saying goodbye

The Perrys left today. You develop deeper relationships in life with some people than with others. That's just a fact...sometimes it is a product of long relationships and time spent together, and sometimes it is just because. Dwane, Annalisa and Johnmark and the just because kind of people in my life. I have grown to love them so much over this short month and I will miss them dearly. Can't wait to see the whole family this summer!!
Sunday was a good day. There were probably twice the normal number of people at worship and we had a a good service. It was so hard for them to do all of these things for the last time...everything became "the last one"
Brielle's friends were supposed to be there but with the snowstorm in the states (weird) they didn't catch their flight and so they arrived Sunday at 1230. We all went to eat dinner at Kartoffelhaus...it was delicious and wonderful to spend time in the company of so many great people.
I met with Dirk, who is a guy that plays on the baseball team here in Leipzig that the RFCs had some contacts with last summer. He is a really gentlemanly guy and we had a good talk over some milkshakes for a couple hours.
Yesterday was all about taking care of the last bits of business that Dwane had. I feel a lot of responsibility right now because I am in charge of a lot of things here now that Dwane is gone. I always perform best under pressure though =) Dwane and I ran around Leipzig all day taking care of stuff and meeting with people for the last time (there are those words again) I will continue to meet with Carolin, and we are becoming better and better friends...for which I am thankful.
I am also thankful for Konrad, a good Christian guy who is a medical student here in Leipzig. It is good to know that if I can't figure anything out I can call him...he speaks German lots better than me =)
Last night I stayed over at the Perrys apartment because I wanted to help them get to the airport and we had to leave the apartment at 330...so I just figured there wasn't much point in going home. We took some of the bags to the train station and put them in lockers last night so we wouldn't have to carry them in the morning. One of them wouldn't fit so Dwane decided to get a cart there and put it on...and then we just decided to push it all the way to the apartment and use it in the morning!! It says that you can only use them in the train station but no one stopped us on the way out and so we just kept pushing it =) they only lived 10 min walk from the station but still...you just don't do things like that in Germany and so it is funnier than it sounds. We locked it to the window grate at the apartment with Kondrad's bike lock and it was there in the morning...thank goodness!! It was really nice to have it because with 3 kids it would have been hard to carry it all.
They made it to Frankfurt fine and Dwane called me this morning before their plane left Frankfurt. They are over the Atlantic now and will be home soon. I know they are excited.
Please be praying for me and for the church here in Leipzig...God can do all things and for that I am thankful.