April 18, 2010

Little Things:
This week I have been thinking about some of the little inconsequential things I am grateful for and then after reading my daughter Jenny's blog I decided to mention them. If she can notice the little things while she is going through a painful recovery and complications from surgery, I should be able to think about the little things that make me smile: so I love the fact that I don't have to do my laundry at a laundrymat but can do them in my own apartement. I love the cool breezes that blow in my windows. I love walking through the embassy homes' neighborhood and seeing the beautiful trees and colorful flowers. I love that I can cut up fresh pineapple and bananas almost every morning for breakfast. I love that I can have limes and avacados all the time. I love that I brought my special can opener that saves my hands. I love that I can sleep on a down pillow under a down comforter and that we have a decent mattress. I love that it isn't cold and it isn't hot. I love taking walks with my husband. I love how sweet the people are and how kind they are to me. I love the sweet sisters in the ward and how they want to help me with the language. I love that my husband loves music and always has music on when we can listen to it and that he makes such good choices---some of the fun ones thanks to my son-in-law Peter. I love that my children have chosen such excellent, wonderful husbands and wives and that they have given me such beautiful grandchildren (smart, intelligent, etc). all ofthese things I am grateful for and so much more. A lot of them are just little things but each one makes me smile and remember to be grateful. I'm even grateful for these vegetables that take me an hour to clean and dry after shopping for them. I thought I was going to have to give up salad and vegetables because of health issues and we get to enjoy it all and it is delicious. Oh, and I really love the thunder storms here.

Monday, we worked hard at the clinic had a very interesting family home evening that night given by the McArthurs. Dr. McArthur is our neighbor across the hall. He was a fighter pilot in Viet Nam and has led a very interesting life and is great fun to associate with and his wife Sandy is just as fun. He just gave a lot of good straight talk about our health. I'm happy to report that hrt is a good thing for a lot of reasons. I'm very glad to hear that because I'm not stopping it because it is definitely good for me.
Tuesday when we went to the clinic, we were met with, "Lo siento, no agua hoy". That happens from time to time at this time of year. It is the dry season and there was no water at the orphanage and when there is no water at the orphanage, there is no water at the clinic. We had missionaries scheduled for the morning and a whole afternoon of tio juan orphanage boys for the afternoon. We had to cancel. It turned out okay though because Paul had scheduled men to come in and install a water tank on the roof so that we won't be without water to work with when there is no water next door. Now we will just have a reserve tank. The Tomkinson's have family visiting and their daughter is a higienist so she was scheduled to work Monday and Tuesday but they were taking off Wednesday and Thursday anyway. While the men worked on the water tank installation, I worked on the computer program. We were having problems with the dental program we are using so I spent two hours on the phone with a very patient young man named Logan who helped me fix problems and install files that were missing from the original installation. Me being the computer expert at the clinic is kind of like the blind leading the blind but somehow I am managing to get things up and working.
Having no water that day turned out to be a good thing for me. I got to work on the computer problems in the morning and I was able to go to the ladies luncheon I was going to have to miss that afternoon. It was great fun. The women in the group are pretty amazing women. Most of the women from the senior couples in our building were there along with Sister Clark, wife of the area president, Elder Clark, Jennifer Johnson, wife of Dick Johnson, the great lawyer we have been working with ( He is from Mesa and she is the sister of the Mayor of Mesa) and cute Sister Curtis(a Guatamalan native) who is married to President Curtis one of the Guatemala Mission Presidents. They are such a great and interesting group of women to visit with. Carol Mask must have been on duty at the temple because she wasn't able to be there. We discussed the wonderful conference talks on the family, the state of the media influence in the lives of our children and grandchildren and the heating up of political rhetoric and lack of civility. I feel like I no longer have a political voice because the extremists in both political parties have taken over the conversation. They don't seem to realize that it doesn't just matter what you say but also how you say it. I can find nothing of Christlike behavior in the rhetoric of either side.
Wednesday there was still no water so we were able to go to the Temple in the Morning and I had a nice visit with Carol Mask at the temple. Paul was able to get a lot of errands run that he needed to do with a local dentist that is helping him get through the city legal arrangements. I got to hang out at home and make cookies and take a real nap. I also studied Spanish for a couple of hours which is something I never get time to do. It really helps to spend a few hours at a time. I was able to study again on Thursday while Paul was out and about. We are having car trouble again so Paul did more errands and took the car to be fixed. He also went for a baptism interview with the missionaries for the man that he has been assigned to home teach. He treated the missionaries to a donut from a place called The American Donut. "IT WASN'T".
We have had some beautiful rain storms this week. It looks like the dry season is over and the rainy season has started a little early this year. I love rain and these are like summer rainstorms in Arizona with lots of great thunder.
On Friday we went to the CCM (MTC here) and checked the new group of missionaries. We do that every 3rd Friday. We don't usually see the missionaries from the U.S. because their dental work is always done, but I noticed that there was a missionary from Mesa and his name was Dallin Kim Hale. I asked Sister Steimle, the Mission Mom to ask him to come in. I was sure he was one of the children my daughter used to love to babysit. She was so sad when they moved across town, out of our ward. She used to make charts and games and bring prizes and make all kinds of things for them. She was a dream babysitter. She used to call the Hale children Snow White's children and their mother was really beautiful and looked like Snow White. When he came in I asked him if he ever had a red-haired babysitter and he said, you mean Emily. It was very fun and we had a nice little visit. Later I looked over at one of the native missionaries and kept thinking he looked so familiar. I asked him he went to the dental Brigada a year ago and he said yes. He was one of our patients and I remembered him. He has a weird tooth that they couldn't help him with there and we are going to try to do something about it this week. Those little moments are always fun.

Elder Dallin Kim Hale and checking out the missionaries at the MTC.

















Saturday we cleaned and studied and went to a baptism. Paul spoke and it is always fun he hear him speak so well in Spanish. People keep telling him that he has no accent and that he speaks like a native. I would probably learn spanish faster if I didn't depend on him so much but at least the only spanish I hear is good spanish so if I ever learn to speak, people just might understand me. After the baptism we went to Pizza Hut-yum. I do a lot of cooking here so it is nice to eat out once in a while. Then we went to Hyper Piaz (Walmart) and shopped. We got home at 8:00 and by the time I got the vegetables washed and dried, it was 9:00. So another great week. Next week will be busy and we have our first volunteer coming on Thursday.
Disclaimer: all spelling and typing errors are the fault of the spelling imp that lives on my blog and are in no way a reflection of my intelligence and spelling ability!