Comings and Goings

Four amazing years

2011-03-31T14:48:00.002-07:00

Four years ago today, I got on a plane bound for Liberia. I'd signed up with a group of people I barely knew to attempt the impossible.

We had raised a whopping $3500, and with it we hoped to make a huge difference in the war-torn nation of Liberia.

We had no idea. But we saw that seed money multiplied like fish and bread all around us and, in time, we began to notice orphans looking healthier, acting like kids again. Buildings sprang up and became loving homes. Swamps were deserted in favor of shiny new wells with sweet water.

I had the idea that I would teach, serve, and inspire. Turns out that the other side of the world is upside down, and I returned a changed man: healed, devoted to God, married.

Today is my last day full-time with Orphan Relief and Rescue, though I'll continue to work part-time for a few months more. It's hard to put words or even a finger on how to feel about it. My heart is full and grateful. I'm eager and excited to see what's next. Though I don't know, I'm not afraid of the future anymore. I'm interested and experienced in so many things; it's such a big world; there is so much to do.

We'll see!

Soli deo gloria

Catching up: 8 months in photos

2011-03-31T14:06:00.007-07:00

Brenda meets her new parents over poutine. At the zoo.

Spenser J. Tyler

Our gorgeous 2nd wedding cake @ family reunion/reception

Our noble steed for The Great Western Roadtrip

New home in Seattle

Un-wallpapering and painting our new apartment

World's deadliest croquet players

Rainier -- which I hope to someday summit

Stunning summer sunsets from our new living room

It's been the Year of Pies. Those newlywed pounds never tasted so good!

Trying to get our new puppy to pose for a respectable Christmas card

Libby on Christmas morning, sporting her new adventure pack. (I think that means she likes it!)

New Year's Day atop Mt. Erie, overlooking Puget Sound and the Cascades

My ladies

Snowshoeing with new friends (and Libby's beau, Townsend)

Libby was all spirit for the Superbowl

Moving on

2010-07-27T14:40:00.004-07:00

Tomorrow I leave Liberia, this time (more) permanently. I expected this to be a melodramatic time, but it really hasn't been. Am I sad? Not really. Going to miss it? Sure, absolutely. Ready to go? Definitely. An excerpt from my journal last night sums up my mood:

tomorrow's my last full day--

end of an era feelings

are finally setting in.

it's easy to see and cite

all the ways Liberia's changed--

what i hope is just as plain

is all the ways i have, too.

in many respects i've gotten

everything i came for

and so it's time to go--

adventure, service,

discomfort, spiritual straightening-out,

not least of all my partner for life.

but in every respect

i'm only now beginning

and so it's time to start.

Just one sign of the times: my next door neighbor, in July of 2007 (l) and 2010 (r).

You call that a plan??

2010-07-04T03:56:00.004-07:00

Most of you know, some of you don't: Brenda and I are moving to the Seattle area later this summer, as I'm continuing to work with ORR there. As such, I have to immigrate to the U.S. -- quite a process, but I'm thankful to say it's been much smoother so far than I'd feared. Until now.

There's one last document I need before I can leave: my police clearance from Canada. To process a clearance from overseas (ink prints), the website says it takes four months. I'd hoped, initially, that meant up to four months. Turns out, it means at least four months. Which would mean I'm stuck in Liberia until early October, or two and a half months beyond when I'm supposed to start work in Seattle.

The alternative: electronic fingerprints taken in-person, in Canada: three business days.

Am I really considering flying for 60 hours to be on the ground in Toronto for just a week? Yes. Am I made of money? No. (If you're reading this and you are, please get in touch. :)

Nothing's for sure yet, so please hope and pray with us that some simpler, cheaper way presents itself. I'm going to price out a ticket this week, but I'm expecting $1600-2000. How much is it worth to me to get on with the next chapter and not be separated from my wife for two months? At least that...

Thursdays

2010-06-10T15:48:00.004-07:00

Sometimes there seems to be nothing to write. Other times--now times--there's too much, it's overwhelming. Or--no, let's be more specific: it's not that it's overwhelming, it's just that it doesn't all seem to link up into one cohesive thought--read, blog entry.

However, without resorting to bullet points, I'll give it my best shot.

I'm married. That's a good start. And married life, I'm here to tell you, is good. At the risk of sounding like a love-struck honeymooner, it's just fun. Brenda and I are having a great time being domestic and dorky and generally ridiculous. If there's a downside, it's only that I don't make as much time to write as I used to. But sometimes it's good to put down the camera and make memories instead of recording them, right?

Well it struck me just now as I was trying to fall asleep that the very name of this public journal has a lot to do with my getting married.

Or at least, it did...until I got married.

For my entire life, as long as I can recall, getting married has been my number one. (I don't know what it was so early in life that made me idealize marriage so, but I confess I proposed to my first girlfriend when I was five. Yep, it was so much fun I did it twice.) Not that marriage was ever just something to accomplish or check off the list, but more like I was away from home, eager to return. And so I've arrived in that sense. But I'm still

arriving, and I plan on constantly arriving...but never stopping. There's always the Next, right?

I don't need to remind you of all those too-true clichés about the journey, not the destination. I'm all about that. But I want to be careful to cultivate the discipline of discomfort, too.

I remember I had this neighbour, a sweet old widow, maybe eighty years old. She told me she does one thing every year that absolutely terrifies her. How fantastic is that? Some years that meant bungee jumping, others picking up the phone and calling so-and-so. (There's another blog entry here about the correlation of marriage and bungee jumping, but I'll save that one for a rainy day.)

To that end, in the spirit of dear Edna, I'm committing to write every Thursday. There may not be a blog entry every week, but I'm going to keep the pen moving at least. And to go along with that, I'm going to try and develop a train of thought through the course of the week. I feel so scatter-brained lately, it's driving me nuts. So as I'm driving, as I'm not sleeping--both of which I seem to be doing plenty of these days--I'm going to try and focus on a problem, a question, some sort of trajectory. And then I'm going to write about it. This goes hand in hand with a broader intentionality across the board. Like not leaving my dirty clothes on the floor. So far so good.

Hey, speaking of which, I was just reading something really interesting about intentional socializing this morning... See you next week.

Meet the future Mrs. T

2010-03-09T01:43:00.003-08:00

Brenda Pigeon, the future Mrs. T.

...Along with two more of my favorite people.

...And she loves my kids too!

So there aren't many details to report yet, but I didn't want to wait to tell you all that I proposed to my beautiful Brenda last night, on a certain bit of beach that already meant the world to me, under a gorgeous panorama of stars and lightning. And (after asking REALLY? about a dozen times), she gleefully said yes, making me the happiest, luckiest guy I know.

Mina

2010-03-04T07:52:00.002-08:00

This isn't one I want to write. Nor do I know where to begin.

Last week I was waiting to pick someone up from the local hospital when I was approached by a man reading the side of the car--"Orphans?". He worked at the hospital, and told me about a little ten year-old girl inside that he and his wife had informally adopted as their own. Mina, he told me, was "a true orphan -- no ma, no pa. HIV positive." The orphanage at which she'd been living dropped her off at the hospital but didn't come back to check on her. So he would visit her when he had the chance, and asked me to look in on her too.

This was one of those times when I'm tempted to be too busy, to brush it off. Then I thought, Well, why not. Maybe I can encourage her a little. And so I walked into the paeds ward and immediately saw her way at the back, sitting hunched over on her bed. Her face didn't brighten when she saw that I was coming to see her, nor did she respond to me except to murmur. The head nurse came over and asked why she wasn't eating, why she wasn't talking. Nothing.

I've never seen such a discouraged child, no matter how sick. And Mina was definitely sick. So I consulted the American doctor handling her case, to see what her outlook might be. I was told she'd be in the hospital for a good long time, but that she needed to start eating and taking her meds. The doctor's biggest concern, though, was her attitude--that she was severely depressed.

Got a call that little Mina, with no parents or siblings, died over the weekend. She just gave up.

This is Africa. This happens. There was nothing that could be done. All of these are inappropriate. No, ridiculous. No ten year-old should, for lack of love and care, no matter what the prognosis, give up like she did. It was staggering.

I'm not angry or sad about this, I'm just...disappointed. And I'm trying to leverage that disappointment into a new commitment. I don't expect more than a handful of strangers have even noticed her passing, but now you can join me in remembering her.

What's next

2010-01-17T02:06:00.003-08:00

Back in June of 2007, getting to the end of my first four-month stint in Liberia, I had a one-on-one with our president, Tim. I had joined the organization before it had really gotten started, which was great because I got to be a part of its formative stages. But Tim and I had taken a big gamble on each other, and we were meeting to settle our bets, in a sense.

