Reflections

As I reflect on this last day of the year, it is hard to believe it is almost January again. Last January I began in earnest on the road that brought me to my new country. In March I learned that I would be going for sure. In May I started packing. This packing and unpacking was the most wearying part of the whole process and was to last until I moved into my final home a few weeks ago. In June I moved my furniture to my mother's house. In July I said good-bye to my apartment, my job, and my world in Houston. In August I went to another state to attend orientation. In September my beloved cat, Monday, died suddenly. In October I finished my orientation and returned to Texas. At the end of October, I said good-bye to my cat Tuesday and left him with my mother in America. On the first day of November, I set my foot for the first time on the soil of my new country. On the 29th of November, I aquired a new kitten. In December I moved into my new home.

As I reflect on the changes, it seems too much to pack into one small paragraph. But I am nothing if not concise! Each of these changes alone would have been huge. But so many in so short a time? Well, sufficent to say that I have seen my Father's graciouness in each step of the way. Always in the back of my mind, the thought hovers that He is for my good. He is often a bit mysterious and He does things His own way but He is always in my corner. In the midst of a year of change, He is still Abba and that will never change.

Recent Events

All,

I wanted to give everyone a quick rundown on recent events in my country. As most of you probably watch the news, you know it has been turbulent for the last several days. As reassurance, I am doing fine. There was some violence in other parts of the city on Thursday evening but my neighborhood is very safe and I experienced no problems. On Friday and on the weekend, most of the shops in the city were shut down due to the situation. I have mostly stayed at home during that time. I did attend a wedding yesterday. Today is Monday afternoon and the city seems to be coming alive again. I took a walk earlier today and observed the mood of the city. Businesses were open, public transportation was running, and people were up and moving about. All this is good - it means things have settled down.

Za Cor

Ok - the house is coming together. After weeks of worrying - no, let's be honest - obsessing about this - it finally beginning to look like a home. I got carpets yesterday. My language teacher and I went to a bazaar on the outskirts of town. This bazaar is locally called the Smugglers' Bazaar because apparently there are lot of things there that are intended for other places and just miraculously appear here. Anyway, it is a great place to go to get higher end things at good prices. I got one room of wall to wall carpeting and two large beautiful Turkish rugs. One of the rugs is shot with browns and creams. There is a large cream flower design in the center of it. I put this one in my dining room. The other carpet is cream with a dark red pattern. It also has touches of green in it. It is a beautiful rug and something I plan to keep for years and years - Enshallah. It is in the bedroom. The rugs have also made the house much warmer as some of the floors are marble...

First Edition Poor

Zama Cor - in the language that I am learning that means 'my house.' After weeks of saying that phrase for a variety of situations, we have finally arrived. I moved into my new place on Saturday. Me and peshu (that is 'cat' in my new language). By the way, I figured out that the cat speaks the local language and not English. When I say 'Peshu, Peshu' he comes running. When I say 'Here kitty kitty' I get a blank cat look!

Well, back to the house. I had a mattress delivered on Saturday. The only problem was it did not fit going up the stairs! So I slept on a toshak last night (they truly are multi-purpose). A toshak is a large cushion that is used for sitting and also at times for sleeping. Kind of like a sofa but more portable. We finally got the mattress up the stairs tonight. I have very little furniture right but have ordered a bedroom suite, a kitchen table, a china cabinet, and a dining room table. The furniture is being made so that will be several weeks before I get it.

