ohio, cincinnati.

when i hear the city name in my head,
i see my name written between the letters.
it's weird. i didn't think it could be like that.
i didn't know how some one could connect with a place
so random and particular,
in such a short time, knowing nothing about it,
never have been there before.
but it happens,
it's something that can't explained until you feel it yourself.
i sure never understood it before.
all i know is that somehow the brethren knew my heart
when they assigned me to those mid-western states.
because all my soul wanted was to talk to american people living in middle-of-no-where-towns
surrounded by corn fields.
now that there might be a chance i'd get to spend some time living in a busy city too
and watch city lights dance on the water of the ohio river,
it's more than i could've asked for.
oh what a perfect, perfect place.
how is it possible to be sent there out of random assignment?
a witness it's not so random at all.
i got assigned there out of soul yearning because God knows my soul.

***

minutes before i opened the envelope, only one feeling engulfed me: rejection.
i did not want to go any more.
i wanted to tell everyone to go home and that i was going to rip up the envelope, throw it away,
and just not go.  i could've. i could've decided to just not go.
feeling overwhelmed in a way i'd never felt, i felt the most confused about it i'd ever felt.
i opened the 8.5x11 envelope,
and then my full name was typed at the top, under the letter head, addressing me as 'sister'.
and all i could feel was how weird that was, i never imagined doing this myself.
after seeing countless friends and facebook videos of people reading the same cliche words
it still didn't seem real. and wondered what in the heck did i get myself into?

the whole evening passed and i still didn't know what to think.
so i just didn't.

it wasn't until the next day when i thought the city name to myself
and thought: i'm really going there.
sure, i've heard of the place before. but i'd never thought of it as a real place
with streets and buildings and trees and cars.
with real people living and breathing.
that have real lives--each so individual and customized.
and i became more excited than ever.
to have a real american experience
in a place with history and a culture different than i've experienced.
what better way to experience a place to its core
than to live there for a year and a half talking to people about the realest thing in the universe:
God's plan for his children and how the Savior's role is the most significant thing that's ever happened in the history of the world.

and i know it's for me.
it's how the rest of my life afterward will work out; it's the experience i've just got to have.
and rumor has it, i won't regret one bit my decision to serve.