For him, he'd taken a big chance bringing in a non-Christian he hardly knew to help start this faith-based organization. For me, I'd agreed to six months in close quarters with a bunch of Christians I hardly knew, or didn't at all. Were they going to try and convert me? Judge and condemn me? Both of us had to trust that we were pursuing God, pursuing truth with passion and abandon, and that we were willing to learn from each other. We'd had some mind-boggling conversations, really challenging each other's core beliefs, and over African chicken chow mien, celebrated that day how those first months had gone.

So he asked me for a three-year commitment--to the organization, and to Liberia. I agreed, almost as quickly as I had agreed to drop everything and move to Africa in the first place. It just seemed right; I had found the job, the lifestyle, that fit.

Well, those three years are almost up, and Tim and I had another meeting not too long ago. This time it wasn't so easy to decide--I'm getting a little older, I'm thinking of other things. Not that I don't still love my job and life here in Liberia; I'm overwhelmed on a daily basis by how spoiled I am, despite the lack of 'little' things. I just didn't want to stay automatically, because it had become familiar or comfortable. I wanted to make sure I was still 'called' to be here.

After about two weeks of tormenting myself with the question, with the angles and the implications, I've renewed my commitment to ORR without a time limit. However long I need to be here, here I shall be. These last three years have been, hands down, the best of my life--where they haven't been the happiest, they've without question been the most fulfilling. To watch this nation grow, these children grow--and looking back, to see all the ways I've grown!

The most important thing, however, the most important reason I'm here, is to grow closer to God. I realized the other day, in the midst of a conversation, that if I hadn't joined ORR and stayed with ORR, I wouldn't really know God today.

That's a powerful statement on many levels. Let me try and unpack for a moment all that that means to me.

A small group of committed Christians gave me the space to be un-Christian, to look for God irreligiously. They demonstrated a key distinction I'd never made for myself, in all my years of looking for God in different ways, different world religions: the difference between abiding by, investing in doctrine and practice, and building a genuine relationship with Deity, allowing Creator to also become provider, friend, father. I still have some personal hang-ups with labeling myself Christian, to be honest--not because I'm ashamed to follow Christ, but because of the stereotypes (some justified) and abuses and jerks and utterly human foibles that have also been stamped with the same label. And the more I learn about God, the less I know. I still don't have all the answers.

And that's precisely why I'm sticking with ORR, my family and my friends, my mentors and confidants and partners in crime. I'm continuing to pursue God most of all--the best and most important thing I can do, the thing which, undone in a day, makes it a waste.

What's next? Who knows! The future is wide open. I only know that I need and desire more than ever your love and support along the way. All of you. I long--and I suspect you do too--to know and be known, to love and be loved. Come and challenge me, too--and let me challenge you.

I hope, most of all, that you'll seek and find the Root of Joy, the one that allows us direct access to a real, personal, interactive God.

Operation Waterwheel

2009-12-23T07:03:00.004-08:00

I'm going to be out of touch for the next little while. A bunch of us are leaving Sunday on our most ambitious up-country venture to date, an epic 1,000-mile journey covering eight counties via the worst (read: most fun) roads in Liberia. The plan is two days down, five days in Harper, a beautiful old city isolated near the border of Côte D'Ivoire, then two days back.

Have a merry Christmas, everyone, and a joyous new year. I hope you get plenty of time, plenty of family and friends and FOOD. Remember the reason for the season, and I'll be back with stories and photos soon. Love to all!

Crash course on orphan politics

2009-12-22T07:50:00.006-08:00

Last week I tweeted my way through an all-day workshop hosted by Liberia's social welfare department and UNICEF. The goal was to validate a framework for a three-year program to de-institutionalize 50% of the more than 5,000 children living in Liberia's orphanages.

I got some questions from my tweeting, so this is my attempt to provide a brief overview. [Disclaimer: If you're not interested in the drier, more politico-technical aspects of orphan care, I'd consider skipping this one.]

First, some context in point form:

Liberia endured 14 years of civil conflict from 1989 to 2003.
Before the war, there were ten orphanages. Now there are at least 142.
Before the war, orphans were cared for by extended family (kinship care) or the community at large (foster care), making orphanages almost obsolete. This intrinsic cultural safety net was degraded by the conflict. While it is still present, it has been overshadowed by a mean entrepreneurial spirit that's noticed the international aid and attention that an orphanage can attract.
Among groups like ours, the generally accepted number of actual orphans in orphanages is 33-50%, the rest having either been recruited away from their families up-country, or residing at the orphanage under a boarding school arrangement (but under the false pretense or being an orphan).
This huge proportion of non-orphans diverts aid and attention away from the real orphans, and relieves parents' responsibility to care for their own children. This program is predicated on the finding that children thrive under individualized attention that they simply don't receive in an orphanage setting.
The goal of the program is to reduce the total number of non-orphans, then reduce the number of orphanages by closing those homes with abusive, neglectful, trafficking, and profiteering directors. This will allow the government and its helping hands to focus resources on the remaining orphan(age)s with excellent directors committed to raising healthy, successful children.

So that's the situation, more or less. Now, the solution is complex, multi-faceted, and gradual. Much as we'd all love to scoop ALL the children out of those poor, broken orphanages and get them into safe, loving, dry, clean homes... Well, we have to prioritize: the worst orphanages closed first.

Top to bottom: Introduction to the framework by Ina, the consultant and spearheader; Breakaway groups to identify and address gaps; Group presentations to the plenary.

The first step is to reunify as many children as have families -- immediate or extended -- able to provide care. This is incredibly difficult and time-consuming, and never really ends. Assessment and follow-up monitoring are needed to ensure children are welcomed, safe, and don't become domestic servants to their own families. Likewise, there will need to be a fine balance struck between providing a "welcome home" package and creating expectations of continued external assistance.

The second best option would seem to be foster care, though this requires intense pre-evaluation and monitoring. In this scheme, government would be expected to share in much of the financial cost of raising these children--particularly school fees. Still, growing up in a home with one-on-one attention, discipline, and love is almost always better than growing up in an institution.

Where children are found to have no living relatives and foster care isn't possible, it's left to place them in the best institution available -- either another, better orphanage, or a boarding school.

The other consideration is to move the children as little as possible, to reduce the trauma of multiple relocations. So while we need to act urgently, we also need to be sure-footed, as confident as possible in the safety and durability of the end situation--whether it's a family or foster home, boarding school, or another orphanage.

Finally, I'll just say this: I've been sitting in government meetings for almost three years, repeating many of the same planning meetings without ever getting around to the implementation. This one, I hope and pray, is actually going to fly--thanks mostly to financial backing from UNICEF. My role within this process is not at all central, but to be an active participant in the process, to provide expertise and momentum, resources and accountability throughout -- essentially, to do whatever I can to ensure it actually happens.

There you have it--my crash course on de-institutionalization. Questions? Comments? Recommendations? I'd love to hear them.

The bright side of hectic

2009-12-01T08:15:00.013-08:00

I picked up some colleagues from the airport the other day whom I'd seen just two weeks ago in Texas, yet it feels like it had been months. Such has been these last two weeks--hitting the ground running, raising the bar for myself, and (well above and beyond all that) watching God line up mini-miracles each day.

I'm explosively happy to be back in Liberia, home, after three and a half wonderful months with, well, the rest of the world. With many of you.

Last night I was telling a friend what I want in life -- roots, community, love and support. And that led me to realize how much life has changed in the three years I've been here. My first trip here, it was just four of us camping out in a big empty house, sleeping on the floor -- didn't have much to offer, didn't know many people, just learning and doing and growing each day. Now, I have roots here. Real community. I have my people. My team is great at what they do. I have a immensely (and equally) challenging and rewarding job. It's still life on a submarine, in a sense--everything in common, no secrets, the good/bad/ugly--but it's become my real life, and I love it. I really love it.

Now, I hesitate to say this; it's not to glorify myself, I just don't want you to misunderstand me: this is hard. Children are sick, skinny, robbed, given away, used, exploited, abused, all but crushed. Adults are lazy, corrupt, mean, hotheaded, selfish and greedy. The country is broken. The healing (while substantial) is still so superficial. They fixed the roads, sure, but there's still the crooked cop cheating a taxi driver out of $0.17 to get through his pylons.

Corruption is called friendship, and everybody's friendly.

What I love is the deep and abiding satisfaction of being right where I'm supposed to be, and that I get to do it with vibrant, deeply loving people. So many of you have been asking me, recently and for three years now, How long are you going to do this? The answer I'm not sure of. I'm thrilled that God called me here, where He knew I'd thrive; but I hope I would go wherever He called me next, Africa or Canada or Space. All I know is, when I follow Him, it always seems to get better...so I can't wait.

Finally, I just have to celebrate two amazing facts: Elena (an old high school friend recently rediscovered) has joined ORR full-time, and just got to Liberia. (Check her blog here) And secondly, another couple, both very close friends from elementary school, are coming in February! I've finally managed to export Huntsville to Liberia, the best of both worlds!! :)

Back to the grindstone

2009-11-15T14:19:00.003-08:00

After a crazy and fantastic three and a half months criss-crossing North America (11,000km / 7,000 mi of solo driving!), I'm finally back home in Liberia. The roosters, the roar of the diesel generator, the heat: it's good to be home.

