It is a wonderful combination of goodness, really. I mean, a red body that I can only move at the pace of an 80-year-old woman and a head full of awesome little black bugs that have made my tendrils their home. Life is funny. God is good.
The sunburn came from my own stupidity of not re-applying while at the beach for 4 hours on Saturday. This equator sun is just a bit more vicious than the old Midwestern sun! All was not lost though in this sunburn process… the time at the beach was amazing. We had great fellowship, went on a speedboat ride, saw sea lions, played in the sand, and ate some good food. The sunburn is actually subsiding as well. I woke up on the second day of burn with much more relief than I ever expected. It was a wonderful surprise and put a little extra bounce in that 80-year-old pace of mine. God has been healing that redness rapidly and today I woke up still red but with very little pain.
Much to my surprise, however, I also woke up this morning with lice. It has not been itchy, which is odd. But I was running my fingers through my hair and came across what I thought was sand (from the beach). Oh no, it was not sand. It was in fact eggs. Yum.
So two amazing ladies, Caroline and Becky, wisked me away to the pharmacy where they had the pharmacist look at my head. She responded with a confident, “si,” followed by the comment that there were a lot of them. Even more wonderful. So, they grabbed the appropriate shampoo, and the rest of the afternoon and evening was spent scrubbing and picking.
I have to say, I have an absolutely incredible community of sisters that have totally taken care of me today though. I have been so amazed and blessed with these people that God has dropped here in my life. It is a true friend that would pick bugs out of your head like a monkey. There have been so many incredible instances of community that have strengthened this group over the past week, and for me, this has been another one of those. Crazy, the things God does to enforce what He wants. I just kept thinking about the community in Acts 2:42-47 (this day wasn’t quite a spiritual or serious as that scripture talks about, but hey, they may have dealt with lice as a community at one point or another in their day too!)
For all earthly reasons, today should have been a really bad day, but God totally lifted me up and protected me from any negativity that could have crept in. I found myself just laughing and shaking my head at the things going on. He put joy in my heart and a smile on my face. In my pure flesh there is no way that would have happened.
So, thank you God for the hedge of joy you put around me today, and for the strong community you are building and watering in not just awesomely spiritual ways, but in odd and funny ways too.
