As Thanksgiving grows near each year, the women of my family have a tradition of taking an annual trip together before the madness of December descends upon us. This trip is for celebrating and strengthening our relationships as grandmother, mother, daughter,sister, aunt, cousin, and niece. Because I have four sons and a husband in my immediate family, this time with my female relatives is especially necessary and important for me. I am eternally grateful for each of these women and our time apart which always serves to renew and refresh my spirit.
However, today I find the idea of leaving home is bittersweet. I am as excited as ever to go and be with my family but I am sad to be apart from my new friends at World Relief, even for a week. It was with a heavy heart that I told my Burmese friends I would not be there on Tuesday to tutor English. We had eleven most wonderful students on Friday for English class and it makes me so sad to have to miss this Friday. How it is that these people have become so near and dear to me in only a few months of interning at World Relief?
However, today I find the idea of leaving home is bittersweet. I am as excited as ever to go and be with my family but I am sad to be apart from my new friends at World Relief, even for a week. It was with a heavy heart that I told my Burmese friends I would not be there on Tuesday to tutor English. We had eleven most wonderful students on Friday for English class and it makes me so sad to have to miss this Friday. How it is that these people have become so near and dear to me in only a few months of interning at World Relief?
This morning for devotion I read a poem of thanksgiving by Howard Thurman, for "all the warmth of humankind that I have known." This poem helped me to understand the love I feel for my new friends and my sadness at being apart from them for the next few weeks. It actually put my deeply felt appreciation to and for them in the context of family. And so this morning, hours before my family arrives and we begin our journey together, I offer this prayer of thanksgiving:
"We bring to mind all the warmth of humankind that we have known:
Our mothers' arms,
The strength of our fathers,
The playmates of our childhood...
The tears we have shed, the tears we have seen;
The excitement of laughter and the twinkle in the eye with its reminder that life
is good.
For all these we make an act of Thanksgiving this day."
Our mothers' arms,
The strength of our fathers,
The playmates of our childhood...
The tears we have shed, the tears we have seen;
The excitement of laughter and the twinkle in the eye with its reminder that life
is good.
For all these we make an act of Thanksgiving this day."
Caren is a student at Vanderbilt University Divinity School currently interning with World Relief Nashville for the 2011-2012 academic year.
