Every time I find myself moving between countries I find difficulty; as if I’m followed by these trials trying to trip me and stop me and deter me. Taking time to look past the difficult, finding time to remember after the difficult, I am finding something new. I am finding growth. Less cliche than “trails bring growth”, just in me growing. I’m by no means full of knowledge, but with each stage in my life, with moving between these two countries, being in different stages in my relationships with people around me, the changes occurring and the things happening, who I am is developing and solidifying. More than just returning to different homes on a semi regular basis, I’m also experiencing a different returning. A returning of myself. In the last few years of me, I lost so many things of myself due to the situations around me and the way I responded. It’s as if I let go of things that were such vital parts of who Abba created me to be, but they got chiseled away by the crap going on around me. And now Sweet Jesus is chiseling deeper into my core to make these things resurface. I’m learning so much more about how to take care of me. Jesus is returning to me a kindness, gentleness and fierceness surrounding myself. He’s firming up the ground I stand on so I no longer curl up into myself. In a way, so I stop letting people walk across me like a doormat. I am being returned to the Maggie I was created it be, and it is tough, but oddly feels comfortable, like I’ve been here before and I’m being released back into it. I let places and spaces of my heart get stripped away and I’m getting the chance, the privilege to step back into these things that were created for me.

During my time in Colombia the first time around, I started embracing even more the parts of arting that my heart leaps at; music, calligraphy, writing, occasionally painting. So things that were already there got extracted and I got to practice making and creating, doing things that were in me me had yet to be explored. And now, this little teensie trip is showing me the things I get to return to. I don’t think God took them away, I think I let them fall away, I shrank into myself and in some ways forfeited parts of my heart. I’m getting them back!

This trip has come with it’s own forms of hard; changes in the foundation, changes in my relationships here, changes, changes, and more changes! But with all the things God has been rolling back out to me, the things that would previously make me crumple have just been speed bumps forcing me further into the arms of Jesus. It’s been awesome, in the occasionally very hard, but crazy good way.

I’ve been here for three in a halfish weeks now and I return to the States in two weeks! My goodness. Time has slipped and slid through my fingers, yet again.

I’ll get back into regular writing, eventually, for now this is what I’ve got. God is amazing and mind blowing in His perfect timing. I’m thankful for the things of me that are returning to me.

And here’s a smattering of photos from the last bit of time: