the music makes me feel so beautiful

sun kil moon always makes me feel beautiful and sort of blushy. like the harmony and sweetness of it meshes with my cells and brightens my countenance by proximity. radiohead does that sometimes too.

my booth faces the big glass windows in the front of one of my favorite coffee shops. i like this shop. i like this booth. i like the coffee. and i love the cloudy day. even when i was opening my own shop, i still came here in the afternoons. maybe it's for the anonymity. maybe it's for the variety. maybe i'm a coffee shop whore :)

so, coming home was hard. it was all so anticipatory on the airplane. when they finally let me out of the passport control and customs in bolivia, i was so shaken up and nervous that i cried off and on half the way to jamaica. lol. luckily the lady next to me didn't speak english, so i was able to distract myself by talking to her and helping her order her food and such. god knows what we need.

the phrase "no te preocupes" (don't worry) was a staple in that whole process, and it is now and will be forever one of the most comforting phrases i have ever heard...thank god for those words.

after enjoying my first peppermint mocha at starbucks in the miami airport, i said goodbye to my lovely ruth (very hard to do) and found another starbucks to pass the time while i waited to finally head home to the midwest. all the flights were miraculously on time. and there was snow waiting for me in dallas along with a very good friend who i was perfectly delighted to see. after a brilliant night in a huge bed with a real down comforter, i woke up way too early out of excitement and headed to the airport.

everything after that is pretty much a haze. just....cloudy. i know i cried almost the entire flight to wichita. i know i cried after i rounded the corner and saw my friends. i know we went to eat at my favorite mexican food place for lunch. i know i became supremely irritated at not having a phone, and stayed that way for a few days till my wonderful brother victor came to the rescue.

just yesterday or maybe the night before, something changed. i think my body finally settled down and figured out that i wasn't moving around anymore. travel will do that to you. you get so used to moving all the time, and changing your surroundings so drastically, that you feel antsy and distracted even after you get to the stopping point. i'm settling. finally. whew.

so what now? now we process. now we write. now we record. now we rest and prepare. because the task wasn't the preparing. the task will be the doing. and loving that deeply, giving that much, pushing through that kind of hardship and defeat....that is not for the faint of heart. so in this time, i will study and read and listen for god to instruct me. because i have to be ready for a fight. it's always a fight to tear something out of satan's grasp. and he wants those street kids.

so we're going to stand in the gap for them. you, me, jesus, and enough love to see them through the failures and setbacks that are sure to come. i'll be writing more often i hope. thanks so much for the support and love you continue to give me wherever i am.

it's good to be at home.

i'll be home for chrismas

you can count on me :)

so i'm sitting here in my room. it's nigh 80 degrees outside, and the hot south american sun is beating down on the poor defenseless vegetation outside. strange environment for what i'm doing....

i'm watching the macy's thanksgiving day parade, drinking hot tea, and listening to christmas music.

**i had to laugh just now. the c alphabet block from the sesame street float almost lost his pants and had to run off the road for a second. that's good times, folks :)**

anyway, as i face the last 3 or 4 days of my first adventure in bolivia, i find myself often stopping to take stock of all that god has done in me, for me, and with me these past 4 1/2 ish months. i have never appreciated my family more than i do now. i have never loved my hometown (wichita) more than i do now. i have never known the value of my best friends like i do now. and i have never ached for and seen the beauty of so many of the small things that made up my life and who i am, as i do now.

the world is much brighter now, from where i sit, than it was just a few short months ago. and for the patience and love of all of you that endured this painful transformation with me, i am forever grateful. even those words seem so small...

so now that i've gushed and mushed all over all of you, i have very specific things i want to let you know i am thankful to remember today. cliche? yes. will i do it anyway? oh yes.

- grandma's house on thanksgiving. the macy's parade was always on all morning while we cooked and ran our errands in the snow or leaves of late fall. after the parade, it was football until our late lunch. which sort of dragged on through the rest of the day to dinner and midnight snacks. oh turkey and mashed potato sandwiches...

