Sometimes I sit here and I reflect and my mind takes me down the questioning road and I ask myself things like, “Why am I here, Lord? Why did you put me here, at this time, in this place? What am I doing that is of any real significance? Please let me know, because I am having one of those days where it isn’t clear to me and I’m wondering what in the heck I’m doing. It seemed so clear before, but now I feel like I’m just not sure that I heard You correctly when you called me here.”
He answers. He always answers. The past week has been “one of those days” and I have been asking myself those questions. This assignment is such a stark contrast to Peru. In Peru, there were so many physical things that we were doing each day – running the three school programs and mentoring the Peruvian teacher missionaries who were leading the programs, helping in the feeding program for the elderly, running a greenhouse and a small farm to supply food for the schools and feeding program, bible studies, home visits, health classes. Side note here… we were told on NUMEROUS occasions by superiors and well-meaning peers that we were doing too much and that we might need to cut back to avoid burnout, but I’m one of God’s stiff-necked people sometimes and I don’t heed warnings very well But I digress... My life seems vastly less “busy” physically than it was then, and my mindset wants to equate “less busy” with “boring, unproductive, unnecessary, and useless”. There are probably a lot of cultural reasons for that, some worldview and some family culture and some mission culture… lots of reasons. But “busy” and lots of programs somehow equates to being productive and doing a good job. Somehow the disciple work with the ladies I see each week seems so normal and so relaxed and so refreshing to me that there must be something wrong, right? I mean, how could drinking coffee and talking with immigrant women and workers possibly be ministry and equate to what my life was in Peru? (Hint… don’t ask stupid questions! God will answer and you will probably see your stupid ways!) Then I got a message from a missionary peer who is need of a listening ear and a coaching spirit. We set a time to talk and I could almost hear the sigh of relief in the typed response. “Thank God you’re there! I’m looking forward to our talk. I need you.” Another wanted my feedback on a few things and wanted to talk about a major transition in her life. I asked if she wanted to converse via email, or did she want to try to do a phone call. “Oh please, let’s talk on the phone! I need to hear your voice! I need to talk to a real person. Please, let me call you on the phone!” So we talked for over an hour that day. I got another message from a missionary couple, “I didn’t want to ask you earlier and waste your time, but now I think I need you. We need some coaching. We need to talk to someone. Please, can you talk to us this weekend?” We set a day and time. I never think that talking to CCWs is a waste of time! Later, I received another message from a friend who said, “I need you. I need your ear and your listening heart. Do you have some time for me?” I made time. We talked. She cried. I listened. And after a while, tears turned to laughter and strength. At the end, she said, “Thanks Friend! I needed that. I needed you to listen and be level-headed and help me find reason in all of this. I feel strong enough to put on my ‘big girl panties’ and face tomorrow. I love you!” I don’t feel like I did anything… I just listened to her heart. This morning, a missionary couple from another agency came over for coffee. Lots of laughs and lots of talking about anything and everything turned in to a time of pouring out their heart and their need for others who understand and to whom they can tell all the hard stuff. Sometimes, as cross-cultural witnesses, we don’t have a lot of people who we can really tell everything to. Some things are only understood fully by other CCWs and people who live it daily. And some CCWs are in the field without a good agency or care people to back them, as is the case with this couple. They’ve been in the field for 10 months and they need some care and some love, a listening ear, some coaching, and a little mentoring here and there. Today was “one of those days” for them, as they began to relate struggles and frustrations and shattered expectations. Their situation is far from over, but someone is listening and they are not alone. As I sat in my chair for a tiny moment of rest after lunch, God tapped me on my forehead and said, “Are you still wondering why you are here and what you are doing? Pay attention! You’re doing exactly what I asked of you! People need to be heard. People need to be listened to. People need someone by their side so they can keep going. Keep listening and keep being available. That’s all I asked of you.” Okay, God. I get it. Just help me to retrain my brain to realize that listening IS ministry, listening IS active, and that listening really matters. My heart knows it, but my brain is stubborn and backwards sometimes. I may not be physically exhausted and sunburned and sweaty and falling-down-in-the-bed tired every day like I was in Peru, and I admit that it is hard for me to not be all of those things every day, but I’m right where you want me and that’s the best place to be! I’m all ears – Bring it! I’m tired of the “F” word… the nice one that everyone is using and no one really means… the little four letter lie that has become so much a part of our everyday English language that even foreign language classes now teach it as the obligatory response to “How are you?” in English. Yes, that’s right – I’m tired of the word “fine”. It just won’t do.