Even before getting on the plane, but especially since arriving, I've been overwhelmed once again by the privilege of being here. Working and sharing life with such incredible people, serving such joyful children, the isolated beauty of this place.

The year ahead will likely be difficult: there is an enormous amount of work to do in a short time, and in the midst of many transitions. But my gut says it's all going to work out, and fly by, and be blessed.

Liberia's still broken but healing, corrupt but optimistic, unhappy but joyful. Back to work.

Sure, the beach might be the national bathroom. But somehow, 'unspoilt' is still the only word that comes to mind!

Vacation, Episode II

2009-10-09T18:13:00.003-07:00

On to September: In an effort to reduce all the traveling I did last year, I split my month in Canada into three. Part one was Huntsville, my little hometown in the woods. Apparently I brought with me the best weather of the whole summer, and I capitalized with backyard BBQs and sunbathing by the river, just like the good ol' days. Part two was camping and then marrying off my best friend, Braden. It was a pleasure to spend a week with him and Melissa, and a great privilege to stand at his side as he took the plunge. Part three was all about family, and I had an amazing time staying with my sister, brother, and finally with my parents.

The whole family (minus Scott--missed you, Bro) even opted to have Thanksgiving a couple of weeks early on account of me. Man, I forgot how good turkey and cranberry is!

Seriously, though. I have SO much to be thankful for. Family and friends, health and strength, a job that's also a calling. There's only one word for it: I feel downright spoiled.

Thank you to everyone that dropped what you were doing to make time for me. I thoroughly enjoyed catching up. I miss you all so much through the year. Thanks for your gracious approach to adopting an hour-a-year friendship with me. Wish it were more. (Oh, and if you have photos of our time together, I don't -- send 'em over!)

Vacation, Episode I

2009-10-09T17:33:00.006-07:00

Ok, here goes. So much to tell, so few photos to tell it with! Let's begin at the end of August, when I had a huge dream come true: I got to visit Gifty and her amazing family. Now, they had warned me that I wouldn't recognize my little monster -- but WOW, she is enormous. So big, so healthy -- so much like a child her age. When she left Liberia, she was a one-hander. She could balance quite happily with her giant belly, though she lacked the strength to sit up or crawl, let alone stand. Well, I arrived in her second week of walking, and it was absolutely heartbreaking to see her screaming around, boss of the world. What a thrill.

It took me back to that first night with her in the hospital. Understand, I'm not a baby person. I wouldn't know if a diaper's inside out or not. So here's this eleven-and-a-half pound, 20-month-old girl, by all accounts just a few days from her end--not even enough strength to cry. No idea what to do--so I did what everyone does in a situation like that. I began bargaining with God. I paced the halls of the hospital for hours that night, singing to and praying over Gifty, promising God that if only He would heal her, deliver her, I would do anything.

Fast forward eight months, and there I am trying to lift a 27 pounder out of her crib. She's looking at me with a scrunched up nose, and I'm wondering if she remembers. She's experimenting with sounds, and she's fluent in all the sign language she needs. Most importantly, she's got a very loving extended family, and really the entire town -- anywhere I pushed her stroller, people would lean out of their cars to ask how she was doing. Amazing! Just look at her now:

Gettin' gone

2009-08-27T09:00:00.002-07:00

I'm back!! My week -- or almost two -- in the monastery in Virginia was fantabulous. Absolutely amazing to live among such humble, hospitable people. Amazing to learn some classic disciplines in a very liberating environment, while also experiencing the structure (and the freedom therein) of liturgy, as we met three times a day as a community for prayer.

I had no idea what to expect, going in -- but it was exactly what I needed after eleven months in the field.

Last day in the office today. Leaving in the pre-dawn for Wisconsin -- I'll be visiting first with churches and friends in Wisconsin Rapids and Appleton and Madison, then spending a few days catching up with Gifty's family. (YESS!!!) Please pray for safe travels!

September I'll be all over Ontario--in Huntsville for Labor Day weekend, in Ottawa for my best friend's wedding, then in Toronto and London with as many of my awesome friends and family as I can pack in. (Here's to couchsurfing!)

October, I've pushed back my return to Liberia to allow me more time to travel and share the stories of all the craziness that God is doing through ORR. So in October I'll be in Georgia at first, then in Texas and Louisiana -- BUT I do have a couple more Sundays if anyone out there would like me to come and share!

It's been really fun being back, I have to say. Re-entry has been easier this time, and I'm told by close friends around me that I seem calmer and more at peace than on past returns. The thing I notice most is that I'm less anxious, especially about future stuff. I feel great; I feel free.

Hope with me

2009-08-07T09:33:00.003-07:00

One last thing I forgot before I disappear. Please pray for Gifty's potential live donor; they're flying down for a big day of tests coming up next week. Gifty's healthy and happy and heavy, but she still needs this liver. Please pray that the tests would go well, that they would both be healthy and a great match. Just pray that God would throw down one last miracle in this crazy story.

And with that, here's my girl...

Disappearing awhile

2009-08-07T08:00:00.002-07:00

I'm leaving today for a week-long retreat in a monastery, a much-needed re-focusing exercise. Then, out of the blue, this poem landed in my inbox this morning. Enjoy, and see you later.

Flickering Mind

Denise Levertov

Not for one second
will my self hold still, but wanders
anywhere,
everywhere it can turn. Not you,
it is I am absent.
You are the stream, the fish, the light,
the pulsing shadow,
you the unchanging presence, in whom all
moves and changes.
How can I focus my flickering, perceive
at the fountain's heart
the sapphire I know is there?

On the road again

2009-07-29T08:32:00.002-07:00

Eleven months is a strange stretch of time: long enough, apparently, that time no longer flies or drags, just is. Maybe that's a sign I'm feeling at home--when I stop thinking of seasons in Liberia as trips, but vice versa. It seems more like I'm leaving home to go on an extended trip.

I was chatting last night with another guy leaving today (he for good), and we found we've experienced the same progression: a month ago, we were both dying to go -- great food, summer weather (less rain, that is), and of course family and friends. But as the time has wound down, I've been given little treats of home so I'm less eager to leave. It's a conspiracy. To start, it's been the sunniest rainy season on record. The other day I had a real bona fide backyard BBQ. I even got to go hiking.

Well, I won't be dissuaded. Time for a break, and time for refilling my tank among loved ones. Maybe three months is a little longer than I'd like, but most importantly of all, I just want to be where I'm needed most. If that means bouncing around the US for an extra, sign me up.

Thank you and apologies to those of you waiting on me to announce when I'll be where; I'm sorry that my schedule is still so up in the air. Once I get back to Texas, the state of my car (and its response to repair and prayer) will be the first domino. After that, I'll let you know--but for now:

August: Texas, Virginia and Wisconsin. September: Canadia. October: All. Over. :)

Kindergarten graduation

2009-06-29T12:01:00.004-07:00

There are all sorts of things I get to do in Liberia that are totally ridiculous. Hilarity is a fact of life in Bizarro World. But one of my favourite times of year (and which I missed last year!) is Kindergarten graduation season. The pomp and ceremony that is rolled out for these kids is beyond funny, it's actually touching. They really make them feel like a million bucks.

Here's to you, graduating class of 2009: only 12 more to go!

(Yes, Moses just graduated from K-2 and is almost as tall as me.... *sigh*)

Home time!

2009-06-29T10:57:00.003-07:00

Summer's on its way which means I'm on my way home--or at least to Canada and the U.S. At this point it looks like I'll be in Virginia Beach for a one-week retreat in mid-August, then to Texas for a week or two, then up to Canada for September.

Throughout September I'm available to speak at events (bbq's, concerts, churches, dessert nights), and for most of October I and the rest of the team will be available around the U.S. -- PLEASE contact us if you would like us to come and speak in your area!

Thanks-o!

Construction update

2009-06-26T04:43:00.000-07:00

Here's a quick look at what I've been up to these past two weeks. We're more than halfway there now, thanks to FANTASTIC weather and a lot of quality help. More soon!

Construction Update At Mother Harley's

Christmas in June!

2009-06-12T09:32:00.004-07:00

So my cousin Erin just became my favorite American. :)

A few weeks ago she sent me a note on Facebook that she wanted to help out, maybe raise some money or send some supplies. Well, I shot back some random stuff off the top of my head, and sure enough--a couple days ago I get this GIANT SUITCASE OF LOVE!! Thirty-six pounds of granola bars, jerky, gum, and every sort of awesome. I'm in overload!

But that's just the stuff for the team: Erin also rallied the troops to donate over $2000 toward clean water projects at our orphanages, and sent heaps of matchbox cars and beautiful posters and cards from the kids at her church. (Always cool to introduce international pen pals!)