- aunt pat's on thanksgiving. can anyone say, pies and fresh whipped cream? how about ice cream with homemade chocolate sauce? oh yes. and pitch tournaments galore with the cousins. grandpa used to say, bid or die. kind of like vote or die. but more severe. shooting the moon and losing was hilarious. shooting the moon and winning was legendary :) <3>

fever dream

well i was going to take a nap. that's what sunday afternoons are for, right? in between church services, before football comes on the television, prime napping real estate.

no such luck. i'm like a little kid who isn't sleepy and can't lay still. hooray for being a grown up and getting to decide for myself when my nap is over :)

i've been meaning to do this for a while actually. and lest i begin each update with apologies for my tardiness, i'll save it and tell you like it is. these past few weeks have been some of the hardest in my life. and some of the best as well. by far. with all that i have had to do, at times just trying to stay alive, i really didn't put the update at the top of the "to do" list.

that being said, i will do my best to help you rejoin the loop.

in addition to my normal research projects and relationship building within the business community, i have been helping with the street kids a lot. with the girls, this has been monumental. i've been working with our hospital to help provide care for pregnant girls living on the street, and discounts for their births and such. this has often included running up to the bridge where our specific group lives, and reading zulma and gary (couple who just had a baby yesterday) the riot act for being there with their other 18 mo old boy, when they're mandated to stay in the room we provided for them near the job we helped gary get. bridge = glue sniffing and violence among the kids. not good for small children and pregnant girls.

with the boys it's been significantly harder. one was murdered in june just before i got here. another was stabbed not long ago, and as he was recovering in a hospital, was persuaded to commit suicide and jump from the window. not a week later, another boy hung himself at the bridge where all the other kids were sleeping. traumatic all around. we decided not to sit idly by and wait for the next kid to fall victim to hopelessness, and called an emergency prayer meeting. we brought down the house, praying and singing, pacing and raising our hands for hours. a few of the kids came, and we got a chance to bless them with prayer, rest, and pizza. it was so good to be able to show them how hard we are literally fighting for their very lives every moment.

the best parts of working with them, by far, have been the small things. when zulma came out to our hospital to get checked by our doctors, i got to care for little miguelito (18 mo old kiddo mentioned above). he calls all of us gringas "niorita" because he can't quite get the word "seniorita" out. we played on the slide and the swings for a long time while amy and zulma waited for the doctors. and every time i would catch him at the bottom of the slide, he'd grab my face with both hands, give me a gooey kiss on the nose, and coo, "niorita...." what a precious baby. born of a union formed on the streets of the city...with parents that sniffed glue constantly as he was growing inside....and here he is. perfectly normal, well adjusted, and very smart. after all that he has endured in his tiny little life, i can't wait to see what his future holds.

the boys also work on the corners, washing windows and juggling fire for the cars to make a little money. the other night i was on my way in to amy's house, sitting on the left side of the bus, closest to the median. my window was open, and as we pulled up to the stoplight, i heard yelling through my earphones. i took them out and looked around as 5 boys came running over to the side of the bus calling, "seniorita, seniorita! como estas? te extranamos!!!" (even though they saw me the day before :) ). i am sure the other people on the bus thought i was crazy as we chatted, gave each other kisses and high fives through the window. they were just jabbering on about how glad they were to see me, and asking if i would come see them at the bridge soon. these kids are anywhere from 11 to 15...maybe 17 years. sweet, sweet boys (except when they're high, of course).

i know this. i don't care what the world thinks. i'll reach out my hands to them from bus windows any time. every time.

all this being said, aside from having typhoid fever (not a lot of fun, just so you know) and being given death threats by the ring leader of the more dangerous street boys, these past few weeks have been an exhilirating experience to be sure. even these bad things just prove to me that god has me in his hands. if that weren't so, i would not still be here, living or otherwise.

and i have finally (AL FIN) found a church home here. this was my second sunday to attend, my first sunday to play and sing with the worship team. and we met such opposition...bloody noses, spilled coffee, weird sound systems, awkward keyboards, everything seemed to go wrong. but we stuck it to the man and pushed through to worship. in the end, our community was stronger and more blessed in our perseverance together than we would have been had it gone smoother.

