First a quote:
The profusion of progress is on a collision course with human limits. Once the threshold of these limits is exceeded, overload replaces margin. ... On the unsaturated side of their limits, humans can be open and expansive. On the saturated side of these limits, however, the rules of life totally change. (Richard Swenson, Margin)
In other words, when you are in a healthy place, you can be creative and productive. Without boundaries, you will become exhausted and good-for-nothing. Drained. It's worth keeping that in mind.
Here are 3 things for the week, plus a question for you.
1. You're not as important as you think you are.
You'd think there's work only you can do. Not true! Others can step in to help and take over if you let them.
However, it is nice to have dogs who believe that you rule the planet. They eagerly await us each morning, ready to be petted as we open the drapes.
I'm recovering after being sick for over two weeks. I got chikungunya, a tropical fever gifted by mosquitoes. It's the first time we've had a tropical fever since we arrived in Indonesia 7 years ago. Our neighbors have been sick with it before and as they said, it is miserable. Headaches, stomach trouble, burning skin, aches, and fatigue. Our yard gets sprayed with a mist of diesel fuel to kill the adult mosquitoes.
Waldemar got dengue a week after I got sick. It has similar symptoms with more joint pain, high blood pressure, plunging platelets (thrombosis) ... but no burning palms. The fevers come from the same mosquito carriers. He's still under the weather while I'm getting back to normal. I skip the weekly forest walk, all high-energy activities, and do lots of household chores instead. (By Friday, W's platelet count is back to normal though he is still resting and feeling weak.)
Our friends sent food last weekend: gnocchi with pomodoro sauce, rice, guava, papaya, noodles ... it tasted so good. It was truly a gift to heat meals rather than starting from scratch. W has no appetite for Indonesian food at the moment so I'm mostly preparing Western recipes when I cook.
2. You can't plan the future, so live in the day.
Early in the week, our intern gets food poisoning from chicken bought at a local supermarket. She's out of commission for a few days. Miserable. She's so plucky though - there's no complaining. We admire her.
Many of our neighbors are doctors and researchers. One household gets COVID so they're in quarantine. The hospitals are full with a post-Ramadan surge - people went around the city and to their hometowns as soon as the travel restrictions were lifted, so there are a lot of COVID cases on Java Island.
Our helpers get sick with fevers as well. We send them home from work with this mandate: "We will pay you if you rest. We're not giving you a wage if you just work at home." Tuesday's helper lasts 1/2 hour. Thursday, the other lasts a marginally longer. I take the laundry out of the washing machine after she leaves. I hang the bedding and W's washed clothes on the rooftop drying racks. (We don't have a drier.)
We're unexpectedly on our own. It's mostly blissfully quiet! other than conversations with the girls upstairs. I record a few weeks worth of videos and rewrite scripts for upcoming talks through mid-July. W is too sick to move most of the week. He works on BIC media between naps.
For one breakfast, I slice tiny roasted Japanese sweet potatoes and a banana, balancing the blandness with a splash of mango juice and plain yogurt. It's ugly but hits the spot.
I go into the office one day to work from my happy place on the balcony. But mostly I'm cooking and fetching guava juice or tea for Waldemar.
Oh look! The Tuesday farmer has sent over beets with our vegetable order. Suddenly I'm hungry for European borscht. I fry diced onions and garlic, chop the cabbage, beets, and potatoes, and toss everything into a pot with a scoop of Costco's "Better than Beef" broth base and spices. After a few hours, it's ready to eat, with 4 bags frozen for future meals. This kind of soup gets more and more flavorful as it ages. I pull out a bag for a second meal later in the week. Yum.
There's no sour cream in the house and W wants sour cream with his borscht. I stir lime juice into plain yogurt and voila. Tastes good. (He doesn't even notice until I tell him a few days later.) We ignore the other condiments from across the globe: out stomachs are still touch-and-go.
3. No matter what is happening, you can be grateful for every mercy and take advantage of what's nearby.
I've been thinking about the blessing of living here without getting tropical fevers for so many years. That's amazing. And a gift from God.
As we regain strength, we start to pick up our tasks again. But we are taking it slowly, one day at a time. Living without margin doesn't allow you face challenges well.
This week, I attend three significant online meetings, mostly at night. One is on Soul Care for cross-cultural leaders. Another is a 3-part conference with a famous speaker. Both are well worth being there and I sleep in the next morning.
The third and most special meetup is with a dozen female leaders. We spend an hour-and-a-half learning and processing information together. Even at 2-3:30 a.m., it's life-giving to see the faces of women I care about and consider friends. I don't bother going back to sleep that morning. My head is full.
