Sitting here at Queen Alia Airport, I don't know quite what to think. I cannot believe its been two years, that I'm going home, that I have to say goodbye and that I have to leave this place that has become familiar and dear to me.
In these two years, I visited Petra nine times, the Dead Sea seven times, Jerash six times, Aqaba three times and Wadi Rum twice but I never did see the Dead Sea copper scroll housed in the museum in downtown Amman. I went to Israel thirteen times, the Czech Republic four times, Egypt three times, Ethiopia twice, and swung through Germany, Belgium, Italy, England, Kenya, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates. I read 63 books and caught up on three years of back issues of the Ensign. I watched all of Psych, How I Met Your Mother, Arrested Development and Supernatural (developing an unhealthy fear of the dark, as a result of the last one). I tried, and failed spectacularly, to learn how to make pad thai but perfected my enchiladas recipe. I used up the 14 jars of spaghetti sauce in my food storage making my own special "Prego Plus" sauce. I got scuba certified but never did take those belly dancing classes or start crossfit.
Most of all, however, I will remember the last two years for the people I got to know and love. Susan came to keep me company and brought Willy with her. Is it hyperbole to say it changed my life? It certainly changed our relationship, bringing us closer together as sisters and making the second year I spent in Jordan much more vibrant, full and happy than the first. I watched the Young Women grow and mature as we learned together and am beyond thrilled that a few of them are planning for missions and the rest are enjoying figuring life out. I made amazing friends who laughed with me, traveled with me, and listened to me complain about boys, and uncertainty in life, and annoying coworkers, and more uncertainty in life. Although I had to say goodbye to them one by one, and cried a little each time, I am comforted in knowing that we'll see each other again. Turns out this is a very small world.
And so, goodbye Jordan. I still am not quite sure how this experience will fit into the larger fabric of my life and what it will be when I look back on it in 10 or 20 years. It certainly did not work out at all how I thought it would. But I wouldn't have had it any other way.
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