and the overwhelming theme of all of this? you just never know where you'll find yourself or what god might ask of you.

i hope you have gotten a sufficient glimpse of life around here recently. i'll try to write again as soon as i can, and remember, i'll see many of you in just a few weeks!

chau chau!

mexican summer

this morning when i woke up, i was really excited to get into the city for my night out with friends. however, i was soon reading status updates, and found that there were bloqueos (blockades) in several places around quillacollo, the suburb we live just on the west side of. at first it seemed small. not a big deal. but upon reading the newspaper, los tiempos, i realized we're actually completely isolated out here under at least 20 points of blockade. we literally can not get into the city or out of here without driving through potato fields.

i started feeling pretty sorry for myself, thinking of ways i might get around it all. trying to bribe taxi drivers. trying to convince my family i could walk around the bloqueos. lol. no one ever said i wasn't stubborn. but in the end, someone, whose opinion matters greatly to me, told me it wasn't safe for me to go out today, and that i was acting like a spoiled girl. to my dismay, i think he was right. i know i can be kind of hard on bolivia sometimes...

that is why i want you to know some of the absolute best things about where i live, and why i know i am blessed beyond measure. i want to give you good news, and not complain. i want you to know that I LOVE BOLIVIA. even on the days when i feel like i hate bolivia, i love bolivia.
so here are some of my favorite things.

* santa rita trees. they grow along the tops of the walls that surround every house and yard in the city. each tree has a different and brilliant color of blossom, and they wind around and grow into and on all the parts of the walls, metal work, you name it. not to mention they have visciously awesome thorns that keep people from climbing the walls. i save a blossom color every time i see a new one. and each time i think, "only god could make a color like that..." beautiful.

* i can suddenly cook. i wouldn't believe it myself if i hadn't heard such amazing praises, watched the boys devour every last bit of their dinner and everyone else's, and eaten it myself. i can make cakes, cookies, banana bread, homemade pizza (dough and all), empanadas, any pasta dish you could imagine, and loads of other things! i guess necessity really is the mother of invention, and of accomplishment in this case :) and i know i must owe some of it to the altitude...

* dogs. i have two wonderful dogs here, and two adopted dogs in the city. sunset lives behind the house as our guard dog. on my worst and most lonely nights, i sit in her pen and she sits on my lap (she's a huge gigantic german shepherd, btw), licking my face and whining when i cry. manchas (spots in spanish) is our other dog. she roams about the grounds, keeping watch. she's also really big, like a big hunting dog, but she thinks she's a baby. she takes her responsibilities very seriously, however, especially where i am concerned. she escorts me to the road to meet the trufis and waits with me, standing guard by (on) my feet. she leads me by the hand and lectures me when i come home late at night, and she always runs circles around me when she sees me, even though she's quite old. lily and woody guthrie are my friend amy's dogs. no one on the planet earth is as excited to see me as they are when i show up at the house. guthro is a sweet little baby, who only wants to cuddle. lily is a pit bull boxer mix who also happens to be my favorite wrestling buddy. we're quite a sight :) she also thinks she's a lap dog, and often tries to climb onto our laps while we're eating breakfast. she gives great hugs, and a heck of a half nelson.

* trufis. yep, i said it. for one thing, it only costs 3 bolivianos to get into the city during the day. that's like....less than 50 cents! a lot less than driving. not to mention, even though it takes anywhere from 50 minutes to an hour and a half to get there, that's prime time for daydreaming and listening to the ipod. some of my favorite moments have been on trufis, riding home at night, listening to feist or radiohead, and seeing the city lights rush by. so much time to figure things out, dream about the future, and lots of time for god to mold me and shape me. in addition to alone time, a great number of my most fantastc human interaction stories have been on trufis. i've met mothers and helped them with their babies, old grandmas and paid for their rides, diagnosed illnesses, prayed for broken hearts, and even defended other women from abusers. some of my greatest ministry so far has been in trufis. go figure :)

