Lasts: A week in photos

On our second-to-last Sunday at Beth-El Mennonite Church (well, the participants' second-to-last Sunday), we hosted a group for Guess Who's Coming to Lunch. Over the course of the year, we received two donated turkeys, the first of which David cooked in a Wednesday night feast for all his coworkers. That was such a success that he decided to cook the second one for these lovely folks.

Our last learning component involved a closer look at the work of RAWTools, Inc. With the help of RAWTools' official blacksmiths, we each participated in the making of a garden tool from a donated gun. (Thanks, Mike and Fred!)

Friday night church league softball game. Daniel, David, and Kate all played.

The grocery store marked down what they thought were rotting bananas, but were actually perfectly ripe plantains. Thus ensued another iteration of Meg Cooks Unusual Foods.

#winning

On one of our last evenings together, we went disc golfing.

On another, we went bowling.

And played Knockout in the backyard.

Which turned out to be pretty tiring.

 But of course, amidst all the fun shenanigans were the many goodbyes.

Many of the ordinary moments of these last days have been tinged with nostalgia and poignant sorrow. The timing for this ending is right, broadly speaking, but the minutia are profoundly bittersweet. The littlest, most mundane things caught me off guard, knowing I wouldn't be seeing them so regularly anymore: Nora's crystal-blue eyes, so bright in the early evening light. Marle lounging on the back porch steps. David's scruffy beard and self-deprecating humor. Kate's laugh like a fountain, bubbling out in spurts.

It's okay to feel sad. It's good to feel sad.

As so often happens, a Winnie the Pooh quote comes to mind:

"How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard."