So my time in Australia is ending very soon. And I’m very sad. I’ve met so many great friends and reconnected with some that are like family and enjoyed this time tremendously.

And this time around I’ve had one of the best farewells of my life.

I’ve been spending a lot of time this trip with the people at a small church in the heart of the city called Ann St. Church of Christ. It’s a great little church because the best people are there. The heart of the church is with several families who all support the church in their own way. One of the larger families come from one of the Eastern Torres Strait Islands, and on Sunday they bid all of us (because there was a large group from the church I go to at home) by dancing for us. And not like dancing you’d see in a club if you went to one. Like dancing that their family has done for generations.

This time of year is when the people and this family do a lot of dancing to celebrate when the first missionaries came to their island and brought the message that God loves people enough to set aside divinity and take on humanity, die, and come back to life to fix the relationship that we broke.

The dancing was beautiful, and what made the dancing even more amazing was the fact that the dancers are all people who are now family. And when I thought that I couldn’t appreciate their generosity and love any more, they taught us all several dances where the dancers have to sit.

So we all (probably around 50 or so people) sat on the floor of the hall in a giant circle. And then the beat started and we all started slapping our thighs and then we started slapping the ground in front of us and the dance just continued from there. And we all laughed and tried our best and had a great time as a family.

And in the midst of this great time, my Australian Iron Ore ring that I’ve had for 4 years broke into several pieces and fell on the ground.

If it had happened anywhere else or at any other time, I would have been incredibly sad because I have connected numerous memories to that ring. But I think because I was surrounded by family having such a great time learning a new dance, the saddness was brief.

Because even though I cannoth possibly ever wear the ring again as intended, I will never forget that I was dancing with family when it shattered. And I will still have the memories because how could I ever forget dancing with family?