I feel like I am 25 again and setting up housekeeping - for those of you who were single for longer than 5 minutes, perhaps you remember your first place. If it was anything like mine, it came with carpet that had seen better days - a lot better days! My first carpet was orange shag that had lost the shag a long time ago but not the funky orange color! The furniture was whatever could be begged or borrowed from family, friends, and people who I just happened to meet on the street and who felt sorry for me. My first couch had orange flowers - vintage 1950s! It had been left in the apartment and the manager was going to put it out on the curb. I said 'No, I'll take it' - I had no couch and frankly, no prospects of getting one. I used that couch for 4 years and my mother had it for another 10 years. She just recently gave it away - it is still in service. My first kitchen utensils came from a relative's house who had a reputation for stopping on the street on trash days and going through whatever was sitting on the curb. Lest you think I was ungrateful, I was not. The set of silverware that came from that relative - well, I used it for 12 years, always with gratitude that she cared enough to give. As I replace all the things I left behind, I find myself missing the stories behind them. For those of you who, like me, have cobbled your life together, possessions become a way to remember, recollections of people we have known and places we have been. For me, I left behind the depression glass bowel that my sister got me for Christmas during a lean year, the cross stitch from Lois in CA, the candelabra that came from a co-worker - the list could go on and on. It is not the possessions that I miss - it is the stories and connections behind them that I long for, I think. One of my friends from those early years (she was equally single and equally poor) used to say that we were furnished in 'first edition poor' Well, poor it certainly was but somehow, the stories made for a fabric of untold richness.

Paper People II

Here is a poem I wrote a couple of months ago.

Paper People

I dreamt of paper people
People who were once real
Flesh and blood and weeping bone
As real as you and I
All they have left is me
You have colored my eyes
And framed my smile
And my strong will
I long for a letter, a sound, a sigh
a glimpse of your ordinary days
I have your DNA
But you are enigma
And I am left to beg for crumbs
Of distant stories and
Half remembered legends

You left me kin
My cousins
And distant cousins
And more distant cousins
They are my blood and my tie
Yet I barely know their names

I whisper with longing to know
My paper people
I shout with triumph
To read of your beginnings and your ending
I hunt with frantic uncertainty
Through dusty files and courthouse records
I stare at pictures so faded
I wonder about your cycles and
how you felt to know that
You were pregnant again –
Did you know that you were carrying
my great grandfather in your womb?
Did you feel him turning and spinning and dancing madly
in your belly
did you know that this was the most important thing
you would ever do?

I long to know the year that the crops failed
And why did you sell the wagon in 1863?
How did you feel about the black
And the gray and the blue?
At twelve, did you huddle under your bed in old Johnsonville
And listen to the cannons pound their fury in your backyard
Did you walk among the dead and look for your kin
Did you come to hate the color blue?
Why did you leave your daughter and your daughter’s daughter
To face an uncertain future in a foreign land called Texas?

How did you feel to ship into Galveston
While the salt air mussed your hair
And stand on the wharf and know no one?
Not a dollar in your pocket or a word
of my language on your tongue
Did you rejoice,
did you grieve,
For the shores you left behind?

I am your legacy
I am the future
Made from dust and sweat
and a thousand days of your
ceaseless toiling on small farms
I am the reason for your rising in
the early morning hours before the dawn
And the cornbread cooking in the wood stove

I am ten thousand prayers
Whispered on wooden church pews in
long abandoned churches

I am your blood.

rrw
summer 2007

Birthday

Hello all,

Today is my birthday. I am not going to say how old I am - that would be telling. For the record, 21 and holding. I have said for years 21 is the perfect age. You can take it as a compliment if people think you are younger and as flattery if they think you are older. However, when I look back, I would not return to 21 for anything. My life has been a rich tapestry. It has not been any easy life or even, at times, a settled life. However, I thank God for these years I have been given. For those of you who know me well, you know the birthday memories are not always the best. However, on this day, let me give thanks for the weaving that my life has become. I have been so richly blessed with family and friends, with purpose, with education, even with possessions.

Most of all, I have been blessed with an Abba who loves me. It has crossed my mind many times that He let me born on this particular day. He could have picked the day before, the day after... Yet, He picked this day to be the first day that my eyes would see light, the first day that I would cry as a tiny infant for nourishment, the first day of the rest of my life. He knows the length and breath of my days and He holds my times in His hand. May this life be a drink offering poured out to Him.