What Else Can You Do About It Except Laugh?

Monday morning was my first day of class. I got up around 7:30 am, got dressed, and plucked my toothbrush and toothpaste off the counter in my room and carried them down the hall to the bathroom. There are four sinks in this bathroom. I went to the one farthest away from the door. I applied toothpaste to my brush and began brushing. After about a minute, I spat and turned the handle of the faucet to wash my mouth out. Sounds simple enough, right? There was only one problem, when I turned the handle of the faucet, no water came out. Thinking I must be imagining things I tried turning the other handle of the faucet, still no water came rushing out, not even a trickle. Unwilling to accept this, I went down the line of sinks, turning the handle of each one. Water did not present itself.

After a moment or two I realized that I still had a full water bottle in my room so I jogged down the hall with my tooth brush in my mouth to grab the bottle. I returned to the bathroom and finished brushing my teeth with the water from the bottle. As I peeked into the bathroom stalls and saw the mess people had been forced to leave in the toilets, I felt a surge of anger come over me about the situation. I wasn't so much angry about the inconvenience this was to me, but about how the rest of the residents in my dorm would act. I am the RA for the first floor of my dorm. While I love being a RA because it means I get to help take care of people, the job also has its downsides, one of which is that resident advisors tend to get hit with a lot of complaints. I don't know many Americans who are used to going about their daily routine without water so I expected I'd be met with dozens of angry residents. Just what I needed on my first day of class!

I am happy to say that I was completely wrong. As I walked down the hall and met people with soap suds drying on their legs, water bottles and toothbrushes in hand, I was shocked by the strange and unexpected reaction I got from my residents. They were smiling. Each and every person I ran into was smiling. And when their eyes met mine, we all just burst out laughing. And I mean hysterical, tears-rolling-down-face laughing, because as one resident said in between giggles, "Well, what else can you do about it except laugh?"

Some students ran over to the recreation center to take quick showers. Others (myself included) headed over to the student center for a bathroom, face-washing run. And as I ran into more and more people trying to get ready for the day all over campus, the more laughter and hilarious comments I heard.

And so for that morning, I was proud that people were able to walk across the street to use the toilet without their whole world crashing in. I was proud that people either took the trek to the rec center to take showers in good spirits, or realized that going one day without bathing wouldn't kill them. That morning, I was proud of people from my culture. I was proud that I heard laughter in abundance and not a single complaint. I was proud that people could defy my expectations and that we could all accept that crazy stuff does indeed happen and being inconvenienced doesn't mean the day should be spoiled by bad attitudes. 

Sometimes, things don't go as planned, even something as simple as brushing your teeth. It's so easy to get angry or annoyed in these situations but so much more fun to laugh and embrace the spontaneity of life.

I Am Here and It Is Now

 Since I got on that first sixteen hour flight to South Africa, time has not been pulsing at its normal rhythms for me and, on occasion, has disappeared from my consciousness all together. I didn't wear a watch in Swaziland, my cell phone remained off, I didn't check Facebook, and only checked my email twice for the sole purpose of assuring my parents that I was alive and wishing my grandma a happy eighty-sixth birthday. Occasionally I would ask a teammate what time it was, perhaps out of habit, but I don't remember ever really listening to the answer. So, as you can imagine, it came as a shock to me to today to check my calendar and suddenly realize that as of tomorrow, it will be a week since our last day at the carepoint.

Nearly a week has past since we said our goodbyes and my heart broke and grew and transformed all at once. I can keep saying that over and over in my head but it still doesn't seem real. I haven't quite come to terms with the fact that I am in America, that I have, as people keep telling me, "re-entered." Every once in a while I feel like a map with a big red X and the words, "You are here" is being shoved under my face as my mind tries to convince me that I should accept my surroundings. But, my heart insists, "You are there. You are there." and I don't have the strength to argue because I want so badly for that to be true.

It's hard to be back on a schedule, to have to adhere to the rigid command of time. I have to wake up at seven, shower at eight, eat breakfast at nine, go to training at ten, break for lunch at noon, return at one, train some more until four, work on projects in the dorm until seven, eat dinner, work some more, go to sleep and repeat it all again the next day. I am virtually always aware of what time it is down to the minute and as much as I love my job and my friends and my school, I find myself missing my life in Swaziland where time wasn't a constant grip on my neck, but a soft hand on my back, pushing me ever so gently throughout my day.

