(un)comfortable

The outlets in Uganda are different. It is not enough to plug something in and expect it to work, or charge, or do whatever it is you want it to do. You need to plug it in, and you need to switch on the outlet. It is not far away or a complicated switch. Every outlet basically has a light switch attached to it that turns the outlet on and off. Simple. 

You would not believe the number of times, in my first months in Uganda, I forgot to turn on the outlet. 

I could come back ten minutes later or the next morning, only to find that my phone or laptop was dead because it never charged. It was a small thing, but on top of all the new and challenging and uncertain obstacles before me at the time, sometimes the outlets were just too much. An outlet I forgot to switch on could easily make me cry. I forgot so often because it was unfamiliar to me. It was different. 

It was uncomfortable. 

(I couldn’t decide if I should call this blog Comfortable or Uncomfortable, so the title is both.)

In time, I got used to the outlets. I almost never forget to switch it on, and when I do it doesn’t bring me to my knees feeling like a failure like it did in the beginning. In fact, now that we are in America it feels strange to be able to plug something in without flipping a switch. Funny how things like that change. 

I have come to learn that “comfortable” is a word of the affluent. I don’t mean people whose salaries are in the six digits and who send their children to private boarding schools in Europe. I mean affluent people like the average western civilization citizen, or even below average. I mean the people who make enough money to plan what to do with it, or who have the luxury of asking once in a while, “What do we want to do with this?” instead of “What do we need to do with this?” I mean the people who are affluent enough to make, in one day, more than enough money for food and shelter for their family that day. 

As I read through 2 Corinthians, one passage in particular clings to me and won’t let go: 

Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God. For just as the sufferings of Christ flow over into our lives, so also through Christ our comfort overflows. If we are distressed, it is for your comfort and salvation; if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which produces in you patient endurance of the same sufferings we suffer. And our hope for you is firm, because we know that just as you share in our sufferings, so also you share in our comfort. (2 Corinthians 1:3-7)

Many of us have trouble relating to this passage. As Francis Chan so plainly puts it: Most of us are living comfortably already; therefore, we don’t need a comforter. 

When the Bible talks about comfort, it also talks about suffering. Being comforted is a response to something; being comfortable is a stagnant position. If there is no suffering, there is no need to be comforted, and no need for a comforter. 

The New Testament expects suffering of Christ-followers. It makes sense—just look at the experiences of the first followers of Christ: stoned, imprisoned, crucified, exiled. It wasn’t something people chose by default or out of peer pressure. The response today, when someone is asked why they follow Jesus, is sometimes, “Why not?”. Early Christians had a hundred different answers to that question: 

Because you might never see your family again. 

Because your friends might call you stupid or foolish. 

Because you will need to give away a lot of your possessions. 

Because you won’t be popular. 

Because it might physically hurt. 

Because you won’t be the one in control of your own life. 

Modern-day western Christianity has eliminated all risk. Faith has become a form of insurance, when it should be an adventure. 

Moving to Uganda was uncomfortable. Painful, in some respects. And not just because of the outlets. It meant being halfway around the world from family. It meant breaking off relationships that didn’t make sense long-distance. It meant packing up my sweet little apartment, not knowing when I would see or need some of those memory-filled keepsakes again. It meant new vaccinations. It meant learning how to hang things on my new walls (tape didn’t stick, nails didn’t go through the walls, and putty-sticky-stuff could only be found in Kampala). It meant not knowing how to hook up my gas bottle to make a cup of tea. It meant days without electricity, needing to lug my toaster to my neighbor’s verandah because that outlet worked, sitting awkwardly outside waiting for my breakfast while he slept on the other side of the wall. (That all worked out in the end. I married him and now we share electricity.) It meant being scolded for hanging my underwear outside to dry or not ironing my skirts. Very little came naturally, and very little was comfortable. 

But oh, how I needed God in that time. 