* my family here. tomas and iris ortiz are the couple that run our guesthouse. tomas speaks brilliant english, which has been uber helpful when i can't accurately explain myself to iris or tia elsi. he's a bible traslator and also a youth worker at his dad's baptist church. he loves movies. we call him papa oso (papa bear). because, well, he never gets upset or irritated unless someone isn't safe. or maybe if that someone never came home one night and they didn't want to call and wake the house up to say they would stay in the city. ahem. no idea who that would be. *sheepish* iris is our mom. she is the most patient and kind person i have probably ever known. particularly when it comes to gringas butchering the spanish language. she's about my older sister's age so we have a great sister relationship. they have a 5 year old daugther, ester, who is the light of my life. i have just begun teaching her english and she's learning briliantly! tonight at dinner i asked her where her fingers were in english and she wiggled them and giggled like a crazy fiend. we also slay dragons, save baby dinosaurs, capture bad guys, and rescue bugs on a regular basis. we're due to have a new baby sister right before i leave to come home in december. i can't wait to meet her. they are naming her after me. brianna grace. humbling, to be sure. tia (aunt) elsi is here to help clean and cook while iris is pregnant. she is literally one of the best and strongest women on earth. i just wish you could know her...

* casablanca. this is my favorite coffee shop. the service is deplorable, the people that work there are often big pains in the bum (cold war gavin), and the coffee is only passable. the best in the city as far as i'm concerned, but that's not saying much. however. all this taken into account, there's something about that place that makes me settle and melt a little. it's safe to just, be. i can go there alone to write, read, listen to music. i can go there to meet people, and chat and have fun. i can go there with huge groups of friends and eat dinner and play cards. it doesn't matter a bit. and if i could transport a piece of the feeling i get at home when i am at mead's or the perk, i'd be able to find it there. that's it. it's a familiarity i couldn't have hoped for so far from home, until i can make my own :)

* colors. everything here is bright. when there are parades (and when aren't there, really :P) the costumes put everything i've ever seen or made to shame. huge twirling skirts of silk and damask and shining glittery sequins. bright furry heads and towering platform shoes. unbelievable. bright patterns hang from every window. each rug an intricate masterpiece. even the food is more colorful. it's easy to forget sometimes when you are used to seeing it after a while. but the colors and the passion are everywhere. these are a people who have chosen to really live. even when they seem to be in the most dire of circumstances. and when they smile, it lights up all of the surroundings. so beautiful.

* friends. i have the most amazing friends! first and foremost, ruth. i live with ruth. and almost daily we say to one another, "you know, if god hadn't put us both here together, i never would have made it." honestly, no one on earth knows my heart the way that ruth does. there's just something about going through something with someone. when this time has passed, i know there will be a sisterhood here that will last our whole lives. amy is the kindred other part of me. a sister i am so blessed beyond measure to spend some great times with. we watch serial killer shows, play with street kids, and eat vegetarian food, among various other things. and kimber and barb are constant sources of everything from love to knowledge, and from sympathy to shenanigans. we have some times. that's for sure :) kelly, jeanette, emma, fiona, and marisol make up the rest of that clan. of course, how could i forget alejandro. because of him, i have truly lived iin my time here so far. i would be hard pressed to find someone more generous and kind than he is. he gives me all these opportunities to be myself, and loves me in spite of and because of them. it doesn't matter if we're watching movies, waiting on a football game that's never broadcast, taking volunteers to the airport and making them late, or driving off to mysterious high places to see the city lights. i never want to be anywhere else but with him when i'm with him. because of ale, i get to have his best friend ivan as well. he very well might be one of the sweetest guys i've ever known. and funny too. great to practice spanish with since he speaks no english at all. except for one line, "are you talking to me??" lol. ale and i are planning ways to teach him english quickly :) believe me, i could go on....andrea, marcelo, ale vedia, patricia, savannah. so many blessings.

okay. that concludes this session of I LOVE MY BOLIVIA.

thank you so much for sending me here, praying for me, being here when i need you, and just generallyl being awesome. i hope you've gotten a little glimpse of my life from what i've written here.