Dr I drops by with a papaya, soursop, guava, and some orchids to make the porch more beautiful. She's a specialist on orchids. The blooms are fragrant and delightful. The rain soaks them through.
Many afternoons and early evenings, the sky rumbles and growls with thunder before the sunshine disappears. Dry season is due but until it arrives, humid air blows clouds from Jakarta and the north Java coast across the mountain ranges to our city. The rain drops into the Bandung basin - there's been flooding off and on, enveloping homes in mud and garbage washed down the streets from higher elevations.
Gypsy hates the rumblings and loud bangs of the thunder. He has to be locked in the crate so he doesn't break a window trying to get into the house.
Friday
I haven't had a productive "homemaker-day" in ages. Today's the day.
It starts with a good walk around the block with one dog, the one who pulls least: Gypsy. I don't have energy to make the others mind. Who would have thought that the pup that pulled me off my feet on our first walk 5 years ago would be the most sanguine now? The two left behind wait at the gate for our return.
When I get into the house, I go into the kitchen. Today reminds me of raising 4 kids = cooking and more cooking. (No baking today, though.) W's off to a doctor's appointment.
My mom calls and a few others want to chat. It's a connected morning while W gets 2 blood tests done, 2 hours apart. He comes home after to await the second test result. He'll have one more appointment after this, we hope. Thank God, his thrombocytes are up almost to 300 from 90 (normal is 150-400). All the resting, along with the juice and vitamin-rich food he's being fed, is helping.
This morning, I browse YouTube to find out how to make guava juice and soursop juice. Oh oh, soursop is sure messy. After you peel the soft fruit, you have to strip the creamy white flesh of its poisonous black seeds. Then you blend in honey and water to your preferred consistency and taste. Into the fridge door it goes. Tastes great. But do I want someone else's "clean" hands taking the seeds out? I decide I'm probably not going to order it away from home. (There must be a more sanitary machine process, don't you think?)
Whaaat?! there's still a half-head of cabbage in the fridge. I fry it with onions, garlic, and butter, to be eaten with lunch noodles. The leftovers are bagged for the freezer. Looks bland. Tastes great.
We finished a jar of pickles yesterday so I cut up fresh mushrooms and squish them into the jar. They shrink after a few hours. Later in the afternoon I add more mushroom to the brine. (W likes pickled mushrooms.)
The fridge is still full of vegetables and I'm on a roll. In 1/4 c olive oil, I fry mushrooms, a diced onion, and whole garlic head while charring and peeling the last of the eggplants. That's blended together with a scoop of peanut butter (no tahini at hand), salt, and smokey paprika into baba ganoush. Finally, I cut carrots, beans, and celery into crudités to be eaten with the eggplant dip. I tuck the morning's work into the fridge. Whew - it's full of healthy foods.
Today's apparently a creating day. I'm actually in the mood to move furniture. That means I'm definitely feeling energized. But with PakGum driving W to the doc and everyone else sick, moving is out of the question. Maybe that's where the swoop of cooking-energy came from. Blocked in one direction? Go another.
Might as well tackle one more 5-10 minute chore: cutting my hair. The 1" chop feels good. In the time that it takes to drive to a hairdresser, I'm done and the bathroom is tidied. One side curls higher than the other; I'll check it again in a week.
Afterward, there's even enough water and water pressure for a shower ... without putting on the water pump! Bonus.
Saturday
We do the mile-long loop around the neighborhood together, dogs and humans. I make breakfast pancakes to celebrate before W's off to see his doc and find out what's what. It's overcast and cool (72o), so I'm wearing a long-sleeved T-shirt. Brrr.
Question: how has the past week confirmed that life can't be controlled. What's been unexpected, whether wonderful or hard? And in what ways have you dealt with life's surprises? (Are you happy with your responses?)
Read more:
*Blessed be God, because he has not rejected my prayer or removed his steadfast love from me. Psalm 66:20
*This is what the Lord says: “Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls." Jeremiah 6:16
*See, I have taken your guilt away from you, and I will clothe you in festal apparel. Zechariah 3:4
*By grace you have been saved. Ephesians 2:5
*Devote yourselves to prayer, keeping alert in it with thanksgiving. Colossians 4:2
Moravian Prayer: God of devotion, we thank you for hearing our prayers and granting us peace. Help us to remember to come simply to you in prayer and to patiently wait to hear your still, small voice.
Saving Lord, draw from us our guilt and doubt like poison from a wound, and cover us with grace and mercy. All glory and praise to you, O God! Amen.
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