I prayed about what to do in even the most minor of situations. I prayed before every English lesson I taught, because I was terrified of teaching. I prayed before going for a run because I didn’t know the dangers that lay out of sight. I prayed after being humbly reminded not to wear my shoes inside or eat while walking, feeling a little embarrassed for my cultural mishaps. 

Over time, Uganda became more comfortable. Culture shock gave way to culture. Experience yielded confidence. I still commit regular faux pas, but less than seven years ago. 

While the difference seems good, I find myself praying less. When my own knowledge and instincts prove dependable, I find myself depending on God less. When other people tell me what to do, I find myself asking God less often what I should do. Familiarity has begun to take the place of faith. 

The thing about being a missionary by title is that on the surface, everything you do is for God. I listened to God when I picked up and moved to Africa, so now by default I am sitting in the middle of God’s will for my life, right? Because I listened that one time? 

It is dangerously easy to stop listening when you think you have already heard. 

The more comfortable I become, the less I feel my need for the Comforter. 

It almost makes me miss those confounded outlets. 

Thomas

He had round cheeks that got a little bit rounder when he smiled. I remember that. 

Four-year-old Thomas sat on a volunteer’s lap in the nursery school hut. School was out and the rest of the children had gone home. I was new to Noah’s Ark and Ineke and I were talking about… well, I don’t remember. She squeezed Thomas tight. 

“This one is special to me,” she said. “Last year when I was here, we were sitting at school just like this when he started convulsing. His eyes rolled back and it looked like he was unconscious. So I picked him up and ran with him as fast as I could to the clinic.” I think she mentioned that it was malaria, but that part is blurry to me. “But in the end he turned out fine, and he is still here with us!” 

That was the day I learned who Thomas was. 

There may have been times after that where I forgot—in the early days of volunteering, with hundreds of new faces and everyone expecting you to remember their name, and everyone shouting your name, lots of faces blend into each other—but after time, and especially after I moved to Uganda, the faces became clearer. Thomas was definitely one of those. 

I won’t pretend I did anything special. The truth is, Thomas loves volunteers. There are some children who gravitate to the volunteers and missionaries, who make themselves known and who set the stage for those people to have fun and personal stories of the children to share with friends, families and churches when they go back home. They like the attention (and the candy). 

In the beginning, I’m sure that is how our relationship started. To me, it was personal. I felt like I had done something really special to deserve his love and that surely I was the only one know, really know, this poor orphan child. 

To him, it was just another opportunity to temporarily bond with someone who could give him the attention he craved. 

I am not complaining or blaming. Just reflecting, eight years later, on how it must have been in those first months of getting to know him versus how I saw it at the time. Retrospect can be interesting. 

Toward the end of my first three months in Uganda, I read through the children’s files. I had come to know and love these children, who are all in the same situation now. But where did they come from? Each of them took a different path to get here. They don’t all have one story. 

Thomas’s story, for instance, began in August 2009. The short story says that he was found lying before someone’s gate and taken to the police station. 

The long story is exactly the same. We don’t know any more about his beginnings than that. From there, he was brought to Noah’s Ark and has been there ever since. He was estimated to be four weeks old when he came, so he was given the birthday of August 1. 

Two weeks ago, Thomas celebrated his twelfth birthday. I am so blessed to have known this goofy boy for eight of those twelve years. So blessed. 

Thomas’s second name (there are not really surnames in Uganda) is Mukwano, meaning friend. That he is, to so many. Like I already mentioned, Thomas makes friends with every volunteer who comes, wether for a few days or a few years. After the initial novelty of our relationship, a real friendship began to develop. Every single day, I would find Thomas at my door, wanting to play or read books or help with whatever I was doing—even if I was doing nothing. He loved to be with me, and I loved it too. His presence was, more often than not, hilarious. 

When Thomas was about six years old, he told me he had a girlfriend. Jaelle was her name. She was a very cute, sweet girl in his class who also lived in the children’s home. I have no idea where the boyfriend-girlfriend idea came from, but they both told me the rumor was true—they were a couple. 