Thanks so much to everyone who pitched in: Branyon Guthrie, Susan Guthrie, Sarah Guthrie and Gary Guthrie, Adrienne, Elizabeth Jones, Nick Person, Brad Parkhurst, Blake and Rachel as well as Grace Buonamia, Rachel Young, and Becky Klein, and anyone else I've forgotten! Special thanks also to Northstar Church Middle and High School Youth Groups, and Cobb Business Women's Assosiation. Thank you all for being such a huge blessing to my entire team, keeping us fueled up and reminded of home.

Velvet Elvis :: Movement One :: Jump

2009-05-27T15:20:00.003-07:00

Rob's preface reads like the back cover, an anecdote to illustrate how this book is a part of a conversation, not an argument or a sermon. This conversation has been going on for thousands of years, and it will never end because it's about mystery. But more on that in a moment...

The first movement of the book centers around one of my all-time favourite analogies for faith: Some people talk about the faith in terms of foundations and building blocks, and their beliefs and doctrines and so on make up the bricks. Rob suggests a different view: springs in a trampoline.

When bricks are made well, they make strong walls--walls to keep people in or keep people out. And if a few bricks fail, the walls come down; the bricks are interdependent. But springs are made to be stretched and strained, and if one gets completely discombobulated, the others pick up the slack. Our ideas and beliefs should be able to handle our most rigorous tests; we shouldn't ever have to take on a defensive posture when talking about ideas on God, which is

"one of the things that happens in brickworld: you spend a lot of time talking about how right you are. Which of course leads to how wrong everybody else is. Which then leads to defending the wall. It struck me [...] that you rarely defend a trampoline. You invite people to jump on it with you." (27)

Ha! I love it. Rob then rounds out 'movement one' with a discussion about the importance of questions--raw, difficult, vulnerable questions, and how we shouldn't be afraid of them. Being my father's son, I need a faith that embraces questions. Sean Penn of all people sums up beautifully the joy of jumping on this great big trampoline:

"'When everything gets answered, it's fake. The mystery is the truth.'" (33)

Velvet Elvis

2009-05-24T03:14:00.002-07:00

It's been an inspiring morning. I woke up and followed my everyday routine, but when I sat down in my usual chair on the porch under the mango tree, something was different. And all I can tell you is that it had something to do with the breeze. It was the perfect temperature, mild and refreshing, persistent but varied, and smelled subtly of home. (A breeze that doesn't smell of diesel or human waste is a welcome enough change here, but this was so much richer. It was startling.)

So I sat there and soaked it in and marveled once more at how blessed I am. And then I felt a little embarrassed at how little I do to try and spread that joy. When people ask "What's new?" I blush that my life revolves around my work and nothing much to say besides that. Nothing much to blog besides that. Yet I smile like I've got an oil well / pumping in my living room. (Thanks, Maya, that's exactly it!)

Then I thought about the book I'm reading, Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell: how it challenges and encourages me to think destructively about established patterns of thought, and compellingly about new, creative, communal ways of thinking about and living and breathing in God.

So I thought, Why don't I just blog this book? And to reassure any of you that think I'm about to get up on a soap box, allow me to introduce this book by quoting the back cover, a tidy glimpse into its tone:

We have to test everything.
I thank God for anybody anywhere who is pointing people to the mysteries of God.
But those people would all tell you to think long and hard about what they are saying and doing and creating.
Test it. Probe it.
Do that to this book.
Don't swallow it uncritically. Think about it. Wrestle with it.
Just because I'm a Christian and I'm trying to articulate a Christian worldview doesn't mean I've got it nailed. I'm contributing to the discussion.
God has spoken, and the rest is commentary, right?

Right off the bat, Rob speaks to my own discomfort and insecurity around mainstream Christianity. If Christianity has become a list of things to subscribe to and affirm and vote for, then I'm simply not. But if it's about living more in tune with the ultimate reality that creates and sustains and loves, then I'm in.

That's what this book is about: claiming truth -- wherever you find it! -- and throwing out the garbage. It's a discussion. And I hope you'll join in.

What do YOU think?

2009-05-10T06:24:00.003-07:00

I love the video below, because it captures something of the struggle I have with some of the stereotypes around Africa. Stereotypes not only of famine and war and flies in their eyes, but stereotypes of helping, too. Of what aid is, what missions is, what development is -- and what they can do.

There are so many boxes: Here's what I can do. Here's what I can't.

Well, here's to a "new conversation."

Dude, a new dog!

2009-05-08T10:14:00.004-07:00

Forget rusty razor wire and dozing security guards--the best security money can buy in Liberia is a dog. I've seen time and time again how terrified Liberians are of OneLove (our companion of two years), despite how friendly he is. Usually.

Anyway we've just doubled our quadripeds on patrol with the addition of Dude. After an agonizing four-minute debate in the driveway over names like 'HeyYou', 'Bro', and 'TwoLove', we decided that you can (should?) begin or end most every command with 'Dude'. So it stuck.

He's still learning the ropes and licking way too much for anyone's comfort, but he's irresistibly cute in that dumb-as-nails, puppyish sort of way.

OneLove's energy level is now that of a 90-year-old, as he's now forced to wrestle or avoid Dude all day, every day. The guards have taken to calling him Ol' Papie.

Redemption

2009-05-07T10:01:00.000-07:00

Last night I was asked to read a screenplay on the life of Joshua Milton Blahyi, formerly known as General Butt Naked -- one of the most notorious fighters in Liberia's bloody history. From 1980 up to his conversion in 1996, he and his boy soldiers killed many thousands and engaged in unmentionable atrocities including human sacrifice.

We read the script for Joshua and a couple of other key characters in a quiet living room, to give them a chance to make corrections and suggestions. It was so strange, so sobering, taking on his voice and acting out some of those atrocities -- and right in front of him, too. But it is a truly powerful story, as true to life as a movie can be, of redemption, of transformation, of victory over evil.

Joshua is now a pastor working full-time with ex-combatants, encouraging them to turn from crime to peaceful, Godly lives. To talk and laugh with him now, I can't imagine the things he's seen and done; there isn't a mean bone in his body. That God can so completely transform one life gives me so much hope for the rest of this nation as well.

Emptyish nest!

2009-05-04T12:16:00.003-07:00

L to R: Jen, Matt and Mariel Le Page, Moi, Ashley, Cramer, and Deb

It's one of those things that stays uncrossed-off through dozens of generations of to-do lists: one decent team photo. Well, the day Cramer left we got this. Matt and Deb have now left the five of us to slug out the rainy season. (Missing from photo: OneLove and Dude--the new puppy)

Lowest of the low v. The least of these

2009-04-26T15:18:00.003-07:00

"Why did you bring us here?! These people don't have any money--why'd you bring us here?!"

This is what the one armed robber said to the other as they tore up an orphanage just a couple of days ago, threatening the matron and older kids. The matron's reply: she chastised them boldly like boys:

"What kind of place do you think I'm running here? I sell cool water. Maybe I make a thousand a day [US$15]. I put 600 in the generator and 200 for plastic bags. You want the other two hundred?! Take it!"

That's about three bucks. Who steals three dollars from orphans?

It's tempting to say, That's Africa. It's tempting to think Liberia's sliding backward. At least that this generation is seriously messed up. But I think it's (sadly) a little more universal than that -- that the most vulnerable people are robbed or abused or forgotten on a daily basis, no matter the country.

The important thing is, everyone's okay, no one got hurt. And I hope that word goes around the criminal community that--surprise!--orphanages aren't a good take.

Birches

2009-04-21T15:35:00.004-07:00

(Just found this new-to-me poem, "Birches", in a book of Robert Frost borrowed from a friend. Beautiful. Enjoy.)

When I see birches bend to left and right
Across the lines of straighter darker trees,
I like to think some boy's been swinging them.
But swinging doesn't bend them down to stay.
Ice-storms do that. Often you must have seen them
Loaded with ice a sunny winter morning
After a rain. They click upon themselves
As the breeze rises, and turn many-colored
As the stir cracks and crazes their enamel.
Soon the sun's warmth makes them shed crystal shells
Shattering and avalanching on the snow-crust--
Such heaps of broken glass to sweep away
You'd think the inner dome of heaven had fallen.
They are dragged to the withered bracken by the load,
And they seem not to break; though once they are bowed
So low for long, they never right themselves:
You may see their trunks arching in the woods
Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground
Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair
Before them over their heads to dry in the sun.
But I was going to say when Truth broke in
With all her matter-of-fact about the ice-storm
(Now am I free to be poetical?)
I should prefer to have some boy bend them
As he went out and in to fetch the cows--
Some boy too far from town to learn baseball,
Whose only play was what he found himself,
Summer or winter, and could play alone.
One by one he subdued his father's trees
By riding them down over and over again
Until he took the stiffness out of them,
And not one but hung limp, not one was left
For him to conquer. He learned all there was
To learn about not launching out too soon
And so not carrying the tree away
Clear to the ground. He always kept his poise
To the top branches, climbing carefully
With the same pains you use to fill a cup
Up to the brim, and even above the brim.
Then he flung outward, feet first, with a swish,
Kicking his way down through the air to the ground.
So was I once myself a swinger of birches.
And so I dream of going back to be.
It's when I'm weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig's having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate willfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

Liberian Dictionary, Vol. 2

2009-04-13T15:29:00.003-07:00

Alright, you've had plenty of time to practice the day-to-day basics of Liberian English. Time to graduate on to useful phrases. (And by all means, if you have any requests, email me and I'll come up with the Liberianism...)

