It still catches my breath ( no pun intended) that I'm in Swaziland.
Like forreal, I'm in month 9 already and am in Africa! Our biggest concern is the taste of the water. If you'd told me that back in month one, I would have laughed in your face but how quickly times have changed.
Sadly, like many travel days especially after all 45 of us are spending time together, I'm sick once more. The nasty cough, constant runny nose, and I either sound like a chipmunk, teenage boy, or nothing because my voice is gone.
As it's our first week here, our hosts took us on a rugged hike that at the peak you are in South Africa and gives you a beautiful view.
I was preemptive.
I went to bed early the night before, hydrated the night before, and even used my inhaler in the morning.
I was going to make it.
I mean, my usual hike back home is a rugged 12 mile. This would be a piece of cake, right?
Oh how naive I am.
Even as we started walking to the trailhead, my lungs began to burn. My chest ached. My coughing got worse.
I figured it was just the cool dry air, I could do it.
As we began ascending, I was in the middle. After having to stop to drink water, take in the view, shed some layers, blow my nose, and cough. I slowly fell to being the last one.
About a quarter of the way there I had to stop. My lungs were on fire. I couldn't breathe in without coughing. One of my squad mates stayed back with me as my coughing soothed and we continued together.
He was nice enough to tell me stories to keep me entertained while we worked our way to catch up.
My voice was gone. Coughing my throat raw it began to hurt even more. It was one step, cough three time, two steps, cough four time, two steps and up a boulder, stop and cough for a few moments.
We caught up with everyone as they perched and waited for us. My team looked at me sympathetically, here is something that I love to do, and I was sick but trying to push through.
I made it maybe fifteen more feet before I had to call it quits. There would be no Mountain peak for me today.
One of my teammates even stayed with me. She sat down and told me some stories about her life I hadn't heard yet. She just sat with me and wanted to make sure I was OK. She was so servant hearted that mine broke. We'd both wanted to hike and see the view and here we were sitting on the trail waiting for them to make their way back down.
As I sat and she told me stories and I tried to ask questions and tried to calm my coughing I realized that if this had been month one, I would have pushed on through coughing, blowing my nose, everything just to get to the top to say I did it and I wasn't weak.
Heck, probably even month 3 and 4 I would have done the same thing.
But today, I didn't. I was able to see when it was too much. I was able to see that, hey if I continue to do this, I could easily get more sick.
Sure, some would argue that I shouldn't even have gone (I got some really good feedback on going) but from having gone and having had to stop, I grew.
I realized its not being weak not being able to do something.
Even if you're sick, broken leg, anything, its ok if you can't do it even when you start it. As long as you try.
So mountain that I will pass by every day on my way to ministry, thanks for showing me how much I've grown.
