State of Denial

Tonight we said good bye to Laura. As I type she is sitting in the Nairobi airport waiting for her flight to the U.S. It was a blessing to have her with us for a short time. I learned so much about myself and also saw the benefit of some of the things we have done as parents.  I will miss having her around to talk to and the kids will miss her too. See you in five months!

So, I think I should say I am in a slight state of denial. I have a number of demons lurking around waiting for the right time to sneak up on me and pounce. This week I have been confronted by a number of things that have made me turn into a beast of sorts myself. I am convinced of the fact that I just am not a nice person. To those of you who have known me for a long time you can probably confirm that. I think I am particularly unpleasant to myself. We are all our own worst critics, right? I found myself thinking today that I wanted to be changed while I am here but now I am wondering what that will look like. My hope is that I will be a closer reflection of God's grace and love than I am at the moment.

To a majority of people here Brian looks like Jesus...or Chuck Norris. People are constantly making comments about his likeness to Yesu in Swahili assuming he doesn't understand. Brian takes a sort of pleasure from this and tells people he is John the Baptist coming to tell them that Jesus is coming. On the other side they think he is Chuck Norris. One man made a comment to his friend, again in Swahili, that he had a picture of this guy on his wall, he wears a bandana on his head. Most people think he is an Israeli but he has also been mistaken for a Spaniard. It is fairly entertaining to me.

I was telling Brian the other day that my reality has changed drastically. This thought came about as I was setting up the water filter on the counter. Everyday we boil one or two large pots of water for ten minutes and then pour that in a filter that sits on the counter. This way we have drinkable water. We have a clothes washer, fortunately, that takes two hours to wash a load. After it is finished I hang up all the clothes on the cables that are strung across the room to dry the clothes. I can sometimes do two to three loads in a day. Generally speaking it takes almost twenty four hours for the clothes to dry. We have five bathrooms in this house. At home we had one. We have decided to use one as a storage room in hopes that no one will use it and I won't have to clean it. Every time we do dishes or want to take a shower we turn on one of the two switches that control the water heaters. We learned a few weeks after we were here to leave the switch for the water pump on. For a while we didn't have any water...  We have less stuff so in some ways it is far easier to keep things in order. Taking care of the things I mentioned fills that space wonderfully. I am starting to think that maybe when I get home I will only bring a few toys back into the house. Its amazing how well the kids have done without all their toys and technology.

We get to head out for a bit this week so the next post should be far more interesting with a number of pictures. I miss you all. I am blessed by you in my life!!!