goodnight :)

it must be night around where you are

i wrote this in my journal earlier, and i wanted to share it with you.

right now i am sitting in casablanca, my favorite coffee shop. usually i am at home in my room when i write, but i guess i needed a change of scenery today. i left bible study this morning, brimming over and about ready to explode. i knew it was time.

i have to tell you, you don't know how many times i have given up this past week. i mean, really called it all in and layed down to face the end. lord knows i haven't been very faithful in my writing lately, mostly because i've been so turned inward. it was hard to see out. but i've decided, today it ends. today, i stand up and take posession of the victory that rightly belongs to me. to us.

the other day i was talking to a dear friend of mine. she asked how i was handling all the stess and loneliness. after a week of pain and confusion, and lots of death and worry.
this was my feeble, yet resolved response.

think of a rock. alone.
out about a mile or so off shore in the ocean.
i am perched precariously on this rock.
the storm is raging.
the wind is howling.
every little bit, the sea swallows it whole, trying to wash me over and drown me in myself.
my clothes are full of holes.
the salt burns my skin and my eyes.
but i plant my feet and scream defiantly into the gale.
"i will not be moved!"
no, damn it. i will not be moved.

take everything from me.
my friends, my family.
comfort.
strip me bare, leave me alone in the dark, with danger all around me and no way to protect myself.

i will still spit in the face of the devil.

i will stare him down and call on the sun to stand still in the sky. (joshua 10)
and my god will take care of the details. he will answer the repercussions.
because this world, this country, this city, my body, my family. they belong to him.

i will not be moved.

i am done being defeated.
i am done feeling unworthy.
i am done watching from the outside.
searching for the light meekly and in vain.

i woke up today a beaten woman.
i walked out of our prayer just now a warrior filled with passion.

here's the deal. the root of it all.
i want so desperately to be who he thinks i am.
and i have never even come close to trying.
honest. that's low down brutal honesty there.

but somebody needs to hear this.

i am who he thinks i am. we are. you are.

he brought me all the way here, planting provision in my every step. loving every stop along the way when i'd see a little piece of him and get it. just for a minute.

and if he would seek after me so relentlessly. me.
the most dreadful, useless liar.
an adulterer. the most unfaithful lover.
leaving deceit and pain in my wake.
lazy. cowardly, i could go on...
why in the world wouldn't you believe he'd come after you???

that's how i know. if it takes everything i have, every last breath, drop of blood.
every ounce of my strength.
i must believe him.
i have to.

i have to trust that who he is, is enough - more than enough - to cover my deception and defeat.

he can redeem even me. even you.
what's more, he wants to.

he must be god.

i was going to give up. not just give up being in bolivia. i don't know what i thought i would do.
but i felt finished.

and then i really felt it. the truth.
he will never give up.
i can never give up.

i'll leave you with some lyrics from a radiohead song (videotape) that's been pursuing me all day...

you are my center when i spin away.
no matter what happens now
i won't be afraid
because i know
today has been the most perfect day i have ever seen.

don't give up.

nocturne, taciturn, sojourn

i know tonight is the night i should be doing this. it's just that...

most of me would rather be watching some nerdy overly dramatic historical movie and employing my greatest form of escapism, aka pretending i am not here. or anywhere for that matter. except exactly wherever i feel like dreaming i am. queen elizabeth I's court...wwII germany...india...
but alas, i am a slave to my conscience and it's time for another note.

i have been learning a lot this past week. i think i may have mentioned this line of thought to several of you before i even came here, but there's been a major theme for me lately, and it has corresponded with the events in the lives of many of my friends here as well.

we tend to hide our struggles. while the struggles themselves are great and formidable on their own, they are even more dangerous when the struggl-er is made to think that they alone are unable to keep up. two big problems that sort of chicken and egg each other, right?

i spend a good chunk of my free time with missionaries. many of them would rather not be called missionaries, largely due to the evangelistic implications that lie therein (which i will leave you to imagine on your own, lest i offend anyone). but nonetheless, here we all are. trying to show people, at the very base of it, what jesus has done in our lives, and how beautiful life can be when you have hope. and can you guess what the number one struggle is for us?