A few weeks later when Thomas was playing at my house, I mentioned something about Jaelle being his girlfriend. The way he snapped his head up reminded me of when a student is excited to finally know the answer to a question posed by his teacher. 

“I KNEW that!” he said proudly. 

That was the last time I heard about him having a girlfriend. 

Thomas loves to help with chores. Every single time I am cooking when he shows up at my door, he asks if he can help. Without fail. Every. Single. Time. When he was young, I used eight tablespoons of butter in biscuits as an opportunity to teach him counting. Later, we rolled oranges on the counter to make them soft enough for orange juice and we talked about healthy food. After I got burned, I made sure he knew how to be safe when cooking with oil. We made bread, biscuits, cookies, sauce, pasta, rice, chapatis, and much more. Sometimes he has more patience for cutting vegetables than I do. 

Something amazing about this kid is that even after helping me make a whole meal, he doesn’t expect he is going to share it. Sometimes he stays and we eat together, but it is also unfair for me to invite him to eat with me every night. The moment I tell him it is time to go home for supper, he washes his hands, says thank you (a miracle, compared to most kids his age!), gathers his things and runs home. 

If there is nothing to cook, he is just as happy to wash the dishes. I’m not kidding. 

When Christian and I married, we wanted all the children to be in the wedding—that meant about fifty flower girls and fifty peg boys, which is the Ugandan boy equivalent of a flower girl. Even thought all the children would be involved, we chose a handful who were especially dear to us to be a bit more involved. Two teenage bridesmaids, two young bridesmaids, two young flower girls, and two young peg boys. We bought them matching outfits in America and the Netherlands, and Thomas walked down the aisle in front of us as we wed for the third time. 

Thomas used to come to our house every day to play. I wondered how that would change once Patricia was born and he had some competition. 

As it turned out, I was the one who had competition. 

Thomas rolled so naturally into the role of big brother I can’t imagine our family without him. He held Patricia as a baby (which was no small feat, since she was big), learned to change her diaper, read books with her, taught her to play cards (“Okay, now you put your card on the couch… no, this is the couch… not on the floor!… yes, there… look,  you won! Clap your hands!”), taught her some of her first words, and loved her better than I ever could have asked of someone. Patricia cheers when Thomas comes to the door and cries when he leaves, even though we know we are going to see him the next day. 

I remember the first time Thomas took Patricia to the playground at the children’s home without us. My eyes brimmed with tears as I stood in the doorway and watched them walk hand-in-hand, Patricia’s tiny ponytail bouncing atop her head. That was one of the first moments I really felt like she was growing up. It wasn’t all about mama and papa anymore. We had to share.

When I was pregnant with Elliot, I asked Thomas who was going to be his best friend—Patricia or the new baby. He shrugged his shoulders, smiled, and went back to his game. 

Thomas was one of the first people at our house the day after Elliot was born, and a few days later he was the first child we let hold our precious newborn. He did it with such care and confidence, it is obvious he grew up with babies around. 

Sometime last year, Thomas and a group of boys his age moved into their family unit. Moving into a family unit is a sort of coming-of-age mile marker in the lives of Noah’s Ark children. Instead of living in one big house with a hundred other children, with only a bed and a cubby to call their own (but to which everyone, even the toddlers, has access), all of a sudden they sleep with three or four people to a room (not eight or ten), they eat meals with their family of nine (not one hundred), they do their own dishes and wash their own clothes, and they have a few things in their possession. Most children are thrilled to hear they are next in line to enter a family unit. Thomas was no exception. 

I was another story. The children’s home is a stone’s throw away from my house. From my verandah, I could see Thomas playing on the playground outside in the mornings and he could call Patricia without even leaving his own home. In the family units, he was only twice as far away, but there was a small forest in between that inhibited me from seeing him so easily. I knew it would be different. He would be excited about his new home and would find things to do there. With one auntie for him and his brothers he wouldn’t need to visit us everyday to get individual attention. Things were going to change. 

