A Note from The M

The M wrote an email to her friends yesterday. I thought you might like to read it too.

Hi Friends!

I’m burning up with an email inside me and I’ve just got to share it. I’ve been cleaning house today. Undeveloped country style. So, I’m just saying…let’s keep it real. So. I went to sweep my bedroom. I’m sweeping, sweeping, and thinking “man this is a lot of dirt that I didn’t even really know we had in here”. So then I get the dust pan with a long handle thing and fill it and go to dump it in the trash can and I get most of the dirt in the trash and the rest of the dirt falls out of the dust pan and onto the floor. See, I’m trying to wrangle the homemade broom and this dust pan with a long handle thing and very carefully get the gunk into the can. With no real coordination. And totally sweating the whole time. I mean sweat pouring off my forehead and dripping off my nose. And y’all know I love to sweat. And clean. And let me remind you there is no sonic here. So I’m minus one route 44 diet coke and I’m just saying so we can keep it real. I’m loving being here and all. So then, I go outside to get the laundry gathered up because apparently I’m way too much of a white girl to keep 9 people’s laundry clean when I have to wash it by handand line dry it. So we are hiring it out. Good thing. Really good thing. We are hiring a lady who needs some work from Humberto’s church. He’s the pastor and agreat friend of Brian’s. So, I’m outside gathering it up. And I find the towels that have been “soaking” now (for two days) in the wash tub and realize that Ihave to wring them out before I can pack them up. So I’m wringing out these towels and sweat is pouring off my nose. And I’m not even washing the clothes. I’m just gathering them for someone else to wash. I’m such a wimp!! So, I cameinside to wash the dishes. By hand. And we have no running hot/warm-ish water. So I go to heat up water on the stove in our stock pot. I go off to let it come to a boil and about 20 minutes later realize it’s totally boiling on the stove and has been for a bit now. So I pour the boiling water into the right side of the sink that I have prepared with a stopper and some liquid soap. I fill it and then put in some of the dirtier dishes to soak (because no one did the dishes yesterday while I was at the beach getting the truck stuck in the sand; true story and for another time…I’m just saying). So, I walk off feeling great that they are soaking and they’ll be really easy to wash in a bit. Off to see what’s going on in the front room and I spy a guy outside at the front gate. He’s standing there like I need to go see what’s happening. So I go outside of the house but I’m inside the gate and he’s on the sidewalk outside the gate and he looks nice enough, but he’s speaking Spanish (of course) really fast. I keep telling him I don’t know where danto lives (because I think that’s what he’s asking me) but finally I go out of the gate and follow him and he is asking if he can have the floor fan we have out by the trash can. Of course he can have the broken-we-bought-new-we-thought-until-it-broke-the-first-time-we-used-it-fan. So I go back around the house into the front gate and inside the house to get the keys to the locked gates and back out through the back door and walk out to the curb where he is waiting and hand him the fan over the back gate. Now the gates are locked all the time because I am a fraidy-cat white girl with two kids at home alone. So, the nice guy goes off on his bicycle with our broken fan and I go back inside. And I’m so thankful that he didn’t hit me or rob meand that he could probably fix that broken motor and I’m thinking I really like it here. Right in the middle of God’s will and all. I walk in the kitchen through the back door to finish up the dishes and see that ALL MY WATER DRAINED OUT OF THE SINK. All my freshly cleaned and boiled water has gone away. Seriously. And so I started this little email in my head. Because I started to get a little frustrated. And because I started to see there was some humor in my situation. Because I’m such an extrovert and such a verbal processer that I’m totally talking to myself about how this is really so hilarious and would be even more funny if I could share it with someone. So I’m sharing it with y’all. Please hear my heart. I love it here!! I am so thrilled that God has chosen me and my family to do this work here in Honduras. So thrilled. But even in the Psalms David often wrote of all the rotten things going on and then right after that he wrote, “BUT I will still praise the most high God!!!”. And that’s what I’m saying. I’m so thankful I get to be here. I’m so thankful that I get to give this opportunity to my kids. I’m so thankful that as a family we are making such amazing memories. I’m so thankful I get to return home to a washing machine (amen) and a dish washer (amen) and a honking huge air conditioner (canI get a big amen?). I’m so blessed. I’m so rich. I’m so spoiled. I’m so thankful. And I’m so thankful that y’all are out there for me to share this with.

I love each and every one of you! The M (I changed her name)

PS) Things went smoothly at the police station yesterday. Really smooth. Just like God had paved the way or something. Thanks for praying friends.