4:20 am.

I'm ready.

I don't think I've every felt like this before; church was difficult for me tonight, more so than usual. I had to make the extra attempt to be involved, to make conversation, to care: my heart is looking outward now, to the journey ahead. It will be the longest of my life, and I am loathe to tarry here any longer.

My heart is leaping and overflowing with emotions, dichotomistic and schizophrenic. Naive dreams vie in my head with the corpses of dead hopes, and I am pulled in both directions. Are old things passing away, and all things being made new? Death and brokenness have marked my spiritual journey for so long that I have forgotten what a springtime of the soul feels like, and the assurances of friends aside, I am suspicious of hope.

It matters not. I am travelling again. This long break has left me restless, ill at ease and I am anxious to try my hand at anything. It matters not whether this is to be a joyous or sorrowful journey: it is the same Master who gives us both, and it is to Him that I strive. If He chooses to pour out my labor as a drink offering, than so be it.

But somewhere deep in my heart cries out that the wind is changing, and not all is as it appears...