I cried. 

I was happy for him, but I was not prepared for that change. 

Thomas no longer comes everyday, but he comes. Sometimes he takes Patricia to his family unit for lunch. Sometimes he joins us for a family outing to visit the goats at the farm. I have heard he can be stubborn at home, refusing to do chores, but at my house he still offers to wash the dishes and help cook. He listens when I rebuke him and is an undoubtedly positive influence on my two children. He turned twelve a few days after we came to the Netherlands, so we sang happy birthday via video chat and promised to have a sleepover when we come home. 

I can’t wait.

God vs Frozen Hamburger Buns

I set a timer on my phone for five minutes. The same five minutes I always do at the beginning of TAG (Time Alone with God—what most people call devotions). Clear my head, meditate on the Lord, try to quiet my thoughts enough to hear from him if he has something to tell me. Prepare myself for the rest of the hour of prayer, Bible reading, and journaling. 

Setting my phone down on the floor next to me, I glance up at the skylight. It is nine in the evening and still light, which feels like a miracle after being in Uganda, where it grows dark at seven in the evening without fail, year round. Clouds blanket this Dutch city, holding in the chill, which is why I am wearing my fleece onesie as I sit. 

Meditate. 

Be still and know that I am God.

Inhale… exhale… Father.

Inhale… exhale… Jesus.

Inhale… exhale… Spirit.

You. Are. God.

Inhale… exhale… Father.

Inhale… exhale… Jesus.

Inhale… exhale… Patricia is still awake, I can hear it. I put her in bed half an hour ago, late for her, but we were running late with everything this evening. She is reading. Well, “reading.” This afternoon she fell asleep with a book draped across her stomach, a position with which I am very familiar and proud to have seen on my two-year-old. Her voice is so sweet. What is she saying? When I told her I was going to read my Bible she also asked for her Bible, so I know she has her little cardboard Bible-counting book. 

But wait, I am still meditating. 

Inhale… exhale… Spirit. 

You. Are. God.

Inhale.. exhale… Father.

Inhale… What other stories about Thomas should I include in my half-written blog post? There are so many about him, but how many can I remember well enough to vividly recount? I wish I had had time to finish it already. What I wouldn’t give for an hour or two of silence—during the day, when I am not worn out at night—to just write. Without interruption. Without background noise. How I miss being able to concentrate. My writing has really gone downhill since having children. Something about only being able to write two consecutive sentences at a time—

Oh wait. These five minutes are for God. Get those other things out of my head. 

Inhale… exhale… Jesus.

Inhale… exhale… Spirit. It was really fun to talk with the other mom at the playground this morning. Christian said he was proud of me for striking up a conversation in Dutch with someone I didn’t know, and keeping it going without her suspecting (at least to my knowledge) that I am not from around here. Well okay, I did mention I live in Uganda so she knows I don’t live around here, but it’s still possible she thinks I am from somewhere else in the Netherlands. Funny, when most people hear that I live in Uganda they start to ask questions and be interested, but she didn’t pry into that. We just talked about our kids. Why didn’t she want to know more? 

Ugh, that is one hundred percent not the point of this time. 

You. Are. God.

Inhale… It was really fun to see Ineke and Claudia today. How refreshing to spend hours talking to people who are familiar with Noah’s Ark and Uganda and not needing to explain the basics of what we do and what the organization is. I’m so happy they could come. 

Oh, come on, Katie… 

Inhale… exhale… Father. 

Inhale… exhale… Jesus. 

Inhale… exhale… Spirit.

You. Are. God. 

Shoot, I wanted to prepare a lot of tomorrow’s cooking tonight. I could have made the potato salad tonight, even the bean burgers to put in the fridge so that tomorrow while the kids are awake I don’t need to spend my time cooking. But I also want to go to bed in time so I can wake up early to do TAG and go for a run in the morning, and I know from experience that if I don’t go to bed early enough it dashes my chances of being able to start my day in a very positive way. Then I won’t stay up late cooking tonight, but I can at least get the frozen hamburger buns out of the freezer before I go to bed. 