uselessness. feeling like we aren't doing anything. literally, across the board.

and it's almost humiliating to admit, even here, even now. one almost always feels pressured to account for every minute of his or her time, making sure everyone knows how hard they are working and all that they have accomplished. at the very least, there's a lot of self-justification that goes on, trying to reconcile what you would like to do, with what you can feasibly do. and telling yourself over and over that you'll do better and you'll do more when you can. some day you'll stop enjoying your life so much and settle down and be serious. get to work!

but no one talks about it. because it's so deeply embedded and such a very personal attack. and i am convinced, having prayed and railed against this for months and months, that the universal prospects of this situation make it most certainly a sneaky and evil lie from the pit of hell. we're being hoodwinked!

and what's more, many of you at home have been expressing these same doubts to me, about your own lives and ministries. so here we are tricked into being isolated by our own fear and unable to help one another because we can't bear to admit that we need help in the first place and we think no one else does. well, cue twisted sister. we're not gonna take it!

i want to tell you a quick story. it's about a guy who works in my favorite cafe. we're going to call him gavin, mostly because he looks startlingly like (a really skinny) gavin rossdale.

the first day i went to casablanca, gavin was there. he was obviously intrigued by my presence, since i don't blend in well, and to be honest, he doesn't exactly look bolivian himself. but i gave him the benefit of the doubt, or rather didn't give him much notice at all, until i realized that he was spending a great deal of time staring at me from behind the window. creeper.

about the 19th time i looked up from my gabriel garcia marquez book because i felt his eyes boring into me, i became exasperated, and asked the poor boy if he needed something. "you're not from here," he said, in staggering spanish. i was irritated. "no, i'm from africa." i sassed back in better spanish. he took the hint. no more creeping. until...

i came back again with some friends a few days later. we were talking and joking around. speaking english. like we do. gavin walked in circles around us never taking our order, for several minutes. it's not a big cafe, mind you. when he finally recognized us, he looked at me and said, "just coffee for you, i know." in perfect and quite defiant english. just like i had a feeling he would. call it a hunch. and that, my friends, is when the cold war began.

gavin and i began to do battle daily. how long would he make me wait before he'd ask what i wanted. and when he did come to my table, would he even look at me? or just wave his hand and refuse to speak. as if i were bothering him. and never again in english. i started to really hate seeing gavin when i walked in the door.

that is, until today. today i had a date with a gypsy girl i met yesterday. she was going to teach me how to make the bracelets they sell. yesterday she had been in dire need of someone to talk to. and you know me, i have a flashing neon sign above my head that screams "tell me your life story," right? so today, she came back, i bought her coffee, and gavin was our waiter. i guess he decided to be nice since she was there with me. no need to punish the innocent. even cold war gavin has morals.

after she left, i asked for another coffee. in english. i suppose i was feeling lighthearted and i wanted to see what he might do. his response shocked me.

he whipped a chair around, and sat down very close to me.
"what are you doing here?" (english) shocked? um, yes.
"i'm a hospital administrator in vinto. where are you from?"
"i'm from the middle east." non-specific. okay, cold war gavin. keep holding out.
silence.
"how did you end up here?" i ask.
"blessing, destiny i suppose." he smiles, and gets up.
"i am studying spanish at the university and i need to practice, so i work here. it helps a lot. how's your spanish?" he asks.
"horrible, can't you tell?" i say, laughing.
"no, i can't tell horrible spanish from regular. mine's bad too." ah, common ground.
now we're both laughing.
"i think we should practice together." his idea. and just like that, cold war gavin offers the cease-fire.

so, i accepted. gladly. it will be nice not to dread seeing his face when i want to have coffee. it was nice to spend the rest of the time smiling at him when he passed, randomly chatting about the other languages we speak or want to speak, and saying, "chau, nos vemos!" when i left instead of trying to get out while he was in the bathroom or something equally childish.

