Special you

Flower necklaces!

 How's your cringe face? You might need to warm it up a little. Cringe. Cringe a little harder. Okay, let's go!

Picture this: you're a young-ish girl in a grand gathering of women, all dressed up, singing songs, reading from the respected book, dancing, giving you flower necklaces and other gifts.

It's your day.

Nope, not your birthday. But it's all for you, celebrating you.

Why?

... you got your first period. Menstrual cycle. Aunt Flo visited. Monthly. Whatever you want to call it. They're all there to celebrate that you're now a woman.

What do you hear?

With some of my "peaceful" neighbors

BAM! BAM! BAM!

BOOM!

Baa! Baa!

Rr-r-r-r-r!

"HEY YOU! COME HERE! HURRY!"

"YOU'RE WRONG! YOU'RE STUPID! WHY DON'T YOU LISTEN?!"

In case you haven't gotten the idea yet, I don't live in a very quiet place. When you think of a tropical island, maybe you think of warm beaches, quiet breezes, and peace, but that's not exactly my reality.

My neighbors have been doing construction, so often I'm waked up by 6 or 6:30 in the morning with the sound of a load of rocks being delivered, or workmen yelling at each other, or roofing metal being dropped from the second story into a pile on the street. And since it's warm and there's no AC, my windows are always open, so the sounds reverberate on my concrete walls and seem to only be louder inside than out.

Yesterday there were a couple people working on building some walls and doors out of metal. All afternoon I suffered through the sounds of metal being sawed, pounded, dropped, moved. And in addition the person supervising the project was unhappy, so he was often yelling at the one actually doing the work to explain what he wanted. Because why would you talk in quiet tones when your lungs are capable of yelling?

Now I know at this point you're saying "Yes, but that's construction. Construction is noisy." True. But the rest of life is noisy too. My neighbors often conduct entire conversations yelling from one house to another. Goats and chickens wander the streets, adding their sounds. Motorcycles rev their engines, trucks and taxis beep any time they're coming in or out of the neighborhood, and I live on a dead-end.

Oh, and did I say that I'm in a quiet neighborhood? Yep, when I tell people where I live they often say "Oh! The coconut tree neighborhood? That's a peaceful place!"

Ha.

*Don't take this as true complaining. I'm fortunate to live in a "quiet" neighborhood. And I'm used to it. But if you ever are in a phone call with me you'll probably notice all the background goings-on. 

Is there class today?

It's clove season here! Time to dry the fresh cloves

Sometimes life here on Clove Island is unpredictable. And sometimes the only prediction is that it will be unpredictable. An example of that would the the school system.

Although I'm not teaching for a public school, I have many friends whose kids are in the public school or they themselves teach there. So I get in on the drama a little too.

A little extra spice for your spices?

See, it's September. September is the month when school should start. And it's quite possible that school will start this month, but when? The governor sometimes sets a day for returning to school, but maybe the teachers still haven't been paid for the end of the last school year. And they often refuse to submit grades for their students until they're paid. If the students don't have grades, they don't know if they passed to the next grade or not. And so school doesn't start.

How long will that go on? We don't really know. Often the government compromises with teachers, paying them for a month or two of their back pay. Sometimes the school year starts with a strike. Sometimes they teach for a week and then go on strike. We'll see how it goes down this time.

Fortunately, for me, I teach independently from the public school system, so I teach as usual and watch the drama unfold from a distance.

A place of quiet and rest

Sometimes life gets to be too much, and we just have to get back to center.

We have to rest.

We need quiet.

This hasn't been the easiest season on Clove Island. And by season I don't mean the weather-- it's been amazing. Cool nights, not too hot of days. But the season of friends and team has been rough. And I love my team dearly. If I didn't love my team dearly it might be easier.

So I was feeling a little ragged. A little burnt out. A little frayed at the edges with not a lot of emotional margins for my neighbors and friends here.

Life doesn't stop, but sometimes we have to. I was blessed to take some time to stop and recenter, taking a weekend away at the beach. I read the Word. I walked the beach. I talked with a friend. I gazed on the beauty of creation and listened to the voice of its Creator.

And you know what? When I went back to my house in the city after a couple of days, I was happy to see people again. I was pleased to greet the old ladies of my neighborhood and catch up on the news. I was interested in speaking of His grace again. And I was able to serve those around me from a much better place of the soul.

Sometimes all we need is a place of quiet and rest. And in that quiet and rest, He meets us.