News:

A billion people died on the news tonight.

Life comes at you fast. Tonight on ABC news there were an uncanny string of stories that caught my attention. I don't usually even watch the news. First, a family of five were shot dead in Baltimore, supposedly by an angry boyfriend. In Columbia, a stray bullet hit a four year old boy in the head, leaving him in critical condition at the time of reporting. Lastly, they showed a short clip of an Black woman from New Orleans getting upset with the missing peoples situation, including her mother. They titled the story 'Raw Emotion'. In light of all the talking and learning about what the Bible has to say about cities, these seem all too relevant. But even so, just like the many other times I've heard this sort of morbid news, I'm still not sure what to do. Right now I mourn. I mourn because of the violence that comes from a network of people being selfish. I mourn because I feel like I know that woman and her missing mom, that she was my neighbor in New Orleans. I mourn because people will see these news stories and come away unsympathetic, and then go to bed and wake up the next morning to continue their daily cycle.

I want to go back. This I know for sure. I've seriously thought about what it would look like to raise funds for another trip, maybe a week... and what it might look like to fundraise for a semester and all the logistics and organizing I'd have to do. Though praying through it thus far seems to point in the 'not yet' direction. I don't know. I do know that I will always miss it. I have a good feeling that someday I'll be back there to leave a little more of my heart down there.