Dear New York City,
I miss you. And, I’m doing well here. The bittersweet reality of changing seasons. (Speaking of, I hear it’s still pretty cold up there — here I’m nearly dying of heat stroke… okay, maybe that’s a slight exaggeration.) First, I’d like to get off my chest the wonderful things I miss: your vibrancy, your busyness, your productivity, your nearly infinite new sights and sounds (and smells…) — and all of your people who represent the great spectrum of human life from age to culture to career to personality to stage and station. I miss being able to walk out my door and, using the legs and lungs God gave me, go anywhere, see anyone, do anything.
It’s a different kind of freedom here. There I was limited by what my body could do and carry. Here, I have the capacity and distance freedom of a car, but only if I can afford insurance and gas. Here, the only people I come into contact with or see are those who may occupy the same businesses into which I enter. Here, (at least, in this part of Texas) there’s open sky, building-less fields, and long, seemingly never-ending roads as far as the eye can see. (Well, it’s not that far when you’re driving east at sunrise and west at sunset — when the sun drastically limits the vision… especially for those as short as myself who don’t quite reap the benefit of the car visor.)
Okay, aesthetic differences aside, I miss my home there. Moving to your (slightly less vibrant due to COVID) street-grid five years ago, I felt excited for this new thing. This reality that I’d only ever thought would be a dream — to live in New York City. And I got to go as a missionary — my entire purpose being to serve people and love them with the Gospel. Then the LORD kept me there, and, to be honest, I thought I’d be there even longer than I was. Because He kept establishing friendships and mission and community — my NYC family. He provided housing when I wasn’t sure I could stay… not once, but twice! He provided the opportunities to grow and heal in ways I wasn’t sure I ever would.
And that last is especially what I am realizing all the more this month. Because, my dear NYC, it is April. And, as you well know, in years past such a statement has meant a chaotic swirl of emotions if not downright depression. BUT, this year is different. (Truthfully, by God’s grace, I think I’ve said the same thing every year as He continues to walk with me through the journey of grief.) How so, you ask?
It doesn’t hurt. For the first time in nine years, it doesn’t hurt. My heart doesn’t feel as though it’s caught in a chokehold, pressured to feel one way or the other. Even now as I purposely think of my mother and the fact that once again she’s not here to walk me through and celebrate with me this new season, it doesn’t hurt.
Sure, I wish she was here. I know she would love to hear all that God’s been and is doing in my life. I know we would most definitely have had many a verbal tiff over where I should put my desk and piano in my bedroom (though perhaps it would have been from our old Frisco house and not this one). But, even to think those things, to think of the wonderful days of shopping and talking and laughing (and disagreeing) in April 2016 — it’s with fondness and not ache-filled longing.
And, that’s an awful lot of thanks to you, NYC. Well, okay, not you, but how God used my time with you to bring the healing that’s even brought me back to Texas. Back to family. Dare I say, back to living, perhaps?
How? Because He taught me to live again within your borders. He took me to the “wilderness” and taught me to depend on Him in a new way. To cling to Him and His body (the church). To ask for help. To be intentional in relationships. To engage with the emotions and not-yet-acknowledged pain of my past.
Of course, I could say so much more about this healing and the faithfulness of the LORD through my years in NYC — and I will. But, for now I just want to say, praise the LORD! Praise the LORD, NYC. That’s my prayer for you even now. That the nations who call you home would know Christ as I do. That you would become the city on a hill (or between land and sea) that proclaims the grace of God. That my sweet NYC family would continue to know their labor in Christ is never in vain.1 That hope in Christ would abound, rejoicing that “in this hope we were saved.”2
With all my love,
Hannah
Some fun photo-evidence of falling in love with you over the years:
May Jesus be found in this city!
Life Without Mother 
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