Travel Diaries #3: Long Trains for Old Friends

I set out on Wednesday on a 4 1/2 hour train ride that traveled halfway across southern Germany to Kempten. Waiting in Kempten were Timo and Lydia and their two little girls. Timo is a man who I met at a Canadian bible school when I was three. Lydia is his wife and Anja is their eight year old daughter who left Seattle when she was two. I didn't know Jennika, their five year old daughter, even existed until I saw her when I arrived. To me, this family was frozen in time until I got off the train and everything fast-forwarded six years. The same thing probably happened to them, too, and I think Timo was surprised when he saw a nineteen year old sitting at his dining room table.

For the first time in my life, I felt like an adult. Here I had purchased a train ticket, transfered trains in Ulm and ended up sitting with Lydia drinking gluhwein and talking about life and the way it changes. I am no longer a thirteen year old living in the shadow of my family, but I am a sophomore in college with a hope to change the world. I can discuss faith with integrity and I actually have an opinion about politics. How did this happen? How did I become old enough to travel alone and discuss things that are "only for grown-ups"? It's good, but a little bit unbelievable.

Visiting this family was a highlight of the trip and I'm glad I made the trek and coughed up the 35 euros. It's always a joy when I can be away from someone for so long and then meet again with the feeling that it hasn't been so long. There was nothing awkward about meeting up with them; it was a joyful reunion. It wasn't just a reunion, though, it was the realization that somewhere between moving into the dorms and flying to Munich, I have grown.

As I sat and played UNO with Anja, who I remember being born, I realized that I have grown into someone sot of resembling an adult. The girls asked me if I was a kid like them or a grown up like their parents. I told them I was in a strange place in between where I can still act like a kid, but am an adult when life calls for it. I like to be in this place of life. The place where playing hopscotch is acceptable, but it's also okay to stay up past 9:30.

All of this to say, after ten days on my own, I have seen a very good side of the ever dreaded "growing up."