Like the Ocean

I sit here and type; I think of all that has transpired in the last four to five years.
I think of my family; I think of my friends.
I think of the trials and hardships, of the victories and losses.
.............

As I think of the people that have touched my life and the circumstances that have come in and out of my life, I cannot help but think of the waves I see on the beach here, always rolling in and going out- it never stops- every wave is new. Some of the sand remains for a while- but then it is washed back out to sea.
Life is like the tide, always rolling in and going back out; people are like the sand, coming and going with the tide- some staying longer than others, but all of them there just for the amount of time they need to be there.


For I know the plans that I have for you, says the .., plans of peace and hope, plans to prosper you and give you a future.


These plans included my grandmother's home-going, they included the end of my basketball career and my soccer career; they included my graduation from high school and first year at college. His plans included my own Dad's home-going and a trip to Argentina, they included hardship and trials, they included tears and broken hearts; his plans even included the moments that I did not understand. They included trips to China, Haiti, and South Africa, they included my graduation from college with a degree and making new bonds of family and friends; His plans included new pages written in new chapters, new jobs, old friends, new places, old lessons. His plans even included a "last minute" decision to move across the world, but the most wonderful thing about this is that it wasn't "last minute" to him- nothing that I have just mentioned ever took him by surprise.
Nothing shocked him.
There was not a moment that passed or circumstance that arose that made him second guess himself- because he already planned it.

Who would have ever guessed that any of that would happen? Who would have guessed that my brother would be married this year or that my best friend is married and having her first baby or that another friend just got engaged and another is getting married soon too? Who would have guessed that another friend would have been taken home suddenly soon after my own departure to a foreign country, or that I would be asking these questions while sitting in a foreign country?
Truly, I cannot know his plans- if I did I would probably say they  were impossible, that I would not survive the next trial, or I could not bare life without that person. I would cry and dig my heels in against the trials to come.
Though the storms come and the rain beats down hard upon the already unsettled ocean and constantly shifting sand and mercilessly drags sand away from the shore at the least expected times, we can rest assured that a peace does indeed come in the morning. "Peace be still", and all is calm. The storms will pass and the roaring waves will subside. The shore will never be the same again, but it will always be there- sustained by his master plan.