Afterwards, we took a tour starting down from the belly of the building where there were once weekly potluck suppers, to the sanctuary and our Sunday school classrooms until we ended at to the highest point in the building – the pool where I became an official Christian.

Such a farewell was not granted to the congregation members of Mision Christiana Cuidad Desead – their church burnt down last week.

Driving to the church's site near the border of Frederick County I was intrigued about what I would find. Work crews? Debris? I arrived and found my answer – an abandoned and crumbling site. It was once cared for and now left alone probably from mere exhaustion. There I was, walking in my black dress and high heeled shoes around the perimeter of the red tape trying to discover a certain something that unequivocally stuck out and would be my story angle.

I knew this was my final story for the paper. No one had spoken those words to me, but I knew. I wanted to write an extraordinary piece and end my tenure with an explosive story. In my searching for what didn't belong amongst the ruins, I discovered that something was me.

This year has been a series of goodbyes for me. Personally and professionally, locations, people, ideas and memories. I have lost a lot – but at least I have had the chance to bid my farewells. Out of all my losses, I would say leaving this paper will be one of the greatest.

I am so accustomed to loss that it no longer phases me and I can charge forth easily without looking back. I was raised in a small town but never belonged there. Likewise, I had an opportunity of a lifetime at a paper in a county where I never fit in.

This morning I went on a walk. My natural inclination was to start running, but I held myself back. I realized I needed not to exercise but to have quiet time to face what was going on. I once had a high school teacher who sent his AP English students to New England to sit and write by Walden pond. I will never forget it. I didn't write anything, coincidentally, but I just sat. I knew this is what he wanted: digestion, internalization and finally, acceptance. I have that now.

Last night as my car hiked the mountain East, my eyes teared. I knew I wouldn't be back for a long time. It was a quiet goodbye, like all the others before it and in truth, I have already been grieving for a long time. My experiences here will always be with me, cropping up in unexpected places – and I'll be reminded that I never really left.