You see, so many times it just isn’t true. It is the face that we put on, the mask that we wear. It is the acceptable response. Or, it is the easy way out. I’m not buying it. So don’t give it to me. I want more than that. I want the truth. I want the real you. And I want to be real, too. So I don’t want to use the “f” word any more, at least not the one spelled F-I-N-E. I do a lot of listening in my work. I ask a lot of questions and I do a lot of listening. And the truth is usually something much more vulnerable and transparent and real than “fine”. Sometimes conversations start out with “I’m fine”, and usually people can get away with that in most of their conversations. But not here. Not with me. Get ready, because I’m going to ask for more. I’m going to ask for the truth. I’m going to listen to you until I hear your heart. Maybe the truth is another “f” word. Maybe your life is fantastic, or fun, or full. Maybe there are days where those words are your truth. So say it! Say something better than “fine”. Sing it out! Let it be known and heard! Don’t diminish it or belittle the fact that you are having a great day or a great week. Let us know! Many of the folks I talk to have other “f” words. They say they are “fine”, but after a little listening, the truth is really somewhere in some other “f” words… words like frustrated, frightened, fearful, frantic and failing. Words like fleeing and finances and floundering and faking it and false come up in the conversation. And now I have a much better picture of your heart and your struggles and your tensions and stresses. Now you are real, and now I know you a little better and a little deeper. And somehow, I love you a little more because you are real. C.S. Lewis wrote a lesser-known work entitled Till We Have Faces, which is a Greek myth retold from a different standpoint. One literary critic wrote that the main point of the story is that, “Until we learn to see ourselves clearly for who we really are, we see nothing clearly at all.” One particular quote caught my attention. “I saw well why the gods do not speak to us openly, nor let us answer . . . Why should they hear the babble that we think we mean? How can they meet us face to face till we have faces?” I recently heard a pastor speak on this very quote, saying that sometimes people worry that God seems to be distant or silent or passive. Yet upon further discussion, it seems that they aren’t willing to be open and real, transparent and close to Him either. They give him the “I’m fine” treatment, just like they give everyone around them. They don’t lift up the Fantastic day or the Fun time or the Fullness of their lives to Him in praise. And equally, they don’t get real with their frustrations and their fears, their frantic lifestyles or their floundering finances. And He is waiting. What seems like distance or silence or passivity is really quiet, patient waiting on His part. Waiting for the realness. Waiting for the true face to be shown. For it is only in showing Him our true face that He will turn His face toward us and allow us to see Him more fully. The intimacy of being truly face-to-face… By the way, “face” is another one of those “f” words – let’s use it well! Last week, my husband shared with me a revelation that he had just had… He said, ‘God said that “it was good” after he created everything, but he never said that it was perfect.’ In true fashion, my husband didn’t really discuss it or delve in to the topic, he just announced it and went on his merry way. That’s the way he rolls. He can be quiet for a long time, thinking… then he will announce some profound piece of wisdom and just leave it there, hanging in the air, with no other words or thoughts or anything special. I envy the fact that he can do that – not stress over anything, not analyze it to death, not worry about explaining his thoughts. I can’t. He leaves these little gems lying around and I’m left to examine them, ponder them, wrestle with them, and wonder if there is something in there for me.
As a perfectionist, I have wrestled with this little sentence that my husband left for me for the past week. True that God didn’t say everything was perfect. And true that He did say that it was good. So far, I’m okay with that. But I take the imperfect things in my life kind of personally. I feel the need to fix them, or to improve them, or to help them reach their perfect potential. And I have an especially hard time leaving something at “good” when I know it could be better. Yet, God did just that! He could have made everything perfect if he had wanted to, but he didn’t. He created everything and then he said that “it was good”. Hmmm. I have realized over the past couple of years that there are some things around me that are not perfect and that I have taken those things on as personal failures. Why can’t I fix it? Where have I gone wrong? What have I not done, or what have I done, that makes this situation less-than-perfect? I am starting to realize that I beat my head against a wall and I beat myself up in the process of trying to smooth out the rough edges of life. When I can’t make it right or I can’t work it out, somehow that equates to failure for me. Imperfect. Somehow the situation is not the only imperfect thing. Somehow, I am labeled imperfect in my failure to make the world perfect. Imperfect. That’s a tough label to accept for a championship perfectionist! So my current walk with Him is a walk of learning to accept that sometimes things aren’t perfect, but they are good and that’s okay. I’m trying to see things through the eyes of The Creator and see where He sees the good in something or someone, even though it isn’t perfection. And I’m trying to accept the fact that this perfectionist is far from perfect and that I need to cut myself a little slack… Sometimes it’s just good, that that’s okay. The afternoon was coming to a close, quickly turning into evening, and I was in a strange town, not knowing where exactly I was and not sure exactly where I was supposed to be. All I knew was that I should be in Cuevas Baja to meet my exhausted hiker husband who had been on the trail since early that morning walking the Camino de Santiago - Mozárabe. I had cell phone contact with him, but he was not sure where he would enter the town from the trail, and I was completely unfamiliar with my surroundings. We finally agreed that I should attempt to find “town center” and he would try to meet me there.