To start with, here are some easy, common ones:

"Monkey jam, eat pepper." (You gotta do what you gotta do.)

"Through crab, crayfish drink water." (Corruption Friendship

has got to filter down and spread around.)

"Your delay is not your denial!" (There's always tomorrow.)

"When elephants fight, it's the grass suffers that suffers."

Then there are the catchy but not-so-useful taxi bumper slogans...

"Poor no friend", "Simple mistake, you out!", and "Take time with my living".

Serious bonus points for the person who can tell me what "7-11 Chicken Egg" means. That was a mystery for a lonnnng time...

Next week: text messaging!

Happy Easter!

2009-04-12T15:49:00.002-07:00

Woke up this morning to a fiery red sun dancing in the palm tree and barbed wire outside my window. Not so strange--my morning routine of coffee at dawn with Bible and journal is perhaps my most treasured possession!--but there was no snooze button this morning. I jumped out of bed, leapt at the thought of what today stands for--this whole day, I've been dancing within and without, celebrating with wild variety the empty tomb. Going to have to be point form, because it was THAT GOOD!

A traditional service complete with hymns and white gloves -- but still African at FOUR HOURS LONG!
An enormous meal of down-home cookin': Mariel's roast chicken, rolls and stuffing by Ashley, roast potatoes by yours truly, Christy's pineapple casserole (!), with a death-by-chocolate fudge cake and ice cream to top it all off! (Who says you need tryptophan to enter an Easter coma?!)
My inaugural round of Catch Phrase -- stressful!
A long evening splash in C's pool, complete with watching that fiery red sun set through palm trees, just like it came up.
A hot shower. (If you don't know, this is a bi-monthly extravagance at best -- HEAVEN!)

And so I hope you've had a wonderful Easter as well, full of family and food and good times. I hope Spring is brightening around you, wherever you are. Life is indeed rich.

Camping in the rainforest

2009-04-10T10:31:00.004-07:00

Last weekend I and a few friends had the great privilege of camping and hiking in the second-largest patch of primary rainforest in West Africa. Our guides were wonderful, and taught us to call antelope, follow elephants, track and ambush poachers, and of course the finer points of machete slashing.

It was absolutely stunning, even the 11-hour drive each way. See the rest of the photos here. Happy Easter!

[Ed. 4/11: For the narrative account including coordinates, see John's blog post.]

Best fridge magnet in a while

2009-03-29T15:34:00.001-07:00

I beg you...

Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart
and try to love the questions themselves...
Don't search for the answers,
which could not be given to you now,
because you would not be able to live them.
And the point is, to live everything.
Live the questions now.
Perhaps then, someday far in the future,
you will gradually, without even noticing it,
live your way into the answer.

-Rainer Maria Rilke

Juicing my creativity

2009-03-13T12:14:00.003-07:00

Good news! ORR was given some money specifically for a website overhaul, so when I have a free few hours here or there I'm hard at work on concepts and priorities. I'm dreaming big, then if we need to rein it in, we can later.

SO if you have favourite websites -- and I'm more interested in sites that work well, flow well, and maybe create community, rather than just look cool -- please pass them along. If you have ideas big or small, hand those over too. Need all the help I can get! :)

Another candle on the cake

2009-03-07T01:31:00.002-08:00

Yes indeed, I can't believe another year has flown by already. And what a year. Thinking back to my last birthday, where I was and where (I thought) I was going, I can't believe all that's changed.

As well as my third Facebook birthday, this is also my third ORR birthday. It's hilarious now to think back to '07, celebrating with a bunch of strangers who would become my family and closest friends. (I'm talking about ORR now, not Facebook!) To think of everything we've gone through together -- those first four months of camping in this house, no beds or table or vehicle -- is, well, heartwarming. Even now, with three newer members, the family is even tighter.

More and more I feel at home: every day this life becomes less a sacrifice, more a blessing. Things that used to drain me now fuel me; annoyances have become delights; all around me are faces I know -- more in this city of over a million than the last time I went 'home' to Huntsville! My Liberian english is no longer just impersonation and imitation, but rooted now in real understanding.

Don't worry, I'm not here for good. But for now, this is perfect. Despite how much I miss so many, I'm dumbstruck most days as I open my journal under the mango tree; so grateful for so rich a life as this.

Thanks for your wonderful birthday wishes and your enduring support and encouragement--I couldn't do this without you all.

La nina

2009-02-12T14:13:00.003-08:00

(That's short for 'the nina'...)

I've kept in touch with Gifty's family in Minnesota, and just wanted to let you all know she's doing really well, getting downright chubby and apparently giggling non-stop -- something she only just figured out how to do in the last week she was here!

Her doctors say she's ready for her new liver now, and they'd like to use a small portion from a live donor. I don't know how it all works exactly, but apparently a liver can regenerate. SO, if you're type O and want more information, I'm sure the family would love to hear from you. If I knew my blood type and could afford the plane ticket, I'd give a whole kidney to see her again...

Why is this an interesting photo?

2009-02-12T13:49:00.005-08:00

This was taken by my friend Christy between anxiety attacks. I'm driving the blue pickup you see, and I'm towing my friend John's 4Runner. Since we were towing it for, oh, about three and a half hours, I had some time to do a little math.

40 mph = ~65km/h

x 1000 = 65000m/h

/ 3600 = ~18 m/s

Wow, seriously? I guess that's about right. But then our tow rope (after a hasty start and its subsequent SNAP) was only 6 feet. That's, what, 2 metres? Hmph. 18 m/s with a 2 m rope....

I guess I can't blame Christy for switching to the back seat after all...

Cold snap!

2009-01-27T08:39:00.002-08:00

I counted at least five layers on Emmanuel last night as I locked the door. Two long-sleeved shirts, a hoodie, a sweater, a jacket... Even a big woolly hat!

"Emmanuel, when I show my people yo' photo, they gonna think it's so cold!"

"(Laughs) The cold too much..."

"But then when I tell them the temperature, they gonna think it's too hot!"

"No, the cold too much in the country. Alright for white man, not alright for black man!"

Yeah, it got down to about 73 degrees by 5am last night. That's less than 23 Celsius! Time to layer up, folks!

:*)

An interesting take on things

2009-01-05T15:57:00.000-08:00

December 27, 2008

As an atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God
Missionaries, not aid money, are the solution to Africa's biggest problem - the crushing passivity of the people's mindset

Matthew Parris
The TIMES (UK)

Before Christmas I returned, after 45 years, to the country that as a boy I knew as Nyasaland. Today it's Malawi, and The Times Christmas Appeal includes a small British charity working there. Pump Aid helps rural communities to install a simple pump, letting people keep their village wells sealed and clean. I went to see this work.

It inspired me, renewing my flagging faith in development charities. But travelling in Malawi refreshed another belief, too: one I've been trying to banish all my life, but an observation I've been unable to avoid since my African childhood. It confounds my ideological beliefs, stubbornly refuses to fit my world view, and has embarrassed my growing belief that there is no God.

Now a confirmed atheist, I've become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa: sharply distinct from the work of secular NGOs, government projects and international aid efforts. These alone will not do. Education and training alone will not do. In Africa Christianity changes people's hearts. It brings a spiritual transformation. The rebirth is real. The change is good.

I used to avoid this truth by applauding - as you can - the practical work of mission churches in Africa. It's a pity, I would say, that salvation is part of the package, but Christians black and white, working in Africa, do heal the sick, do teach people to read and write; and only the severest kind of secularist could see a mission hospital or school and say the world would be better without it. I would allow that if faith was needed to motivate missionaries to help, then, fine: but what counted was the help, not the faith.

But this doesn't fit the facts. Faith does more than support the missionary; it is also transferred to his flock. This is the effect that matters so immensely, and which I cannot help observing.
First, then, the observation. We had friends who were missionaries, and as a child I stayed often with them; I also stayed, alone with my little brother, in a traditional rural African village. In the city we had working for us Africans who had converted and were strong believers. The Christians were always different. Far from having cowed or confined its converts, their faith appeared to have liberated and relaxed them. There was a liveliness, a curiosity, an engagement with the world - a directness in their dealings with others - that seemed to be missing in traditional African life. They stood tall.