Time isn't just holding me, it's holding our entire culture. I've been asked what time it is by a friend at least ten times in the past two days. Every time this happens I get a surge of distress. I want to scream at them, "You are here and it is now! That's all that matters!" But, instead, I slip back into the cultural norm, pull out my cell phone and inform my friend that it is one o'clock and that we need to get back to training.

I feel like I am starting this life all over again. The twelve days I was gone feels more like twelve years. Everything I once called normal seems completely unfamiliar. This world feels like a museum instead of a home. Things are too clean. I am too clean. I miss blowing dirt out of my nose at the end of the day and shaking rocks and dust out of my shoes. I miss really having a reason to shower. The roads in this world feel too smooth, the lights feel too bright, the cows are far too fat and the dogs are ostentatiously well-groomed.

There is time here. There is so much time. And it has so much power. I want to love it. I want to say I feel so blessed to be back in America. I want to say I am so glad for all of the freedom we have. I want to be proud to call this place my home but I'm just not there yet. I'm not sure I can ever fully be there again.

It's 10:35 pm in Iowa and I don't know what that really means. I am here and it is now and I'm still living and breathing and ready to be in reality again serving my brothers and sisters.

Inadequate Words

I'm sitting in my dorm room in Iowa, tired, sore and sweating. With the help of my father and several friends, my stuff has all made it into Hildenbrand Hall and I start Resident Advisor training tomorrow. It's crazy to realize that four days ago I was in another country, continent, and hemisphere. Everything that's happened since landing in America has been a blur. I feel disconnected, like a brainless robot performing tasks but unable to truly think or feel.

One of my family members asked me the other day if Swaziland had been an unbelievable experience. The truth is that it wasn't unbelievable, not at all. I have never felt anything so incredibly real as I did during the few weeks I spent in Swaziland, I have never felt so alive. The experience that's unbelievable is returning to America, returning to a place that I once called home and realizing that my heart is still in the rolling hills and mountains of a country far away. What's unbelievable is waking up each morning ready to spend the day at a carepoint with smiling, wonderful children and realizing that it will be at least another year until I can be in their presence again. What's unbelievable is spending my time away from my loving and fantastically supportive teammates who, in a matter of hours, became my family. What's unbelievable is coming into a world where we complain about five extra minutes in traffic, a broken air conditioner, hair in the sink, too much grease on food and a million other minute details. Swaziland was real. The shock of America is what's unbelievable.

As I adjust to existing again in my native land I feel, as my friend and teammate Sierra would say, like I'm on "The Struggle Bus." Friends and family members alike have been asking me countless questions about my experience in Swaziland and as I recount story after story to them I realize how incredibly inadequate my words are. I can describe my horror and pain witnessing the children's ward of the hospital we visited, I can describe the landscape and how many children came to the carepoint barefoot, some traveling three or four miles on roads of dust and rocks. I can describe the crumbling huts made out of branches and mud that many children come home to with no dinner on the table or parents waiting to care for their needs. I can describe so much of the pain and suffering I witnessed and experienced alongside the people of Swaziland but it's inadequate to just tell these stories without being able to describe the unspeakable joy and peace that permeated the entire country and its people.

I don't know how to describe in words the source of the light that shone out of the children of Ludlati Carepoint. I don't know how to explain their gratitude and contentment despite the grave odds they face. I don't know how to explain their resilience, their kindness, their bravery, loyalty, or beauty. I don't know how to convey to people how inexplicably happy these children are, how blessed they are to be able to survive on God's grace alone and be constantly thankful for even the smallest blessings. I can't explain how much peace I felt holding little Danele against my chest, or the excitement of a chat with the animated Colile or how my heart shattered into a million pieces as sweet Kholiwe called out to me, "I will pray for you all year!" as I walked towards the van on our last day.

My words are inadequate and that's hard. I want so badly to tell everyone the stories of my trip but nothing I describe can truly bring that place justice. I am on The Struggle Bus and don't know if I will ever be getting off. I can only take peace in the fact that while my words are inadequate, God's love for these children is not. I rejoice in the fact that while so much about the lives of these kids is broken, their spirit remains strong. They are an indescribable blessing that I can only make feeble attempts to put into words.