I parked my car in front of a little corner bar, the kind that are so quaint and oh so Spanish. True to form, the local 70 and 80 year old men were congregating for their evening beer and an hour or so of solving the world’s problems. I walked across to the town plaza to see if I could spot my husband coming up the hill. No luck. I walked down to the next corner for a different view of the town’s streets. Still no sight of him. I repeated this process a couple of more times, each time passing through the plaza while five local kids played soccer in the growing shadows of the church bell tower. An enthusiastic “Hello” in English caught my attention. “My name is Kevin”, said the local boy. He must have been about ten years old. “Hi, Kevin. Encantada a conocerte (Pleased to meet you),” I replied “I am bilingual”, announces Kevin. Then, he quickly reverts to Spanish. “Hablo en dos idiomas, ingles y espanol. (I speak in two languages, English and Spanish.)” “Muy bien, Kevin!” I then decide to ask Kevin and the other children, in Spanish, if they know about the Camino and if they know where the trail comes in to town. I explain that I am looking for my husband. He is hiking. Of course, Kevin – my new best friend and font of endless information – knows about the trail, but he is not sure where it enters town. We chat a little more, in Spanish. He asks where I am from (in Spanish) and why I am in Spain. He and his friends are excited to meet an American, and doubly excited that the American lives in Spain. They continue to tell me how they learn English in school and how they are bilingual, although they haven’t been able to say anything other than hello and tell me their names in English. Finally, I spot my precious, exhausted, sweaty hiker coming around the corner and I bid my farewell to the group. Wildly waving their goodbyes, Kevin proudly bids me farewell with a giant smile and these words: “Where are you from good pizza!” I am smiling too big to respond to my “bilingual friend” and his attempt at an English goodbye, so I send him a wave and the blow of a kiss in his direction. Makes me wonder how many times I have done the same thing. How many times have I been a Kevin, thinking I’m bilingual and doing my best, to the amusement of others. Doesn’t matter… Kevin stole my heart with his sweet attempts to share his language skills with me and help out a stranger in the plaza. Until next time, “Where are you from good pizza!” Just got back from a time of gathering with peers and colleagues, friends and mentors. A time of training, digging deeper, reflection, vision, and prayer. It was a complex time for me. It was a time of reconnecting and building deeper relationships with other cross-cultural workers around the globe, as well as a time of serious introspection and learning and inner growth. Right now, all I am left with are questions and words that have randomly arranged themselves in my head as a poem of sorts:
Where am I? Home, yet in a foreign land Somewhere between here and there In transition, again Among friends, with my tribe, yet lost Who am I? Teacher, coach, counselor Pioneer, leader, mentor Mother, wife, friend Child His child What am I doing? Everything Nothing Too much Not enough Swimming upstream Drowning Fighting to stay afloat Wondering if I know what I’m doing How am I? Awesome, terrified, awesomely terrified Excited, nervous Scared of failing, hoping to succeed Unsure of most things, timid Acutely aware of my brokenness Yet I put on the smile and say “I’m fine” Where do I go from here? Back to Him, back to His Word Back to the center of it all Return to the Focus Recalibrate Let Him do the work He wants to do in me Let Him heal all that is confused and searching Give it all up to Him and surrender So He can restore me, so He can put the pieces back together Put my confidence back in Him, off of me It’s a time of restoration, of reconciliation A season A swing in my rhythm of life with Him This is exactly where He wants me Dependent and in need Weak, so He can be Strong In knowing Him, in knowing who He is, I know that I’m going to be okay It’s a process It’s tough, but it’s all good I look back at last week and I think of all of the many emotions that I slogged my way through, and I use the word “slog” here because if I had been anywhere near dirt, I would have definitely left tear-soaked mud in my wake. I think I cried a river, maybe literally. Seems like every day was a practice in emotion control, or a challenge to see if I could make it through even half my waking hours without wasting another day’s ration of mascara. The Eternally Happy One (Billy) was dumbfounded by what on earth could possibly be happening to his usually-has-it-all-together wife. And God bless him, because he really had no idea what was happening to me or what to do about it. What should have been an exciting time of reconnection with friends and peers and colleagues was quickly turning into a Festival of Kleenex.
