader yell lovingly at his kids the same time next week? The thought of facing a new reality, my old reality, seemed unreal. 

Yet shortly thereafter I really did find myself boarding a plane, wondering when it would all come crashing down and finally settle in. I drank Quebec in for one of my last times as I gazed over the landscape of Montreal through towering airport windows. I turned to one of the dear sister missionaries next to me and said, "You can't even imagine how much you have blessed this place." Tears began to well in her eyes, and she uttered three words in reply that shook my whole soul. "It's so sacred."

Sacred. I could not think of a better word to describe how it felt to be in Quebec, how it felt to be a missionary, how it felt to live and breathe and work over the past 18 months. In that moment looking through those daunting airport windows I couldn't help but shed my own tears, a strange mixture of tears of sorrow and of joy. 

The hours spent in the airplane seemed to drag on like days. The group of amazing missionaries traveling home with me became my world for a time.  I literally had nothing else to cling to, nothing else to identify with. I desperately needed them as a security net. Was I really going home? Did my family actually exist outside of my imagination? What on earth would happen when I stepped off that plane? A connection flight and an eternity later I looked out my window and saw the glorious, mountainous landscape of Utah. It was all starting to sink in, slowly but surely. I shed a silent tear or two as I looked over my beautiful homeland, for once feeling at peace, no longer a foreigner in a strange yet hallowed land. 

Scared, lost, confused, joyful, excited missionaries stepped off the plane, a general feeling of disbelief overshadowing us all. Approaching the escalator I heard a man say to us, "Go! There are a million people waiting down there for you!" I simply couldn't believe it. Our families were actually there? These people really existed? Fear nearly kept me from stepping onto the escalator, but anticipation pushed me forward. And so I took that last step, the stairs unfolded downward, revealing to my view a sea of screaming, happy people. I couldn't even see my family and I was already sobbing. I served a full-time mission! I was home! I was really, truly, actually home.

And then I saw them. My legs could not carry me fast enough to my glorious shero's welcome. I have never known what true joy felt like until that very moment, locked in my mother's embrace, surrounded by dearest family members and friends. The source of unwavering support that I had always felt but never seen over the past year and a half was finally there, in the flesh, right before my very eyes. The sense of love was almost too much to bear, and my chain smoker voice could only scream out in jubilation so loud! Never has there been so much joy, love, and happiness in one place at any given time than that moment at the Salt Lake City airport. 

Now I'm here, I'm home, and I'm sorting out life one moment, one choice, and one man at a time. ;) I will be forever grateful for my time as a missionary and for the people I met while serving my Heavenly Father. What does the RM world have in store for me? I suppose only time will tell, but for now, forgive my awkward RMness and help me get back to the atmosphere. That is all I ask. Bye for now! Life updates to come.