Tomorrow Came Way Too Fast

I am flying to Swaziland tomorrow and I'll admit it, I'm slightly terrified. I've been playing it cool all this time thinking, "I've done long flights and a foreign country before. This is no big deal!"Honestly, I think that the only reason I felt that way was because I couldn't believe that I was actually going to Swaziland. Getting to go on this trip was such a crazy blur of events that were so incredible I couldn't even grasp it all. I kept saying, "I'm going to Africa this summer!" But, it was just talk, just a concept, too amazing to be a reality. It feels like forever ago when I was riding home from Iowa for spring break and got a text from one of my friends who saw on Facebook that my sister had won a t-shirt contest. That moment of pure joy and gratitude put me into a kind of blissful shock and today I woke up and realized that this crazy "leaving tomorrow" thing came way too fast.

I feel unprepared even though I've checked and double checked that I had everything I needed for this trip. I've crossed everything off my list but no matter how much I reassure myself that I've got everything down, I can't help but be completely positive that I don't have anything down at all.

But when I stop and really think about that, I realize that it's going to be okay to be unprepared. Yes, I undoubtedly will forget something, maybe even something important, but it's okay because it's going to work out for the best. The beautiful and terrifying thing about all of this is that I don't know what "for the best" is. I don't know what to expect and that's mortifying but spectacular too. I used to say that this was no big deal, but it is. Going on a mission trip to Swaziland is a big deal, but it's also the right deal. It's a deal that I suddenly found my heart fully committed to before I ever knew that there was a crazy t-shirt contest in store for me. This is what I am supposed to be doing. Yes, I cant shake the feelings of nervousness, terror, feeling unprepared, and a thousand other things that are haunting me right now, but I also can't shake the overwhelming knowledge that this is beautifully and inexplicably right.

Tomorrow is happening. It's going to be here before I can blink an eye and I'm not ready, not at all. But  even with all the time in the world to spend thinking and preparing, I still never would be. All I can keep telling myself is that the fear, the nerves, and everything else is okay. I've never been in this alone.

What Do I Absolutely Need?

Today is Saturday and I just finished cramming most of what I need to survive in a third-world country for nearly two weeks in a backpack. It's a large backpack, but still, a backpack. I am leaving for Swaziland on Tuesday morning. Well, sort of. First my team has to get all of our bags loaded in a van, then drive to Chicago, then fly to Atlanta, then catch tremendously long flight to Johannesburg, South Africa and then, finally, drive the five hours to Swaziland.

I've never thought of myself as a particularly heavy packer. I know girls who go through three outfits a day. I only need one, thank you very much! I don't straighten, curl, or even blow dry my hair. I wear a minimal amount of makeup if I wear any at all. I always try to pack just what I absolutely need. But, as it turned out this time, what I absolutely needed wasn't able to be zipped closed in my bag. I tried rearranging again and again to no avail. I simply had too much stuff.

I was in a predicament. Most of this stuff was just what our team leader had instructed us to pack. But, clearly, something had to go!

"Okay," I thought, "What do I get rid of when I have everything I am supposed to have?"

I stared down into the chaotic tumble of travel items. The first thing that caught my attention was the mini pillow and blanket. These were not huge items. It wasn't like I was bringing a full sized pillow and a comforter, but did I really need both for the plane? No. The blanket could be folded to make a pillow if I needed it and I already had two sweatshirts with me. So, just like that, a surprisingly large chunk of space appeared.

Next came the shoes. Did I really need a pair for the carepoint, church, and the plane? No. The shoes I wore on the plane could very easily double as church shoes, so I chucked the shoes I had carefully matched with my dress for church into a pile in the corner.

I got rid of some skirts, t-shirts, pairs of socks, bras, and limited myself to one pair of jeans (sorry if that horrifies anyone). Eventually, the bag zipped and honestly, I am pretty sure that I am still over-prepared in the wipe, tissue, snack, medication, hand sanitizer, toothpaste, and soap department.

It's funny how much I still have even after stripping away nearly a quarter of what I was sure I needed. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised at all if I got rid of a few more things before I leave on Tuesday!

Grieving to Gratitude: How Thankfulness Changed My Life

            In my lifetime, I’ve heard more than a few rumors about myself. People have spread falsehoods about my family life, my friendships, my romantic relationships and more. I thought these rumors would end after high school but they are just as prevalent now, in college, as ever before. The most recent rumor I heard about myself is that I’m always happy. Apparently, I never stop smiling, am always in a good mood, and practically radiate positivity. Although this rumor is flattering, nothing could be farther from the truth. I am not always smiling and am most definitely not in some kind of eternally good mood. I get angry, sad, and feel pain far more often than most people seem to realize. I have my bad days just like everyone else. I’m human, not a Barbie doll with a smile plastered on its face.