the thing is, we are actually allies, gavin and i. whose name is actually nima, by the way. we are both lost and trying to find our way in a strange country, away from everything and everyone we know. but because of a long list of assumptions made by each side, we have been practically shooting poisoned darts at one another for weeks. instead of finding solace in our similar situations. and because we thought it would be too hard or humiliating to admit these things to another person, we pridefully engaged each other in disdainful (if not halted) spanish conversation for much much longer than necessary.

here it comes.

that's kind of like how we struggle against ourselves and our perceptions of other people's work and ministry, and never take the time to speak it out and see who is really behind all the lies. crazy, huh?
we're letting him win.

but not today.
cold war gavin and i are having coffee next week.

score :)

borrowed light

i am suddenly aware that lots of time has passed since my last note! i didn't realize just how long it had been, until i went to check something on an old post, and saw that even that last silly post was from almost 2 weeks ago.

epic fail in the update once a week department. guilty as charged.

things have been really interesting around here. i'm sure now that interesting is the best word for it. for the most part, i'm really just trying to settle in and figure out how to live here. the good news is, i'm actually getting really excited about the chance to make a life and be out on my own again. not long ago, i was almost certain that would not be possible. but the lord hears even our smallest and most seemingly insignificant requests and desires.

if you know me at all, you know that it would be a vast understatement to say that i am a little independent from time to time. i think the thing that was killing me most in the beginning was my inability to do anything without help. i couldn't really leave alone, and even if i did, how would i know where to go? what trufi to take? how to find my way back once i got to wherever it was i wanted to go. and what if i got lost? would my spanish be good enough to get me back home?

when i lived in wichita, i was always running about. scheduled down to the very last minute before i'd creep in to my sleeping house with my already sleeping family, and throw myself into bed exhausted. i love being able to decide where i'll go and what i'll do. i love choosing my own work and making my own appointments. i cut hair, give russian lessons, wait tables, and volunteer at my coffee shop. and at any moment, you could find me anywhere, any cafe or bar, with anyone. that's what cell phones are for. but here, even with a cell phone, i felt....trapped. after all, we live outside the city quite a ways. think.....goddard. not just in extreme west wichita....but not really justifiably in wichita at all actually.

to my great joy, i've been enjoyed a great burst of freedom lately. i suddenly developed nerves of steel and some mean spanish skills, and i started trying things alone. half way to bible study alone. meet a friend for lunch in a place i haven't been before from a direction i haven't come from before. getting lost and finding myself all in time to meet someone for coffee at a place i've never been. all the way to bible study alone. and finding my own favorite coffee shop from as many different angles and directions as possible. i even managed to make it to the irish pub on my own to meet my new friends, and never got lost once. i was early! shocking, i know...

but all these advances and victories, albeit small to those who know their way around here, have meant everything to me. it means that i really can do this job and be a grown up here. i really can start a business and have a life. i really can clean up my spanish and be fluent, communicating effectively and consisently. consistently being the key there, not only with brilliant flashes and great disasters. it means that i don't feel trapped anymore.

today nicole and i had a beautiful lunch with a friend, and some amazing coffee. then we walked around and found a great shady spot to watch the parade and drink tumbo juice. hours afterward, as we were leisurely searching for our trufi home, we picked flowers and talked about life and all kinds of things. tonight when we got home, i taught luis to play a song on the guitar in russian. then we wrote it in spanish too just for fun. and then in dutch. four languages if you count engllish, which i already knew. afterward, when everyone had gone to bed, i got a strange wild hair, and decided to make banana bread for the family. and for my bible study tomorrow too. and as i danced around the kitchen in my pajamas to over the rhine, and threw flour all over myself, the floor, and probably many other places to be discovered later, i couldn't help but smile. i'm so amazingly, gloriously free.

tomorrow i'll take my martha-stewart-quality banana bread to bible study, to which i will go alone, for the first time without help. i might meet a friend for lunch. i might stop to read for a while at my favorite cafe. i might dance with the gypsies again.

but whatever i do, i will enjoy it, and everything it means to really live.