Still in the throes of transition from ministry in Peru to ministry in Spain, I came to the conference a little frazzled and confused. Life in another culture is hard work. Transitions and changes in life are tough, even on a good day. In public, I hold it all together and look like life is going just fine, but I’m exhausted from the strain of trying to tune my ear in to different accents and vocabulary that is foreign. I’m constantly thinking, because there is no auto-pilot when you are new to a culture, a place, a people group. My roles are not defined yet, and everything – literally everything – is a learning experience with a steep learning curve. I love to learn, absolutely LOVE to learn, but when every single word and experience requires analyzing and mental gymnastics, it is exhausting. I hadn’t been able to completely put my finger on what wasn’t quite right with my mood and feelings and attitudes over the past month, but I knew that something was fighting inside of me. Something was struggling to connect and wasn’t getting a foothold, and I was going down with it. But what was it??? The last two weeks started to pull it all together, or rather, ravel it all to pieces. I think that maybe being back in my own culture and around my own people and my own language, for even a short time, was enough to let my brain catch up. Oh, but when it caught up, it was able to put all the pieces together and the result was not at all what I wanted. The result was the reflection in the mirror of who I am and why I’m struggling. I realized that I have transitioned out of a ministry in rural Peru and into a work in an urban center in Spain... worlds apart. I left a successful, vibrant work in a village of people hungry for The Word, and I transitioned to a yet-undefined role in post-Christian Europe where virtually no one wants to hear and no one cares. My greatest strengths (Gallup StrengthsFinder) are Learner, Achiever, Analysis, Strategic, and Individualizer. My gifts are Encourager, Shepherd, Teacher, Mercy, and Compassion. My love languages are Quality Time and Words of Appreciation. I am most successful and most fulfilled when I am working within those areas and meeting those needs. And I realized over the last two weeks that I am failing miserably at almost all of them right now. My Learner strength is off the chart and exhausted and overwhelmed. I am not being successful or achieving anything. Because I am in transition and my role is undefined right now, I have nothing to analyze or strategize or individualize… so I spend a lot of time analyzing myself – not a good thing! It is tough to encourage others when you are discouraged. I have gone from a crowd to shepherd or teach down to a mere couple or few who will sit with me. The lack of ability to build deep relationships yet is causing a rift in my need to spend quality time with others. Do you hear it? Do you see the Perfect Storm brewing? Can you feel the cataclysmic clash coming down on my emotional heart? Upon arrival at the conference, well-meaning friends hugged and kissed and asked “so how is it going in Spain?”, and my heart sank a little more. How do I even answer that? “I don’t know yet”, became my standard reply. I think I said it at least 20 times a day. After you say I-don’t-know enough times, especially if you have Achiever as one of your highest strengths, you start to feel like a real failure. Add to that mix a few of your most beloved mentors, people you look up to, whom you value, and whom you want nothing more than to have them validate you and believe that you are good… nothing like some self-imposed pressure! So there I sat, each day being a bit more ‘real’ than the last, bringing more tears and more self-realization. I started listening to the voice of the Enemy as he took advantage of the situation, of my weakness, and began whispering in my ear, “You know you’re going to fail this time. What made you think you could do this? You aren’t good enough, strong enough, smart enough…” Each evening, I wanted to stay up and visit with friends. I wanted to sit in the main hall and play games with the others. I wanted to be in community, to connect, and to have fun. But I was exhausted from all the self-talk, the self-examination, and the realization that I don’t have anything together – not at all. If I stayed up, chances are I would just start crying again, and that was too much vulnerability to endure in one day. So I went to bed to protect myself from having to talk about it anymore. In processing through all of this in the aftermath of the past two weeks, I think maybe I’m getting somewhere. I do recognize now that all of the situations that made me weep and all of the issues that brought me to tears where the result of listening to those statements from the Enemy. I have heard Frank speak warnings to me many times before about those statements that the Enemy uses to discourage us, to deceive us, to beat us down. In every single circumstance, I look back now and recognize that I was hearing those things in my head and reacting to them. I have come to the realization that this season of my life in ministry, this time here in Spain, is going to be different. I don’t know what God is up to, but I do believe