            “You’re so lucky to have such a positive disposition. You can always find the good in every situation,” one of my friends informed me a few weeks ago. Yes, I try to find the good in every situation and yes, I tend to have a positive disposition but it’s not luck that made me this way. Life didn’t just coincidently grant me with a positive attitude. I wasn’t born an infinitely happy miracle baby. As a young adult, I do feel blessed to have a positive spirit but I was not always this way, I was not always able to find good in my life. No, I am not lucky to be positive. It was not by chance, but by choice, that I came to accept the gift of gratitude for my life.

            In the summer of 2010 I was miserable. I spent as much time as I possibly could in my bed sleeping because living was a nightmare. Every night before I fell asleep, I prayed to God that I wouldn’t wake up in the morning. I asked Him to save me from this excruciating existence and every morning I opened my eyes in despair and anger realizing that God expected me to make it through another day. I thought He was trying to torture me and I despised Him for it.

 I was lonely all the time. Even when I was around other people, I felt completely isolated in my own mind. I dreaded every breath I had to take and looked forward to nothing except sleep.

            On one particularly horrible day, within a two-hour time period, I found out that the boy I was in a relationship with at the time was going to move away because he had gotten a scholarship to a school across the country and also that my mother was moving out of the house. When I got the news about my boyfriend, I cried uncontrollably for over an hour. My stomach ached so badly it seemed like a piece of lead must have been lodged inside of it. Each beat of my heart felt like a baseball was being pitched straight at my ribcage. Just when I had pulled myself together, I got the news about my mom. This time I didn’t cry, not even a little. I went numb and stayed numb for months.

            Then, one day, about three weeks before I started college, I decided I’d write in my journal. I felt so dull that I could only manage to put one sentence down: “I’m thankful that I have food on my plate.” I recall staring down at those words for several minutes in shock. Did I really have something to be thankful for in my miserable existence?

            The next day I wrote in my journal once more. Again, only one sentence and it said, “I’m thankful for waking up feeling better than when I went to sleep.” Like the day before, I stared down at the words I had written hardly believing they were my own. I wasn’t sure why I had said that, after all I always looked forward to sleep and dreaded waking up. I was intrigued by what I was writing and so I decided to continue. Everyday I sat down with my journal, stopped thinking, and wrote a sentence. I discovered that I was thankful for friends, laughter, technology, beauty in nature, giving and receiving love, family, patience, new opportunities, and more. Writing down a sentence of gratitude became so much of a habit that even on my bad days I found something to put down. It became a game to me, and I wasn’t about to let any negative emotion keep me from winning.

            “I’m thankful for tears because they mean I have something to lose,” I wrote one day. Another day I wrote, “I’m thankful for the pain in my heart because it means I’m alive.” I even went as far as to be thankful for the people who had made me angry because without them I would have never learned how to forgive.

            For months, I wrote down one thing I was thankful for every day no matter how tiny or silly it seemed. I wrote when I was happy, sad, tired, angry, desperate, and excited. Then, one day, I looked down at my journal and discovered words that I never, even in my wildest dreams, thought could come from me. I had written, “I am so incredibly thankful for my life.”

And the amazing thing was that beyond just seeing those words on paper, I actually felt it. I felt so grateful to be living and so thankful that I had woken up all of those mornings I had begged God not to let me. I was thankful to exist, to be a walking, talking, breathing, loving, being.

Last August, I went through a break-up with the same boyfriend who had moved away the year before. I can’t lie and say it was easy or that I handled it even remotely well. I wasn’t smiling or feeling positive. In fact, I was doing quite the opposite. However, there are two journal entries during that time that stand out to me. The first one is from the day we broke up and it says, “I am thankful for love and for life and for the people who have shaped me.” The second entry is from the day I said goodbye to him because I was heading off to another semester of college and it says, “I am thankful for you.”

Those were two of the most painful days I’d had since my misery summer of 2010. I felt completely heavy and depressed. If I was smiling, it was forced.

I’ve had plenty of terrible days since then. I’ve suffered. I’ve felt sad and hurt for dozens of reasons. I’ve been so venomously angry that I’m almost ashamed to talk about it. Despite what many of my friends think, I am not always happy or positive, and I’m certainly not always smiling. But, I am always thankful.