At 24, travelling by land across the continent reinforced this impression. From Algiers to Niger, Nigeria, Cameroon and the Central African Republic, then right through the Congo to Rwanda, Tanzania and Kenya, four student friends and I drove our old Land Rover to Nairobi.
We slept under the stars, so it was important as we reached the more populated and lawless parts of the sub-Sahara that every day we find somewhere safe by nightfall. Often near a mission.

Whenever we entered a territory worked by missionaries, we had to acknowledge that something changed in the faces of the people we passed and spoke to: something in their eyes, the way they approached you direct, man-to-man, without looking down or away. They had not become more deferential towards strangers - in some ways less so - but more open.
This time in Malawi it was the same. I met no missionaries. You do not encounter missionaries in
the lobbies of expensive hotels discussing development strategy documents, as you do with the big NGOs. But instead I noticed that a handful of the most impressive African members of the Pump Aid team (largely from Zimbabwe) were, privately, strong Christians. “Privately” because the charity is entirely secular and I never heard any of its team so much as mention religion while working in the villages. But I picked up the Christian references in our conversations. One, I saw, was studying a devotional textbook in the car. One, on Sunday, went off to church at dawn for a two-hour service.

It would suit me to believe that their honesty, diligence and optimism in their work was unconnected with personal faith. Their work was secular, but surely affected by what they were. What they were was, in turn, influenced by a conception of man's place in the Universe that Christianity had taught.

There's long been a fashion among Western academic sociologists for placing tribal value systems within a ring fence, beyond critiques founded in our own culture: “theirs” and therefore best for “them”; authentic and of intrinsically equal worth to ours.

I don't follow this. I observe that tribal belief is no more peaceable than ours; and that it suppresses individuality. People think collectively; first in terms of the community, extended family and tribe. This rural-traditional mindset feeds into the “big man” and gangster politics of the African city: the exaggerated respect for a swaggering leader, and the (literal) inability to understand the whole idea of loyal opposition.

Anxiety - fear of evil spirits, of ancestors, of nature and the wild, of a tribal hierarchy, of quite everyday things - strikes deep into the whole structure of rural African thought. Every man has his place and, call it fear or respect, a great weight grinds down the individual spirit, stunting curiosity. People won't take the initiative, won't take things into their own hands or on their own shoulders.

How can I, as someone with a foot in both camps, explain? When the philosophical tourist moves from one world view to another he finds - at the very moment of passing into the new - that he loses the language to describe the landscape to the old. But let me try an example: the answer given by Sir Edmund Hillary to the question: Why climb the mountain? “Because it's there,” he said.

To the rural African mind, this is an explanation of why one would not climb the mountain. It's... well, there. Just there. Why interfere? Nothing to be done about it, or with it. Hillary's further explanation - that nobody else had climbed it - would stand as a second reason for passivity.
Christianity, post-Reformation and post-Luther, with its teaching of a direct, personal, two-way link between the individual and God, unmediated by the collective, and unsubordinate to any other human being, smashes straight through the philosphical/spiritual framework I've just described. It offers something to hold on to to those anxious to cast off a crushing tribal groupthink. That is why and how it liberates.

Those who want Africa to walk tall amid 21st-century global competition must not kid themselves that providing the material means or even the knowhow that accompanies what we call development will make the change. A whole belief system must first be supplanted.
And I'm afraid it has to be supplanted by another. Removing Christian evangelism from the African equation may leave the continent at the mercy of a malign fusion of Nike, the witch doctor, the mobile phone and the machete.

Tripledogdare

2009-01-04T15:43:00.004-08:00

I DARE YOU to try and not smile, looking at these! (You'll be happy to hear that she's doing well, at home now with her whole family until the hospital's ready for her.)

Vacation!

2009-01-04T15:23:00.002-08:00

It's tough, taking vacation, when you don't feel as though you're really worn out. That's why we have friends who force them upon us, because they know better than we do how much we actually DO need them....

So I've been trying to, err, vacate this past week. The whole team and I returned to Robertsport for three days of serious lounging, surfing, etc. Robertsport is a gorgeous little town at the far northern end of Liberia, far removed from the commotion and general nastiness of the big city. It was once beautiful, as you can tell from the hollow shells of once-ritzy hotels and even the shape of the streets. But development is only now beginning to reach there as infrastructure allows tourism again.

We ended up crashing a wedding on new year's eve -- one of the most beautiful I've ever seen, pure elegance on the beach at sunset. It was a South African and a Norwegian getting married, so the crowd was quite a mix and the music was 85% ABBA... I ate like a king, enjoyeda glass of champagne for the first time in aaaages, learned that dancing on sand is incredibly hard work, swam in the phosphorescent sea under brilliant stars, and finally turned in the following year at midnight......Eastern Standard Time.

The whole day I was simply mind-blown. The surfing, the company, the glow-in-the-dark ocean, everything. I couldn't catch my breath all day for the beauty. It's something I'd recently realized I was missing: since leaving Canada, I hadn't really been struck by beauty, and it's always been natural beauty that's made me feel closest to God. Liberia truly is a gorgeous country, and I am SO incredibly lucky to be here, doing this. It's humbling, and it's more than I ever asked for!

I hope, wherever you are, you too had a spectacular new year. And I hope that 2009 will be better than you expect -- better even than you know how to ask for.

Christmas in Liberia

2008-12-24T08:37:00.002-08:00

In case you missed it elsewhere, here's a look at Christmas for the kids in Liberia. Hope you enjoy Christmas and cherish the food and fun with family and friends. God bless.

2008-12-17T14:06:00.003-08:00

I'm now editing for the third time an entry that just doesn't seem to want to come. I wonder what to write about and then, hours later (usually as I'm just about to fall asleep, but invariably when I'm out of reach of my computer), I'll think of a dozen things, each of which worthy of its own post.

- There's the obvious Christmas greeting, almost but not quite as overdue as last year's Dec. 29 email.

- There's the Christmas play I'm directing at a church here in town. (How I got into that, I have no idea; I could write an essay just figuring that little mystery...)

- There's the litany of AWESOME skin maladies that have come my way recently: ringworm on my foot, then two separate acid bug burns! (Very cool to watch how they start out like just a little red spot and then boil over then turn grey then get itchy. Completely backwards. But so engrossing, having a little Discovery Channel action right on my own skin...!)

But I think a better blog entry would have to be in regards to this book I'm reading, and the uncoincidences alongside it. The book is The Myth of Certainty, and it's all about navigating the narrow middle ground between the smugness of close-minded secular humanism and the smugness of close-minded, know-it-all, religious Christianity. The author does a fantastic job of striking a balance (offending both sides in equal measure), writing to a minority he calls 'reflective Christians'. These are people unafraid on answerless questions, insatiable minds with the humility to admit they don't know but the rigor to always demand More.

In the midst of reading my own testimony in its pages, I've been meeting new friends and having new conversations with old friends seeking earnestly for More, yet unable to stomach the religiosity and/or hypocrisy of church.

To be perfectly honest, it's hard to know what to say. Most of the time, I have no stinking clue, and that's the best answer I can give. (That's the answer I wish I'd gotten, countless times!) On the one hand, I desperately want you to get a little closer to God--more than anything!--to drink from the same Source of strength and comfort and direction that He's poured out to me. But on the other hand, all I can do is share my story: that my life has been saved, in ways I can't begin to express. I've never seen the map, and the only part of the road I know is that which I've already walked.

I want a culture of difficult questions. I want a culture that's more concerned with asking than with answering. I want to draw nearer to God -- and honour Him! -- by chewing things too big for me. I don't want anything else in life besides More. Of God. After a 25-year search, More is the only thing worth my time.

My hope is that you'll ask with me, search with me. My hope is that you'll delve only into worthy things, whether or not you agree with me. My hope is that we'll all be brave enough to agree humbly and disagree well.

Gifty is on the plane!

2008-12-10T13:29:00.003-08:00

Is it possible? What seemed like an impossibility two months ago, two weeks ago, even two days ago -- it's happened! The first leg of the race is over for my little girl--she's got a family and she's on her way home.

Deb and I were talking on the way home from the airport tonight what a blessing it was that she's been healthy the past two weeks--for months we couldn't keep her fevers away for more than a couple of days, and her doctors were talking about running out of options for her (she was taking the strong antibiotics they had!). But ever since her mom arrived she was great, eating and interacting like crazy. I couldn't believe it, playing with her today, how far she'd come since I met her on September 23rd. The girl I held then was an absolute wreck. The girl I kissed goodbye today was radiant, a spoiled little queen.

It's been a joy to get to know her these past few healthy weeks. To feed her her first french fry, to introduce her to her reflection, to learn what her different cries mean (and how sincere they are). To hear her first attempts at talking. Tomorrow, after thirty hours of traveling, she'll discover the land of the free: Dad, Grandma, siblings. Snow. Clean hospitals. A new liver, even.