with all my heart that He did call us here and He does have a plan… but for the life of me, I don’t know how He plans to use me in it, if I will be successful in it, or how exactly it will all play out. I think that He has me in a place of weakness for a reason, but I’m not sure why or what the lesson will be. I know that I am extremely uncomfortable with weakness, and maybe that is precisely the point. I don’t do ‘dependent’ very well… I’m an independent Texas girl who has always been able to put on her boots and hang in there with the toughest of the tough. My motto in my earlier days was “Quitters never win and winners never quit.” I learned that if you fall off the horse, you better bounce right off your butt and get back up in that saddle. If there isn’t evidence of blood, bones, or barf, get back in the game. Nope, dependent hasn’t ever been in my vocabulary. And that’s just where He has me… dependent, crying, weak, and wondering what on earth He’s going to do next. One of my peers said last week, “This is my people. This is my family. This is my tribe. I’m safe here. I’m going to say it all and share it all here.” I’m so glad that I have people like that in my life! I’m so glad that I have friends and peers that can sit there when you cry, sometimes without any words, and you just know that they understand and that they are there for you. During the Sunday worship and prayer service, Mercy and Ravi prayed over us as we wept at the altar, later to tell us of a vision they had of a ‘new garden and new growth’ while we were kneeling there. Later in the week, Katheryn talked to me about our season of transition being like a field that lays fallow for a season, preparing and refueling for the new planting and new fruit to come. Thank God for these people who speak words of life into my often-times dry and crying soul. I’m okay with being dependent and weak and struggling when I have “my tribe” to hold me and my God to lean on. I’m going to be okay. Maybe dependent is not such a bad place to be. Thanks to everyone who put up with the tears and who love me enough to just ‘be’ with me. I love you, too! So glad to be with you when I needed you so much! This question never ceases to crack me up! There just isn't a “typical day” for us. We never had a typical week in Peru, either, although is was a completely different schedule and lifestyle! The life of a cross-cultural worker (CCW) or missionary is always punctuated by random acts and divine appointments and teachable moments… we are continually working on something (we have to-do lists, too, just like anyone), but always ready to drop it all to meet with someone who stops by or calls for us. Our days don’t follow “normal” work hours, as we are constantly molding our schedule to fit what pops up of happens. I can give you an example of what our days usually look like (ha ha ha!):
We always try to be up at 5:30 a.m., but it is usually closer to 6 before our feet hit the floor. Quiet time / devotionals, then catch up on some quick internet world news. Sarah is up at 7:30. Family breakfast, then off to school. We walk Sarah to school each day (15 minutes there), then we head off (brisk walking) to the town center to try to combine some exercise with some errands and some cultural learning. We take a different route almost every day, so we have now almost walked 2/3 of the city’s streets. We stop along the way to do any banking or light shopping or post office things that need to be done. Our town is all uphill / downhill, so it is a decent workout. Almost daily, we run into someone we know and stop to talk for a bit. Home by 10:30 or 11:00 a.m. Showers, dishes, laundry, then office work… contacting several of the other missionaries whom we care for, writing for the blog or the newsletter or the TMS website we are working, writing curriculum for the coaching workshop we will teach in January, etc. At least once a week, that plan gets side railed by an urgent need from another field, a counseling or coaching call, expense reports or time-sensitive issues that need to be dealt with. And at least once or twice a week, none of the office stuff happens because we receive a call to come meet someone for coffee and discussion, which always becomes a fantastic 3 hour meeting that we know was planned by God Himself. Morning office time is important, as it is our only time when Sarah is not in the house and doesn’t need help with homework, and we have hours then when the USA is still sleeping (i.e. no emails, no calls from USA, no urgent requests for anything from that side of the world) - so we try to get a lot accomplished before 2 p.m. This is when we can be most effective in the office, as well as work with ‘this side of the globe’ on ministry, counseling, and coaching. Walk to school to get Sarah by 2 p.m., then we walk home and have lunch. Spaniards have a big family lunch in the afternoon, then they have siesta hours until 4:30 or 5… but not our family. We eat lunch and we take a small break until 4 p.m. at the latest… can’t afford longer breaks as Sarah is playing catch-up this year in school and she is swamped with homework (usually 4+ hours of homework each night). Sarah gets to work, as do we. Afternoons become a little more