Picking Up the Pieces and Carrying On

After a few meditations of where I am and the rattling enquiry of what on earth am I doing? and of the relatively less financial security, and the fact that it is winter here and I am guaranteed nothing, due to the lack of drive and initiative, of comfort and heaters, and sweat tea, and most importantly all my many good friends in the US...I've decided to fly in the face of all these, how important they may be, and stay.

Now, some of you may be wondering, what could possibly make a roving individual like myself yearn for my return. You see, it was a number of things that add up when thrown into the light of a pretty horrific financial setback. (Here, for the uninformed, I refer to my catastrophic car crash in my past note.) But there were other things hanging on the memory like a dapper salesmen on the doorknocker of my mind. I must admit that I didn't leave some dull and drab job in the states. I was not exactly making an escape from mundanity. But I had a relatively interesting source of income, stamping all over the south, and sometimes beyond that. Flexibility and travel were hallmarks of this job. Plus my own ability to pretty much plan where I will go and what I will do when I get there. Then there is that strange word, that perplexes adventurers when they both have it and don't have it, and yet, dare I say it, still tempts me....that word being "comfort."

Imagine if you will waking up as I did today. Freezing in a sleeping bag, as I've done for the past 3 months. Now the cold isn't that bad by itself, but add the fact that there is really nothing to do for that day. All the jobs that you've been applying for don't pan out. You don't even get called back. Transportation is all about a bicycle, for you wrecked your big bad automobile that you've had after the first week of driving it. Even to ride your bicycle (which you're borrowing from one of the Thai guys who is allowing you to stay at their house), out to get some fish and chips takes a dent in your bank account for everything is dastardly expensive here. Not to mention that it is raining. You just lay there in your sleeping bag, not wanting to get out because for some reason not many Kiwis have discovered the advantage of placing heaters in their homes.(And its like their December right now). Plus you feel confined and stuck, discomfort is okay if there is excitement with it, but when it is dull and idle...Good Lord, give me a heater and a steak! So my mind began to drift back to the land where it is summer...hot, humid summer...with sunshine and fireworks on the 4th of July, where free refills overflow into gargantuan cups, and netflix...pure, sweet netflix. So you see...what phantoms of the US, I am up against.

But I have been fortunate, not only in suriving my crash, but also in the friends that I have found here. For the past 3 weeks, I have been staying at members of the Church of Christ in Otumoetai. The last 2 weeks, I have been staying in the house with students at South Pacific Bible college. A house composed of one Kiwi, one Aussie, and two Thai guys. I sleep on a mattress in what they call the rumpus room, kinda like the basement..free of rent, for the time being. And from this constant interaction with those involved with the church and college, I've connected with so many others within the church family. My world is broadened; hope is sparked; my faith renewed, surely...in all reality after all the negativity of my misfortune is overstepped....my cup overfloweth.

Besides, I'm in a interesting,new country. I am already making new plans for the future here. I'm thinking vineyards but further north where it is a bit warmer. And at the end of the day, it is all about the journey, the adventure, and the people that we meet on their own journeys. A famous fellow Alabamian who was both blind and deaf once wrote, "Life is either a daring adventure or nothing." I remember being in art class way back in high school and being stirred by the quote that I etched it on this drawing that I had done of either Lewis or Clark as they peered over this precipice, glimpsing the lands and the river stretching down below.
So, no, I don't plan on returning any time soon for right now. Tonight, I will watch with some Kiwis the All Blacks (New Zealand's national team) whoop up on England once again, and I will enjoy myself. And as for tomorrow, I will worry about it when I wake up tomorrow, again cold and hesitant...for each day has enough worries of its own.