Oh wow. God, are you frustrated with me yet? If I were you, I would leave me alone and go listen to the prayers of all your children in Afghanistan who are running for their lives—for you. Am I really getting distracted from you by frozen hamburger buns and cookies I didn’t remember to bake? How can I let myself do that? What does that say about the place I give you? What kind of Christianity do I have compared to those in Afghanistan? 

Inhale… exhale… Father.

Inhale… exhale… Jesus. 

Inhale… exhale… Spirit.

You. Are. God.

Inhale… exhale… Father. My hands feel really dry. 

Inhale… exhale… Jesus. 

Inhale… exhale… Spirit. Patricia stopped talking. I am willing to bet she fell asleep. It makes me so happy that most nights she falls asleep without a fight. 

Agh—

You. Are. God.

Why do we need to sort the trash in the Netherlands? It is so complicated, what goes in each bin and what counts as plastic and what doesn’t, that I know they need to sort it again at the plant (or wherever it is the trash goes). Wouldn’t it be even easier to throw everything together and they can sort it all—

Timer. 

Five minutes. 

For God. 

Only maybe not.

The Thing the Devil Does Right

Now you, man of God, run from these things; but pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance, and gentleness. Fight the good fight of the faith… (1 Timothy 6:11-12)

God places a huge premium on living, breathing faith. In fact, the more you search the Scriptures, the more you discover that nothing is more important to God than our faith. 

But God is not the only one who puts a high priority on this issue of our faith. Satan also has no greater focus in a single area of our lives. Though he is no match for God, he is a powerful and dangerous foe of believing man and woman. 

Not coincidentally, then—because the stakes are so high—both God and the devil are targeting our faith. They know faith works. We need to know it too. 

(Beth Moore, “Believing God”)

——————————

We really tried with the teachers. The secondary school library staff, which included myself, Farouk (my full-time librarian) and five student librarians, had come up with a plan to convince the teachers that we are on their side and that the library can actually supplement what they are teaching in class, not distract students from it. We searched the library and pulled out hundreds of books from all the different sections, putting them in separate boxes for science, history, English, and the other subjects. We found books with experiments for when students are learning about electricity, a historical fiction novel about a blind girl in Europe during World War II for when they study that war in history, biographies of Nelson Mandela for those learning about apartheid, and so many more. We had evidence to back up our claims of the library’s helpfulness and we were ready to argue our points. 

Only they didn’t come. 

Out of the more than twenty teachers we invited to meet with us, we saw three. Out of those three, two sat quietly and ate their lunches while we talked. The third spent half the meeting arguing with us, trying to convince us that it is actually a bad thing for students to have access to information. (Nope, I am not making this up.) If students have access to information, then they will start to question the teachers, or worse, learn things the teachers were not yet ready to teach them. Absolute worst case scenario, they will make the teachers look like fools if they learn something the teachers don’t know. 

All in all, our plan was a bust. None of the teachers were convinced that the library could possibly be a good thing for their students. 

As those three teachers walked away, I turned to Farouk and said, “Well, at least he cared enough to argue.” 

Honestly, out of all the teachers who either sat there and didn’t say a word, or all the teachers who didn’t come at all, I preferred the one who argued. I preferred the one who snapped back. At least he listened to enough of what we were saying to decide he disagreed with it. He was the only one who found our argument worth arguing with. That was a hundred times better than indifference. 

My husband is the physicist in our relationship, but there are a few things I took away from my excruciating (sorry Mrs. Pattison, you are a great teacher—I just really, really disliked the subject) high school physics class. One of them is that it takes less energy to keep an object in motion that it does to get an object into motion.

Let me illustrate this for you. 