hectic, as we begin to get emails and Skype calls from the USA for ministry things, etc. If we have meetings with missionaries who are in their preparation stages, or if we meet with the office for anything, those calls happen in the afternoon for us. Late afternoon and evening time is a juggling game, as we have ministry things (bible study, meetings with people) or “extras”… Sarah has a class on Wednesday evenings and we have a bible study and fellowship with another couple. Every week on alternating days (Monday or Tuesday), Laurie has a group meeting; and again on either Thursday or Friday, depending on the week, she has another group in another town. Billy meets his friend to help him with English, or with another friend to talk about culture and immigrant issues. We try to have dinner at 8:30ish, Sarah is in bed by 9:30, and we are finally ready to sit an relax together or fall asleep reading. We try to be in bed by 10:30 or 11 p.m. so we can start all over again tomorrow. ☺ ![]() I won't lie to you... I have a ridiculous fear of finding hair stylists. Seriously. There is a part of me that feels like this is really serious business - what my head looks like - and there should be some kind of interview process, a look at a portfolio, several references, and maybe a sneak drop-in visit to watch the hairdresser in action before actually choosing the person that you are going to trust to attack your head with scissors and a round brush. In The States, a had a mild panic attack when I went to a new hairdresser upon returning from Peru. She had been recommended to me by someone I trusted, and she sounded great on the phone, but the salon was named "Eye Candy" and that sent a small shiver of fear down my spine. Should a women in her late forties be getting her hair cut in a place named "Eye Candy"? I went to the appointment anyway, only to walk into a salon that was painted in zebra stripes and hot pink and lime green and lined with about 20 chairs and stylists. Maybe because I had just spent 5 years in a third-world country, this threw me for a little bit of a loop. I mean, in Peru, haircuts cost just a handful of coins and my cute little hair lady had a very modest two-chair salon that was about the size of my bathroom. So walking in to this "chic" hair salon was a dramatic difference for me. I started to fear for my life... well, maybe only for the life of my hair, but still. In all honesty, it was great! The stylist was darling and she did exactly what I had asked her to do. She was a great conversationalist and we had a great time. PS... I love Eye Candy and I will return when in The States again. So, fast forward to today... I haven't gone to get my hair cut since moving to Spain. Again, fear. The dread of finding a good stylist. So I let my husband go first. A few weeks ago, he went to get his hair cut at a place close to our new home. When he returned, he looked great! It was even actually a little longer than his usual cut, which is a mistake in a good direction - you can't do much about a mistake in the too-short direction! I began with my battery of questions for him. "Are they professional? Was it a woman in her bathrobe with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth, watching a soap opera while she cut your hair in her kitchen / salon? Did the scissors and combs and salon appear clean? Did the stylist have purple hair or a tattooed face or anything that would make me fear for the fate of my hair?" He assured me that all was well, that it was clean, that they were professional, that it was a real salon, etc. So I agreed to try. Today was the fateful day. All three of us needed a trim. My daughter went first (okay, I admit to letting her be a guinea pig, but I was pretty sure they couldn't mess up "cut an inch off the bottom"). After a few minutes, she was washed, she was trimmed, she was dried, and all was well. Great!!! This might actually work out! Then it was my turn. I was washed and set up in the chair. I showed the stylist the photo that I always take in with me. She looked at it, as did the two other stylists in the salon. "Que preciosa! Muy elegante!" (How precious! Very elegant!) Hmmm... score one for me! That sounds promising! I asked her to please not trim my bangs any shorter than they are right now, to which she agreed. Great again! Okay, now down to business... she combed, she separated hair into parts and clipped up areas with pins and clips so she could attack, umm, I mean "style" the back. With the first cut, I knew I was in trouble. You see, there just isn't much you can do when someone holds the scissors vertically up the back of your head and cuts from neck to crown in one fail slice. Yep. There it goes. You can't replace that big hunk of hair that just fell to the salon floor. And you can't exactly quit now, seeing as there is a giant hunk of hair missing from the back on your scalp! The hair continued to fall, and fall, and fall. And I thought, "This is it. This is the nightmare that I always feared would happen in a salon." I began to think back to the two blog articles I had read by other mission women on this very subject. Want to know what women go through in other cultures trying to get a simple hair cut? Worth a read