Last month in Guatemala I spent a lot of my time in a damp room, huddling for warmth and feeling a little helpless because the rain was unrelenting and ministry, consequently, kept coming to a halt. This month in Albania the weather isn’t much better. We’re wedged between the mountains and the sea, which means icy wind blows down from the slopes and meets with the chilly rain coming in from the sea. But as I write to you, I’m sitting in a warm bed in a building with electricity, Western toilets, and (can you believe it) HOT SHOWERS.
I spent most of my day in a pigsty. George, our British contact, taught us how to distinguish between pigs that are ideal for breeding versus those which are ideal for eating. The key, apparently, is in the nipples. Also the hair. After we picked the pigs up by their back legs and counted their nipples and examined their hair, we herded them into the appropriate pins.
Later in the day I stood in a small, green field and watched a flock of sheep as they grazed. It was pouring rain at the beginning of my shift, but the sun came out almost immediately. I held my hands out to be warmed by the sun and silently observed the sheep chewing on the fresh grass. I thought about David and Jesus and what it means to shepherd a flock and tend to your herd and what it must have been like to go from shepherd to king. When Jon and Ben came by and chased the sheep, one of the poor creatures got scared and jumped the fence. So I left my flock of 99 (actually 21) to go get the one that ran away. When the sheep were calmed again and went back to grazing, I went back to standing in the sun, singing to the sheep, and thinking about how I never ever thought I’d be in Albania learning about shepherding.
Towards the end of the day, Liz and I worked for nearly two hours shoveling the sheep poop out of stalls. There was about a four-inch layer of poop on the floors, so its removal required a lot of scraping and shoveling and flinging. Liz is a hard worker and I really like that. She’s the type of person who works efficiently and doesn’t waste time complaining about the awful stench or the defective tools. As we shoveled along, we listened to music for a while. I thought about the first time I heard the old songs and realized that I never ever thought I’d be in a sheep stall shoveling poop, singing songs like “Every Time We Touch” by Cascada.
For most of the time though, Liz and I didn’t talk. We didn’t really need to though. We enjoyed that kind of silence between two friends that’s very rare and usually isn’t achieved until a friendship is quite ripened. Our silence reminded me of a memory from El Salvador. I was with Andi and Daniel riding in the back of a pick-up truck along the coastline as the sun began to set. The wind was whipping my hair around and my thoughts were also moving very quickly. I think the others were deep in thought too though because we all rode in silence. Then Daniel smiled and said, “You know, I really love when friends can be together and not say anything at all, and it’s not even a little bit awkward.” And then we all smiled because that was so true and so beautiful.
(This guy was really curious about my camera so he walked right up to see what I was doing)
I guess I don’t really have any profound wisdom or extraordinary stories to share with you, so I’m not really sure what the point of this blog is. I think I just wanted to write to you and let you know that I’m alive and doing very well. This journey I’m on is not always easy and rarely is it comfortable. But still I’m filled with joy and I think it inspired me to write about my life as it looks from the top bunk of this bed at an Albanian summer camp.