Now, instead of opening my eyes in despair each morning, I open them in anticipation. Instead of waking up grieving over the torturous life God is making me go through, I wake up grateful to be able to live the life He has blessed me with. My circumstances don’t always provide me with an easy path to happiness. I am not lucky. I am simply thankful everyday for whatever comes my way, and that has made all the difference.

Cancer-Based Love

I am usually a pretty friendly person. I make an effort to be nice to everyone and I am mostly successful. I try to love and not judge, but sometimes, as much as I hate to admit it, there are people who just grate on my nerves.

Not long ago I met a man who, to be quite honest, drove me a little insane. I noticed him on the first day of one of my courses at school. He was an older gentleman, and by older I mean older for college. He was probably around fifty and he liked to talk, a lot. Whenever the teacher explained anything, he always had a comment to make or a story to tell that somehow, in his brain at least, related to what we were studying. Every day we heard story after story about his life, and don't get me wrong, they weren't bad stories I just didn't want to hear about them during class time. This gentleman was not in the least bit unintelligent, however, I began to feel agitated every time he opened his mouth because I knew something longwinded would come out. Even when his comments were helpful to my understanding of the subject matter, my annoyance far out-shadowed my thankfulness.

One day, I noticed my class seemed strangely quiet. I scanned the room and unsurprisingly the gentleman wasn't there. I felt a little thrill. For once, I wouldn't have to listen to those stories! The next day, the gentleman didn't return. Nor did he come on the following day or for the rest of the week. I began to feel hopeful that maybe he had dropped the class. The class discussions had changed quite a bit and I can't say I minded that he was no longer there to dominate them.

This Monday, my teacher announced to the whole class that the gentleman had officially dropped the course. I wasn't sad. I wasn't disappointed. I had secretly been hoping for this. But then, my teacher told us why.

The gentleman had cancer and would be needing treatment and operations right away.

And suddenly, I couldn't breathe. I felt like an entire elephant family had just planted itself on my chest. My whole body ached and I thought my heart might explode out of my ribcage and spray on every person in the room.

I had always considered myself a nice person. I had always thought that I tried to love everyone.

But I hadn't succeeded this time. I hadn't loved this fellow at all. Even when he was kind to me and had helpful advice, I couldn't get past my own judgement to listen to it. I had rejoiced in knowing I wouldn't have to deal with him in class anymore.

This gentleman has cancer. This gentleman that I didn't love has cancer and I was happy to have him gone. Can I still call myself a nice person?

No. I can't really say that about myself anymore. Or, more accurately, I can't call myself perfect. I can only call myself human and infinitely flawed.

The problem is that I could only see as far as my limited perception. I could only see my annoyance. I could only understand my frustration.

"If I had only known, I would have responded differently. If I had only known, I wouldn't have felt so annoyed, I would have just loved."

Those were my thoughts after initially hearing the news. Yet, I can see now how infinitely flawed those thoughts are too.

If you only love someone when you find out they are suffering, it's a weak love, a guilty love, a conditional love. That's not the kind of love God asks for and it's not the kind of love I am okay with giving anymore. God asks us to love our neighbor as ourself. He doesn't say love your neighbor if you find out your neighbor has cancer. He doesn't even ask us to love our neighbor because the neighbor might have cancer. God says to love your neighbor. That's it. No questions asked. No conditions. Just love him.

The most beautiful and terrible thing about being human is that you can't ever really know what's going on inside of someone else. You can't ever fully understand the journey that other people have traveled on to get to where they are. You can only see them as they are. And if you judge everyone by your first impression, never truly understanding the intricacy of the joy and pain that knits all of humanity together, you miss out on one of the most spectacular commandments: unconditional love.

I can't go back and change my actions or my attitude toward this gentleman. I can only pray for his life and continue on with my own having learned something of infinite value.

I know now that I can't go on loving in conditions. I can't go on judging first and loving later. I have to love first, and love unconditionally because if I do that, the judgements I would have made in my lack of love, will no longer exist.

If there's anything I want to teach the world from my unfortunate mistake this time, it's just to love your neighbor, always. And I don't mean love your neighbor because you never know if he might have cancer, I mean to love your neighbor unconditionally. Because, in the end your love for your neighbor shouldn't depend on if he has cancer or not.