This journey has been incredible. To face these immovable mountains day after day, bureaucratic or medical or logistical, to battle with despair, and then to see them jump out of the way -- it's been nothing short of breathtaking. I always hoped I'd see a miracle, something I could look back on and say, Yes: I watched God intervene.

I can say that now.

Thank you all for praying for Gifty so faithfully. Your support has meant so much to her, me, my team. Please keep her in your prayers, as she has a long, long way to go yet.

Need your help

2008-12-06T07:12:00.002-08:00

After five very eventful days helping Gifty's new mom work her way through the Liberian court system and back and forth across town a zillion times, we finally made some progress: in the Republic of Liberia, my little girl now has a mom, dad, two brothers and one sister.

That's wonderful and a miracle in itself, but there's still the U.S. side of things. Gifty has changed her ticket to Wednesday, and we're hoping and praying that by then, with a lot of hard work, we can either find her aunt or another relative that can help us straighten out the facts and satisfy the Embassy that she is in fact abandoned. We're putting the word out here, and I would ask you to please pray with me that my little girl gets to go home -- to a real hospital, where they can give her a new liver and life -- on Wednesday.

For now, Gifty's health is the best it's been in a long time, and she's been able to live with Mom at our friends' place, so we're grateful for that and for finishing with African bureaucracy...almost! Much love. More soon.

The big week

2008-11-30T13:33:00.002-08:00

It's crazy how fast these last few months have flown by. I met Gifty on September 23rd, and last Friday night, the 28th of November, her new mom arrived on a plane. Hopefully on Friday, after a week of final medical checks and legal hurdles, they'll board another plane together and fly back to the States. There are still a lot of doors that need to swing open for my little fighter, so please continue praying with me that everything will go well...

Spoiled

2008-11-26T15:22:00.002-08:00

It's been hectic around here. For weeks. Unrelenting. But it's had me digging deeper, for which I'm grateful. I've had to push myself, I've had to ask more difficult questions, I've had to admit failures. It's been wonderful.

I'm grateful for so much, this year. For early Christmas presents, yes. For a visit with my old friend from high school. For the chance to wear many hats in a 'typical day' (haha). For the sweet knowledge that my life is in hand, wherever it takes me and for however long. For the African dawn bursting through palm leaves and barbed wire, warming me each morning along with thick, dark coffee. For the innumerable people who've made this bizarre place home, full of love.

I just feel spoiled.

Over and over again as I open my journal to decompress, I just resort to that same word: spoiled. God's given me more than I knew how to ask for.

Happy Thanksgiving.

My little ham

2008-11-11T09:19:00.000-08:00

Re-thinking the Figured Out

2008-11-07T15:55:00.003-08:00

I'm reporting from Ganta, a small city five hours' drive (or, more accurately, slalom) from Monrovia. Today and yesterday we've been assessing orphanages up here, introducing ourselves to the people and the problems they're facing.

We stayed the night at the Methodist compound, at a guesthouse tucked behind a beautiful, sleepy old stone church. Instantly you turn into the driveway, you feel the age of this place: the ancient palm trees in neat rows, the wide lawns, the sense of calm that comes of order not imposed but grown.

I woke up this morning feeling like I was back at camp, where I grew up: the stillness, the smell, thin pillows' happy ache. Only the dew was missing--despite the lovely chill that makes you want to journal in a big hoodie, it's never quite cold enough to produce dew.

I am truly blessed, and rarely have I been more keenly aware of it. Perhaps strangely to you, it's not working with destitution that reminds me of this--not nearly so much as the simpler things of the day, especially the sprawling quiet of an African dawn. The richness of experience even in routine--as long as I can keep my eyes open and my skin porous.

Because I'm with a short-term team from the States, I also have the benefit of seeing with fresh eyes things that have become normal for me. Last night after dinner we pushed our chairs back and got into hours of excellent dialogue about what we'd seen, about Liberia's outlook and the challenge of addressing not only the immediate physical needs of children, but the needs of the whole child. More and more it's not the poverty that breaks my heart -- mostly because 95% of people here are facing those biggest and most basic struggles -- but it's the de-individualization of children living in institutions; it's the lack of love and attention they receive; it's the lack of imagination and dreaming I see in them that hurts the most. And these things are infinitely more difficult to address than hunger, disease, education...

After you give a fish, teach fishing. Relief gives way to development. But after you hold a child, how do you leave him with love? How do we cultivate environments of love and holistic growth, throughout and after the emergencies? How do we encourage a mother of eighty children to raise up eighty individuals as she would in a family of five?

The Other Way

2008-11-01T02:29:00.005-07:00

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,

Because it was grassy and wanted wear;

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I kept the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way,

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.
--"The Road Not Taken" by Robert Frost, 1916

I often wonder about the other way, no more or less but altogether Other. We by nature long, I think, for that which we don't have--especially that, surely, which we've forfeit. I'm well aware and blisteringly grateful for what's in my hands, overflowing, and for the way I've chosen. (Well aware, that is, when grounded!) And I wonder too if the choice is permanent. I don't think it is, I think I could travel by that Other road, "Yet knowing how way leads on to way, / I doubt... if I should ever..."

I'm fascinated these days with images of walking through life and the choices in frame of mind that make the difference between hiking and trudging, strolling and marching the days. I've found, as I'm sure have you, the only real companionship on the road, on the highways and byways, is God. This stage of life, I'm hiking for the edge of loneliness: a purposeful, shall we say energetic stride, but trying not to stare too hard at my feet; trying to enjoy the journey as if, as in cliché, the journey itself were the first destination.

War

2008-10-30T04:43:00.003-07:00

Whenever I travel back to Canada and the States, a lot of folks inevitably ask, "Is it...safe?" (To which I laughingly reply, "Yes -- safer than here, at least!") But the other day I was wondering about how war ever began in this country of peaceable, smiling people. Who it is that begins a war, and what are the early days of a conflict like? The scars of war are everywhere here, still. Every single lamp post is riddled with holes, most buildings have shell holes painted over. Even our house has a couple of bullet holes, but it seems far away, long forgotten. We speak of the "three world wars" making up Liberia's 14-year conflict with a kind of textbook-like objectivity.

This morning, however, there was a rumour of war on the other side of the city. There have been no rumours before today, no sense of discontent, no announcements of groups forming against the government. So where on earth does a rumour like this come from? The biggest disturbance this country has seen in two years has been a labour dispute at the UN. Who would start a war here? The powerful elect, that's who: those making six figures but not seven in a country where teachers and civil servants make $50 per month.

Of course this morning's panic was just a mix-up -- the Drug Enforcement Agency destroying confiscated dope apparently sounded like gunfire -- but it so quickly becomes "War!" as word-of-mouth quickly exaggerates. My heart sinks a little to see my Liberian friends revert. The old fear -- and curiosity -- return quickly, the dual instinct to run away and toward. Common sense is the first casualty of any conflict, I imagine, as it becomes every man for himself.

I pray that the majority prevails in Liberia, that a handful of the arrogant rich don't ever again stir to conflict the good and simple common man. To me this is the most urgent reason to close the poverty gap, not between Africa and the West, but within African nations as they develop.

Liberian Dictionary, Vol. I

2008-10-25T02:50:00.004-07:00

Liberian English (pronounced "englitch") is not nearly so complex as some would have you believe. Over the next few weeks, I'll be your humble tour guide as we navigate Liberianese together. Just follow along with me, speaking the words out loud in your cubicles and dropping the phrases into conversations at the water cooler.

Words are translated into American in quotes, with phonetic pronunciations in italics.

Introductions and Polite Conversation

How are you doing? - "How the day?" (howda deh) - also "How's your body?" (howde bodeh). A casual greeting appropriate for strangers or family any time of day. Good responses include "Fine" (Fii) meaning great, "Not bad" (Noh bah) meaning pretty good, "I'm trying" (Ah tra-eeh) for not-so-great, or simply "Yeah" (yahhh) meaning I don't really know you but thanks for saying hi. For intermediate students, these three replies should end in '-O', for example "noh bah-O!" or "ah tra-eeh-O!". Other answers for the advanced student include "I thank God" (tank goh), or "I tell God 'thank you' for life" (Ah te goh tankyoo fo lii).
I'll be right back. (or, Wait just a second)- "I'm coming" (Ah comii). While it would seem to mean the opposite, this is a polite way to excuse oneself in leaving, or to ask for your listener's patience while you get to your point the long way 'round. For the intermediate and advanced speaker, you should end with the rhetorical "yeah?" (Ah comiiYEEA?). This common suffix will be picked up later on in many other phrases as well.

Breaking. Properly.