are Scissor Hands and "Pavos, Flecos, Bangs!" While my stylist is having a heyday on the back of my head, my husband is seated in the chair next to me for his cut. He looks over and sees the mayhem that is ensuing. He tries to not let it register on his face. He is unsuccessful. He tries to assure me that it will be okay. Also unsuccessful. He decides to close his eyes for the rest of his cut. I think I'm supposed to think that he is relaxing, but I KNOW that he is praying... praying for a miracle, praying that I don't kill him for convincing me that this was a good salon, praying that our night / weekend / life is not forever effected by this episode. Probably praying that he can get out of his chair first and run before I am finished! Just as she finishes my hair, she says, "I just love how you have let your gray hair grow and blend in with your blonde. It looks like it was frosted. So silvery. Preciosa! Que Preciosa!" Hmmmm... I'm not sure how to take that, seeing as literally every single person in the salon has on a cap smeared with hair color - including the stylist! The only ones without caps and dye are me, my husband, and our nine-year old daughter. So I'm not sure that my hair color really is so "preciosa". I think it is just a novelty that I don't color it. Maybe sarcasm, maybe a hint... whatever, it didn't feel very preciosa at the time. So here I sit, staring at my reflection in the computer screen. My daughter took one look at me and her eyes bugged out and she said, "that is not the picture you showed her". No kidding, Baby, no kidding. Is it any consolation that everyone in the salon commented and said, "Que Preciosa!" as I walked out? The hair salon... a sure-fire road to the pit of culture shock. ![]() So I'm cleaning the house like a wild woman today... sweeping, mopping, dusting, scrubbing toilets... everything. We have guests coming to coffee later and the house has to be spic and span EVERYWHERE, not just the kitchen or the living room. In the USA, if the upstairs wasn't clean and perfect, "oh well". Because usually the guests only see the living room and the kitchen and the bathroom anyway, right? Well, not so here in Spain! It is customary to "show the house" when you have guests over. When we have been over to visit others, we are shown the whole house - like a tour. We are paraded through the rooms - every single one of them, even the bathrooms, even the laundry room, even the roof area where they hang laundry, everywhere! The first time, I thought it a little strange. The second time, I thought it even stranger! Then I was let in on the secret... it is customary. Cultural. It is showing you that there is nothing to hide. You have seen it all. You are "in" and accepted. You have been shown the whole house. So, I'm cleaning today in anticipation of having to do the home-tour thing tonight and show our guests the whole house. Not that there is a lot of house to see... but they will see it none-the-less. Dust bunnies, beware! I'm on a rampage against grime and smudges today! Oh the things we do in the name of culture and 'fitting in'... ![]() We had hopes of bringing our dog, Charlotte, to Spain. She is Sarah's dog and she has been with us for our entire adventure in full-time mission service. We got her in Peru when we first arrived and she and Sarah quickly became best friends. In our opinion, she played a big part in Sarah's adjustment to Peru and in our lives. So, when we left Peru, we took her to Texas with us. It was a huge financial sacrifice for us. HUGE!!! the funds came from our own pocket - don't worry, no ministry funds of any kind went to flying a dog to Texas! What was at first a nominal sum of money quickly became an enormous outlay of cash. We wrestled with the idea of leaving her behind. It was a decision that we didn't want to make, but felt that financially we may have to. But, when talking with our best Peruvian friend (and Sarah's Peruvian mom), she burst into tears at the idea of leaving Charlotte behind. Which, of course, made us burst into tears, too. She said it was unthinkable! On several levels, just unthinkable. For one thing, Peruvians don't take care of dogs as 'pets'. Dogs are for guarding things and for herding animals and for killing anything that comes near your stuff. But dogs are not loved and cherished and cared for. They roam the streets. They eat from the gutters and from trash. They are chained up on rooftops and in concrete yards. It is sad. Our friend knew the outcome of what would happen to Charlotte is we tried to leave her behind with a Peruvian family... she would be mistreated and not loved or fed properly. She would be let out to roam the streets. She wouldn't know how to defend herself or find food. She would die. The other reason - the one that made us all cry - was that Charlotte was, in our friend's opinion, Sarah's sister. She had been Sarah's only family. She was the live version of a most-loved stuffed animal or the baby blanket that is carried around for years. When Sarah had been sick several times and in bed with fevers and unable to do anything, Charlotte never left her side. Charlotte was immensely loyal. We couldn't leave her in a foreign country where no one loved her or cared about her. The