In the Netherlands, everybody rides a bicycle. It is by no means the only mode of transportation, but it is a popular one. It is actually one of the things Christian misses most when we are in Uganda. We love biking here, whether it be winter or summer, near or far, an intentionally long distance or because we got lost. I was pleasantly surprised how easy it was to bike while pregnant, and also how quickly after delivery I was able to get on the bike comfortably again. 

Now that we are in the Netherlands with kids, it is a bit different. Christian has a seat for Elliot on the front of his bike, and I have one for Patricia that sits above my back wheel. In principle, biking itself is exactly the same… only Patricia is heavy. I notice her weight a little bit while we are moving, but I notice it a lot when I need to get moving. The first few times when a stop light turned green, Christian with his long legs and smaller baby shot out ahead of us, and I tripped and stumbled to keep the bike upright long enough to get my feet on the pedals and get moving before we annoyed the people behind us. It takes so much energy to get both of us into motion. 

Do you know who is already in motion? 

Satan is moving, and moving fast. That guy cares enough to get moving. He is not indifferent about God. He is not stagnant. He is invested. He is on the move. He has devoted one hundred percent of his time, energy, and resources to opposing God. He knows God is that important. 

Do we? 

How many people devote one hundred percent of their time, energy, and resources to God? How many put him in a position of such importance in their lives? I have to say, sadly and honestly, that my priorities are too divided. I do not pursue God like I should. I do not pursue God like I want to. I am one hundred percent certain Satan knows the scriptures better than I do.

Who would have thought we could learn from the devil’s example something to do right? 

At least he cares. He knows the power of God. Do we? Do we really want to? 

What would the world look like if we lived with the same intensity as Satan? What would happen if we pursued God with the same passion and zeal as the devil uses to oppose him? We cannot afford to be indifferent. We cannot afford to be stagnant. Or motionless. Or lazy. We cannot fight the good fight of the faith without moving. 

It takes energy. It takes courage. It takes risk. It takes faith. 

Is God worth the energy it takes to get moving? 

2,429 gifts

For anyone who read my last post, it was a little bit… bleak. Depressing. After writing it that afternoon, I told Christian, “I wrote a blog post for the first time in a long time, but I think it might be too negative to post.” But it was true, and I did, and, well, it’s there and that’s that. Just in case you missed it and somehow got convinced by this paragraph that it is worth reading, you can find it here: It's Not Over.

I decided to post it because it accurately reflects how I feel sometimes. Not all the time, but regularly, whether it be on a mild or severe level. However, it is important to note that that is not always how I feel. Not by a long shot. God is so good, and I know that goodness all the time, and I feel it some of the time. I am on a journey (aren’t we all?) of learning and trying to take in and experience his goodness more and more. 

A very important step in that journey—or rather, the catalyst for such a journey—happened seven-and-a-half years ago. I had recently returned from volunteering in Uganda for the first time and had decided to go back to Noah’s Ark as a missionary a few months later. It was a challenge to sort out commitments to camp, Noah’s Ark, my boyfriend, my family and friends in America and Uganda, and I did not always handle that challenge gracefully. 

In the midst of all that, I read a book called One Thousand Gifts by Ann Voskamp. In that book, Ann describes her journey of learning to give thanks to God—daily, regular, open-the-eyes-of-my-heart thanksgiving in the best and worst of circumstances. I won’t tell you more because I think you should read the book yourself, but one thing she shared in her book was that she was challenged to make a list of one thousand things she was thankful for—one thousand gifts from God. 

I know with certainty I am not the only one who read that book and then bought my own journal to start a list of gifts God has given me. It was spring 2014 when I wrote my first entry: 

1. geese that make funny sounds that make me laugh

What, you didn’t expect my first entry of a thousand things to be thankful for to be geese? Neither did I. I do remember sitting at a park outside Madison as I read and journaled that day, and that between all the long, yellow grass in the pond there was a flock of geese. I don’t remember the sound they made, but I do remember that it was an unusually sunny day after the coldest winter in 35 years, and my number two reflects that: 

2. warm sunshine on my face

And I continued. I made a goal of writing three things every day. Some days I forgot. Some days I couldn’t think of anything new. Some days I got carried away and wrote ten or twenty. I filled one journal and started the next. I wrote in Uganda, I took it with me on furlough, when I got married, when my children were born. Last year I decided to accompany the entries with dates so I could more easily see when I was thankful for particular things and what seasons of my life prompted such gratitude. 

