Missing callings

At church today, someone mentioned going to the General Young Women Meeting last night, and I immediately felt bad for having missed it. This is the first year in over five that I have NOT gone to one of those spring broadcasts. Then I remembered that I'm not in Young Women anymore (haven't been for almost a year), which of course means I don't need to go to those meetings. You'd think that would have been a relief: "Phew! No more having to sacrifice a Saturday evening to go sit in the stake center with a bunch of teenage girls." Truthfully, however, my reaction was the opposite. I felt a bit wistful and sad.

I miss those girls. I miss the women I worked with in that calling. I miss saying the theme every Sunday during opening exercises. I miss teaching lessons. I miss listening to advisers teach lessons. I miss the girls' genuine questions about the gospel and life. Yes, I even sorta miss their texting during class. It's funny how the things that drove me crazy while I held the calling are now somewhat endearing.

Then we're driving home from church, talking about Stephen's new calling, and he tells me he feels like he did toward the end of his mission. He was in an area that he absolutely loved, training a new missionary, and thinking he would finish his last 3 months there when he was transferred to a more difficult area with a companion he previously had and was given the responsibility to help him finish his mission on a strong note. He knew he was in that last area for a reason, but that didn't stop him from missing what he'd just left. Stephen misses the young men's calling he was released from a few weeks ago. He loved working with the priests and was just starting to feel like he was really getting to know them. Alas, he's needed elsewhere. That seems to be the way callings go: the second you really love yours, it's time to move on to a different one where you can be challenged in a new way.