decision was made to move her to Texas. As we waited for our visas and our moving date to Spain, we prepared Sarah for the possibility of not being able to take Charlotte to Spain due to the cost. Leaving her in Texas with family was a viable option - Charlotte would be loved and cared for and she would have a great home. We continued to check on how to move her with us, but it wasn't looking good. We left for Spain in August with the hopes of coming home to get Charlotte on a quick return trip that we would take in another month or so. Things were in order for the possibility of her traveling, but the contingency was for her to stay with family. Finally, while we were settling in to our new house in Spain, the last of the quotes from airlines came in and they all surpassed the budget we had for Charlotte... they surpassed our budget by a LOT! There were lots of tears in our home that night. We called home and asked Granny if she would continue to keep Charlotte forever. Soon thereafter, we began to look for a puppy to complete the void in our house in Spain. We had wanted a Spanish Water Dog and asked around about puppies for sale, but we couldn't find any that were ready. Some were still not born, some were not weened, and some were too old for what we wanted. Then we found a mixed breed puppy with the cutest face ever... he looked just like Benji from the movies of my childhood! Sarah fell in love the minute she saw him and "Buddy" came home to live with us. Now for the interesting cultural mistake... Several days after getting Buddy, we walked past the kiosk on the corner in our neighborhood. The guy who owns the kiosk (he sells candy) yells out and says, "Hey. I have your puppy here today. Here he is, right here behind my store." He proceeds to pull out a little bitty Spanish Water Dog! We had asked him the previous week if he knew where we could buy a puppy. We thought he might know since he has three of the same breed. He had told us that he knew who had some puppies, but they weren't ready to leave the mom yet. They wouldn't be ready for a couple of weeks or so. And he told us about how high pedigree they were and they were very costly (way more than we wanted to pay for a puppy!). We politely listened to they whole sales pitch, then said we would maybe think about it. He had told us that when the pups were weened, he would bring them to town and we could see them. We smiled and said we might like to see them, them we went home. Now, less than a week has passed and here he is shoving a puppy in our faces and saying that this one is ours. We told him that we had already found a mixed breed, but thanks for remembering us. (This is where the non-verbal cues that are so important to culture come in... the irritated, angry face, the clipped speech, then the silence.) Our problem became evident to us quickly... 1) this guy was under the impression that we wanted his puppy, 2) "maybe" and politely saying "we'll thing about it" usually means no in the USA and it seems to mean yes here, 3) this guy is of a gypsy sub-culture which has it's own set of cultural rules, and 4) we have to walk by this guy's corner kiosk about 6 times a day, every day. Without too much discussion, we decided it was best to buy this puppy and dig ourselves out of this cultural soup! So, in our very best effort to smooth the waters / stop an international incident / save face / and keep the peace in the neighborhood, we went back and bought the tiny Spanish Water Dog. Great... two puppies... I'm thinking Charlotte's airfare is looking like it was probably worth it... we should have just dug deep and shelled out the cash to the evil air cargo empire. Two puppies... |
Laurie DrumIn my USA life, I was a teacher in Texas for 15 years. I was also a professional photographer, a soccer mom, a horsewoman, and the neighborhood hospitality queen. I did "Joanna Gaines farmhouse style" before Chip and JoJo were even a thing - we restored an 1884 Victorian farmhouse in small town Texas and did shiplap walls until I thought I'd go crazy. I taught at NASA, scuba dived with astronauts in training, and studied animals at Sea World for educational purposes. I've tried just about everything, because I have an insatiable need to know if I can do it! Never underestimate a Texas girl in cowboy boots! In 2006, my husband Billy and I became cross-cultural workers (CCWs) with TMS Global. For five years, we served in three rural Quechua Wanca villages in the Andes of Peru. And when I say rural, I mean RURAL - like no potty! I spent my days in Peru learning to live a Quechua lifestyle in a rustic adobe house - cooking Peruvian foods, sewing with Quechua women, raising my chickens and goats and pigs, and planting my gardens. Now I live my life in small town Spain, serving other cross-cultural workers via teaching and training and care, and helping displaced people to navigate their new reality in Europe.
I'm passionate about fostering personal growth, growth in community, and growth in The Kingdom. Walking alongside others and helping them to use their unique design, their gifts and strengths and maximize their abilities to fulfill their God-given purpose - that's what makes my heart sing! Archives
March 2024
Categories |