I intended to write this post in the first week of January, freshly released from 2020 and ready to take on 2021. My Facebook feed was full of people celebrating the end of such an awful year, and I can’t blame them. But I had no desire to join them. 2020 was different. It came with new challenges, we all know that. But it also came with new blessings. New opportunities. New moments in which God opened my eyes and my heart and filled me with gratitude for blessings big and small. 

So even though, as you read in my last post, we are still very much in the middle of Covid here in Uganda, and even though sometimes I feel trapped and stuck and frustrated, I am thankful. 

To date, I have written 2,429 things for which I am thankful. I am on my third journal. I have probably repeated things over the years because, let’s be honest, when I feel gratitude for something I am not going to pore over a hundred pages of my list just to see if I have already said thank you to God for that particular thing. 

Today I want to share a few entries from the last year—from the beginning of the pandemic up to now. Because the truth is, even in the midst of what many call the worst year ever, it has really been a great year for at least 990 reasons…

1,430. Christian’s support of me pumping breastmilk for Babirye even though it took a lot of my time

1,432. when I was sitting alone on my bed, reading through the last several chapters of the book of John, the way the Easter story came alive in my heart this year

1,436. our fridge, freezer, stove and oven

1,596. yesterday marked six years since I moved to Uganda

1,601. enough printers on the compound that even when four don’t work, there is still a way to print homework

1,684. I am known by God

1,739. the patience to calmly deal with discipline cases all afternoon and not blow up at the children for interrupting me

1,759. Simone washed all our windows and now they don’t bother me anymore

1,762. hearing my dad’s laugh in my head when Patricia does something funny

1,771. I cannot hear a single mosquito this morning

1,765. a short list of boys’ names on which we agree

1,769. a reminder of the urgency of the gospel

1,779. Little Peanut, aka Elliot Mukisa Berkman, is here!

1,784. managing to naturally deliver a 3.9 kilogram baby without pain medication

1,820. the book Bright Evening Star by Madeleine L’Engle

1,828. the gift of a chunk of pumpkin from the neighbors and the possibility of pumpkin muffins

1,830. toys for the children to play with at our house

1,881. having two young children in the house, knowing where they are and that they are okay all the time

1,945. the feeling of relief after waking up from a bad dream

1,994. the younger kids, like Isaac and Asaf, joining band

1,998. uplifting phone calls with Ruth, Josephine and Vanessa

1,999. the joy of a fully chaotic house and yard with the kids in the afternoon

2,004. democracy

2,097. watching Zadock focus so much and work so hard on his shading sheet

2,099. the holiday program aunties participate wholeheartedly in Monday morning games

2,100. Lydia teaching stomp with me

2,169. our Olympics opening ceremonies went well

2,180. “Patricia, wat was het hoogtepunt van jouw dag?” “Papa!”

2,223. spending part of the night sleeping next to Elliot and seeing his cute, sweet little face when I open my eyes

2,226. back scratches

2,262. new, nice neighbors

2,299. despite being the only nurse and working full-time, Rachel does her job with as much love, joy, patience and care as ever

2,302. Big Josephine tutoring Little Josphine and giving her much-needed help in school

2,303. Yulia has prepared a lot and planned a really good camp to do with the children

2,315. P.4s enjoyed reading games so much that the next class over had to tell us to be quiet

2,349. the small group of teenagers who are putting full days and lots of energy into Bible Camp

2,373. a mattress cover so when we have sleepovers and children wet the bed the clean-up is still minimal

2,374. Patricia’s prayers

2,420. we made it to the Netherlands