Reflections on a Box from the Past
While cleaning/re-organizing a few things around the house yesterday, I ran across a small box containing letters, notes and a few other items from about 7 or 8 years ago. I had stuck the box in a place I thought was out of the way, but it turned out that space was better occupied by other things…and I needed to move the box out of the way. I’ve known this box was in the bottom of the sewing cabinet, but that was a great place to not think about it.
Having not looked at the contents for a couple of years at least, I decided to take a moment to do so. For some reason, I have left this box frozen in time, its contents representing only a little more than a year of my life when I was still in college. The items inside included number of encouraging notes, a couple of birthday cards and thank-you notes, a panel cut out from a Myrtle Beach Salt Water Taffy box, many letters from friends in other states (most of whom I don’t keep in touch with any more), a few pictures, some dried flowers and even a pin advertising the ”bucket ‘o fries.” at McDonald’s. In retrospect, I don’t know why I even kept many of these items.
I have a lot of mixed feelings about the contents of that box. Amazement that I’ve already experienced a lot of the things I only dreamed about at that time in my life, like going on staff and seeing the Rock become what it is today. Wonder and awe that God is so good to me that He has given me a life beyond what I could have imagined at that time. Disappointment at relationships in which I didn’t keep my end of the deal and hence lost contact with amazing friends. Sadness thinking about friends I miss because they are now in other cities. Curiosity at what happened to acquaintances I haven’t seen in many years, some of whom I haven’t seen or heard from since that year.
Do you ever read things from your past and see yourself as you once were, almost as though you were looking at the life of someone else? I feel old and jaded in comparison to the idealistic, zealous, immature, young punk I was at that time in my life. I have few regrets over what has transpired since the events frozen in that box. Even when I think of the friends I have lost track of, I can see reasons why God might have wanted our lives to go in separate directions.
At that time in my life all I wanted to do was change the world. or at least change my little corner of the world at Iowa State. Now I’ve been here trying to do that for almost ten years. A few times I’ve really felt like I was, and most of the time it just felt like living life. Deep down, I know I will always be the kind of person who wants to change the world. But there are many days where I just get caught up in the mundane details of ministry and life, not really thinking about the bigger picture. I wonder what I’ll think if I hide this box for another few years? I hope I can hold on to being at least a little bit crazy and zealous even as I get really old. 