farewells...

if i were solomon writing ecclesiates 3, there's one more "time" i would add in -- a time to say hello and a time to say goodbye. this is something that definitely is a "season" under heaven, especially where we live in blacksburg.

living in a college town can be challenging sometimes, because its such a transient place. people come and go, and yet, some of us stay. so we have a lot of hellos and goodbyes...more than the average person in some suburb or city somewhere.

this week has been a week to say farewell to our friends deric and sarah. they have both recently received their PhDs and are moving to boston to start jobs/post-grad work. it is a very exciting time for them, as they are going to be able to experience the fruits of their labor. but it is also a sad time, as they are saying farewell to blacksburg for a long time.

david and i met deric through basketball in war memorial gym, and it turned out he had been to nlcf so he recognized us. there's been a group of mostly grad students deric knows that david and i joined in with who have played basketball together weekly for the last 2 years. and now its time to say farewell.

we played our last "game" with deric on tuesday in the gym, and last night we joined a crowd of folks at the cellar to have a final meal with deric and his wife sarah. they pack up the uhaul on sunday (assuming uhaul actually has a truck for them -- they've had quite an ordeal with their reservation).

in august, new folks will come to town and we'll continue to make new friends. but we'll sure miss the old ones. and we'll sure miss our saturday basketball games with deric and company.