The higher gifts

To congratulate myself on my not bad, not bad at all 3.8 this semester, on "scoring" a solo on the celebration choir recording on the same ridiculous song that I messed up so bad at a concert last month that I got taken off the verse of "Lead, Kindly Light" I was supposed to sing for Ordinations, and on finally moving a good amount of the way too much I own to storage, I bought Folk Choir's "Seven Signs" album off iTunes this morning. Needless to say, that did nothing to ameliorate the situation of "Coventry Litany of Reconciliation" being stuck in my head for about three weeks now. Not even the whole song either, just the delicate little "Be kind to one another" soprano solo. Over and over again. In my head. Three weeks.

Senior week is neato, gang, even though I'm very little caffeinated and as a result about two-thirds awake and only about three-fifths as funny as usual. Honestly, I'm sort of at a loss to explain my feelings about Senior Week just yet. I think "unsettling" is the word. Not in a way that a little Pepto would clear right up, and not just because nobody likes goodbyes, and not just because I'll never forget what it was like to look into the teary, somehow pleading and utterly and sincerely loving eyes of the Folk Choir seniors as we sang "Jesus the Lord" and "Lead, Kindly Light" at Senior Last Visit to the Grotto. Like I said, I'm still not sure. But I feel unsettled. I love that we all just hang out all the time though. I'm a little nervous that once I've gone Senior Week, I'll never go back. School really gets in the way of kickin' it with everybody and staying up until all hours of the night talking and laughing and learning the High School Musical Dance and going to the mall expressly to eat at Panda Express and watching The Original Kings of Comedy for the first time, or the eighth if you count how many times Blair and Tony P have, at one point or another, recited the entire movie. I love being a part of this. I love, I love, I love this.

In the midst of all this Senior Week goodbye madness, I've been trying to figure out what it was exactly that made this past year so transformative for me. Friendships, Folk Choir, faith and understanding and the glory glory hallelujahs of my beloved theology major... it's all of that, but it's more. I realized last night, as my eyes blurred with tears during the part at the beginning of "Jesus the Lord" when the cello crescendos for the first time, as I contemplated the reality that I won't be returning to the ol' loft until I get back from Chile in January, and how in the world the seniors must be feeling at that moment, and how completely impossible it was to not cry, and wondering why that was, as I looked from face to smiling, singing, sobbing face, trying to somehow memorize the familiar panorama and take it with me, keep it with me to constantly wipe away the dust and readjust it on the desktop of my mind like the one precious family photo you keep with you in a worn frame during your exploits in a far off lands... I realized that I've never felt more human that I did at that moment. I've never felt more a part of something larger than myself than I have this year, and somehow, in becoming a little piece, a little member, a little flower, I feel like I'm finally becoming a whole person, the kind of person who might someday understand what it means to be made in the image of a God who is love. I feel real. Our culture tells us that independence is the name of the game; that in this life, it's every man for himself. But I think Fr. Poorman put it best when, during his speech after being honored as Senior Class Fellow, he said, "Choose a community here: academics, sports, your dorm, the band,

the folk choir.

All of these communities have shown us the way we are to live, and that way is together."

And that way is together. And that way is together.

Goodnight, everybody. I love you a lot.