December 27, 2006
As I write this blog, I am on my way home from a trip to Florida with my family for Christmas. Because my grandparents and my mom’s family live down in Florida, we try to get there each Christmas. It is about a 17 hour car ride which can be tiring but also fun since all of my immediate family is together. Our time in Florida was definitely a lot of fun – lots of games of Rook, Settler’s, Pepper, Capture the Flag, volleyball, basketball, and soccer. In the knick of time my cousins, siblings, and I finished a 1000 piece puzzle in keeping with our Christmas tradition. There was good fellowship and laughter. Eleven of the cousins went to the movies one evening and endured an agonizing drive through a parking garage with a 6’2’’ clearance in a van that is probably 6’4’’. We thought of paying extra people to ride with us out of the garage to make the van sink down a little more. Thankfully there was no contact with the roof.
I returned to the States on December 17th and quickly settled into a busy 3 weeks of trying to visit with friends and make various appointments. There was a bit of culture shock in coming back, but not too much. The hardest part was discovering that my mom had purchased cushions for the dining room chairs and I had spent the last 2 weeks anticipating starting a water fight with my family by putting water on the hardwood chairs and having one of them sit in it. I was disappointed to say the least. Today I was eating lunch with my family and cousins before we began the return trip to PA and I was discussing a camp in Michigan called Amigo Center with my sister. At that moment the water brought me another glass of sweet tea and without thinking I said “Gracias!” My family all looked at me and laughed. I was actually excited that I could return to Spanish so quickly without having to think. Here in the States I am not having a lot of opportunity to practice Spanish and I hope that I do not forget what I spent the last 4 months learning.
The last few weeks of language school were perhaps some of the more challenging because it became harder to focus as the end of the trimester drew near. Although a lot of classes went on excursions or played football during the last week of classes, my class kept studying Subjunctive verbs up until the very end.
I did have a few adventures in the last few weeks in Costa Rica. I organized a group of students to go visit a nearby Volcano, only I chose the worst day weather wise. December is supposed to be the beginning of the summer and dry season I Costa Rica, but not this year. Up at the crater the temperature was probably in the mid-50’s and at first there was a steady sprinkle and lots of fog. The fog did part for about a minute, allowing us to see the green water in the crater. As we were all trying to warm up and dry off in the unheated snack shop, it began to pour. That squelched the hope that a few of us still had of doing a bit of hiking. The snack shop itself reminded me of a ski lodge where persons would stop for coffee or hot chocolate before continuing on with their skiing. Unfortunately we were experiencing torrential downpour and not a blizzard. I have decided that maybe I will let someone else organize the next trip since trying to make a decision that will make 13 people happy is not my favorite.
The second weekend of December I went to camp one last time for this year and helped at the climbing wall. The program director had just finished building a new high ropes element which involves a little free fall before swinging on a cable. We were able to try it out that Sunday and though my stomach did a little jump, I swung without screaming. I have decided that a bigger challenge for me than heights is that of screaming, and the next activity I do, I need to scream.
In December I went to one last youth worship service at a local church and it ended up being a good time of hearing from the Lord as well as worshipping Him. We were singing a song about “at the cross … gently broken … I surrender.” My first thought was, how can brokenness ever be gentle? I then had an image come to me of a clay pot that was broken, with a few cracks running through it. But there was a light inside of the pot and everywhere that there was a crack, light shone through. Next to it was another pot, unbroken or marred, also with a light. From this pot the light shone forth only at the mouth. I was gently reminded that in my brokenness and weaknesses, Christ can shine through and sometimes be more evident than when I am at my best.