symphony

It was Monday, market day. The village was a bustle with people coming and going with loads of goods piled on the back of their bikes and a top their heads. The sun was beginning its final decent, giving everything a soft pink hue. I heard voices floating in through the back door. I peered through the window to find a row of women lined up on the path that ran along the backside of the house. They had stopped to stare at my battery-powered lights. I opened the back door and greeted them. “Sannuu, “ I said. “Sannuu de aiki?” I was just hoping that was correct. They seemed to understand and rewarded me with bright white smiles and nervous giggles. And then…there we stood, they with their colourful wraps, beautiful beads, and balanced bowls and me with my dull brown skirt and sauce pan filled with tuna macaroni. It was an awkward yet beautiful encounter. Only my creative God could have orchestrated such a moment.

it's a process

i just had a crazy summer. spent two months in Nigeria, most of that time was spent in the bush with no toilet, no running water, no refrigeration, no fresh fruits and veggies, in fact, not a lot of food at all. after nigeria brett and i flew staight to eastern europe where we spent 10 days in a small village in romania. i flew home and ten days later i took off for the center of the earth, that's right, quito ecuador. three days ago i laid my head down on my own pillow and that's when my immune system gave up even trying. being sick gives me an excuse to stay at home and lounge around, which is really all i want to do at this point anyway. it gives me time to process. many people keep asking me how my "trips" were. all i can manage is a "good." they were good. that's all i've been able to process so far. i am still waking up at night not knowing where i am. it's the strangest sensation to lay there and have no idea where you are or how you came to be there. it's scary really. two nights ago i woke up and couldn't figure out who it was laying next to me. i laid there, frozen in fear, until i realized that it was my very own husband. and last night i woke up and could have sworn that there was a bus parked outside of my window filled with people staring in at my slumber. but anyway, hang in there everyone...slowly, slowly my stories will start to come out...and i think that there are some good ones boppin' around up there -sn.

hard at work

brett was hard at work while i was in ecuador. check out his new website here

why i can no longer have children

on tuesday i flew home from quito, ecuador. i have a lot of processing yet to do about this trip, but i can share this: in the airport my stomach was searched for baggies of drugs I may have swallowed through the use of a big, huge, third-world x-ray machine. i was given a small triangle of cloth to tie around my waist to protect my ovaries, but i don't know if it helped. -SN