2008-10-24T06:54:00.002-07:00

We're always talking in soft tones about being broken, living a broken life. Heady stuff. That's another post altogether: this one's about surfing. Most of you don't care about surfing, I realize -- probably the only of you who do care were with me this morning...but nonetheless:

I woke up at 4:45 this morning -- and before I go any further, can anyone tell me why, no matter what hour I set it for, I invariably wake up fifteen minutes before my alarm goes off?? And for a bonus point why, if ever I choose to rely on my internal clock, I sleep till ten?? So anyway, I get up early (I love making coffee while it's still dark out -- reminds me of snowplowing in Canada), and a few of us drive downtown to Poopie Point. I've put off going for...well, over a year. First because of the stories of stepping over "inuukshuks" and then paddling past, um, floaters. Then I missed a bunch of opportunities simply because I was lazy--and hey, it's five in the morning, can you blame me?

But MAN, today was perfect. Today's going to make going back to the old beach breaks really awful. I rode only a few -- I should've gotten into way more -- but to ride so LONG. Ah. To finally know what it's supposed to feel like. Brilliant. And then to stay in for so long! Normally I get tired or bored or sore after 45 minutes on a beach break. We were in the water for three hours this morning. It was ridiculous.

The moral of the story? Well, I never thought surfing was worth navigating a Poopy Beach (that's actually what it's called); I never thought surfing was worth getting up at five a.m. to risk a secod bout with e.Coli ....but I'd never ridden a proper break, either. :)

re-embarking

2008-10-21T13:41:00.002-07:00

the days are getting so much better.

each time i make that choice

to laugh, not shout,

to breathe, not bite,

to rearrange perspective,

life gets quantifiably better.

each time i choose my mood.

each time i remember to pray.

each time gratitude shines on me

for where i get to be,

what i get to do,

who i get to walk with--

these are all unearned gifts.

and when loneliness comes,

when doubt comes sulking with it,

it's my choice again to trust.

it's my choice again to relax, engage, dig in

to this wild time, short or long.

and the days are getting so much better.

One step backward, two steps forward

2008-10-15T12:09:00.003-07:00

When you think of coming down with pneumonia, you probably don't think it a plus. At least I don't. But for Gifty, my little stinker, it might be. After a one-day discharge last week, she's back in the hospital with a little pneumonia and a nasty cough. Despite that, her insatiable appetite is loving the regular doses of vitamin-enriched milk and the attention of a great pediatrician. I think she's still posting gradual weight gains even with the setbacks. Piko, her darling caretaker, tells me that she's been lively and playful lately as well. All good signs.

I went to see her this morning, and was delighted when she refused to be held by anyone but me. (Sorry, Deb. Point: Tyler.)

On the adoption front, we're moving ahead with one of the several families that have offered to adopt Gifty. They're lovely people and have almost all of their paperwork up-to-date, meaning that as long as the embassy cooperates, Gifty should be home before Christmas. I hesitate to say that out loud, but that's my prayer...

simple vs. easy

2008-10-14T05:53:00.000-07:00

I'm a sucker for profundities, always have been. I like idiomatic truths; I love it when people can sum up big things in simple language. About a month ago a teacher of mine revealed that simple does not equal easy -- that the big ideas are simple yet difficult. Isn't that true: our most sublime truths can be understood in a moment yet take a lifetime of study to grasp.

I've just started reading Donald Miller's follow-up to Blue Like Jazz, a much meatier but just as entertaining little collection called Searching for God Knows What. Sitting out on the porch this morning, the dawn full in my face, I couldn't help but quote whole sections of it into my journal. Great, sweet truthy bits like this one I just have to share. He's talking about how Biblical authors spontaneously break into poetry when the ideas get too big to be related by literal language. How we betray moments of truth, of love, of surpassing beauty by stabbing at them with our wimpy formulas and steps and bullet points:

If you ask me, the separation of truth from meaning is a dangerous game. I don't think memorizing ideas helps anybody understand the meaning inferred in the expression of those ideas. .... I wondered if when we take Christian theology out of the context of its narrative, when we ignore the poetry in which it is presented, when we turn it into formulas to help us achieve the American dream, we lose its meaning entirely, and the ideas become fodder for the head but have no impact on the way we live our lives or think about God. This is, perhaps, why people are so hostile toward religion. (57-59)

The poetry isn't just the vehicle but is intrinsic to the meaning. I love it, and I dare you to disagree: Do you remember the story, or do you remember your Grandpa's voice and smell and the twinkle in his eye as he told it? Which was the more important?

The fundamental truths are simple. Really, really simple. But they're also extraordinarily difficult, and please don't try and make them simple. I plan on working them out for the rest of my life.

Rubber Ducky, you're the one...

2008-10-11T07:40:00.000-07:00

Jen: "I'm at the junction. I just got in an accident -- the brakes went out completely!"
Me: "Everybody ok?"
Jen: "Yeah, I just had to give the bus driver $25 to fix his bumper. I was going really slowly."
Me: "Ok, I'll be right there."
Jen: "Actually you can't... The whole road is closed for a soccer game."
Me: "Cramer, can you take me down to the junction on Matt's bike?"
Cramer: "Can I shower first?"
Me: "No...Jen just got in an accident."
...
Jen: "The policeman's still got my license."
Me: "Yeah ello, Sa."
Cop: "Yeah ello. Everyting fine, I took good care."
Me: "Yeah, thank you for taking care of ma people. The man gone?"
Cop: "The man gone, everyting fine. Only the police left now."
Me: "Ah, I see. So how the day? Big game, uh?"
Cop: "Yeah, Liberia versus Tunisia. So how best can we do?"
Me: "You have her license?"
Cop: "I got it right here."
Me: "Can I have it?"
Cop: "Yeah, here it is. So how best can we do something here?"
Me: "Let me ask you, the Liberian license, is there still some delay? Because the police can hammock me for no license, but I hear you can't even get one..."
Cop: "Big delay. American license is fine, fine. No problem."
Me: "Aha, good to know. Well, thank you sa. I will see you again."
Cop: "Ok, any time. I'm on the ground."
...
Jen: "How much did you give him?"
Me: "Nothing."

Just another day of T.I.A. moments -- dancing instead of bribing, thanking God that no one gets hurt when the brakes go out. Always fixing something... :D

Oh the irony...

2008-10-03T00:47:00.000-07:00

...of a nasty head cold in the heat of Liberia. How this is even possible when I'm sweating 22 hours out of every day, I'll never know. But this morning I'm almost through it...

Debbie's arriving today, the final piece in our amazing team. Looking forward to having her here with us, not only because she's hilarious but because we've been running into many medical questions lately and we need our expert nurse on the ground.

Newsletter's almost done. Photos to come, I promise. Sorry I've been so bad at posting pictures this time around. I'll make it up to all y'all, just you wait...

Open doors

2008-10-01T12:42:00.002-07:00

This time last year, I only knew a couple of families who'd adopted kids from overseas. Adoption was a strange word and a foreign concept that happens 'out there'. Now it seems I keep in more constant contact with friends I've never met, adoptive families from all over the place. How this came about I have no idea, but this past week I've seen amazing fruit come of these distanced friendships.

Since meeting my little friend Gifty, I've had to wrestle through a lot of things I'd never dealt with before. For one, she's made me more paternal than I've ever felt, even when my nieces were tiny. And just as I was starting to feel really uncomfortably fatherly with this little tiny fragile ball of awesome in my arms, the doctor (a very sweet Spanish paediatrician named Elena) told me she's not going to make it. She needs a new liver, and that "just doesn't happen here."
I can tell you that any reservations I had about adoption as a partial solution to the global orphan crisis were summarily squished in that moment. I wanted her to be adopted almost as much as I wanted to adopt her myself.
While I never would have thought it possible, especially given Liberia's moratorium on adoptions, doors have been opening at every turn for little Gifty: a wonderful family has come forward that wants to give her a loving new home in the U.S., the Liberian government has said they'll do everything they can to speed her way, and with a few more doors opened (mostly at the U.S. embassy), she could be Home in time for Christmas. Then, of course, it's onto the transplant list and even if she makes a full recovery she's got a long road ahead.

For now, my hope for her has found friends in circumstances, coincidences, minor miracles. For now, she's getting a little bit fatter, a little bit feistier each day. For now, my hard little heart is a little softer for witnessing all this.

Ok, enough...

2008-09-30T11:57:00.000-07:00

One thing I've learned about Liberia that you won't find in any book or atlas: everything happens on the 15th of the month. Ask a group of folks when rainy season begins, for instance, and they'll have a heated argument about whether it's May 15th or June 15th. It might even come to blows--watch out.
Well today I was told that no, it's not September 15th but October 15th that rainy season ends. I thought it was safe to come back. I was wrong, apparently: this morning the rain started at 7 and by 9 there was over two inches flooding the entire yard... Doesn't help the motivational level, let me tell you...

Gifty

2008-09-27T10:08:00.001-07:00

This is Gifty, my little prize fighter, with Piko as we transfered her from one hospital to another (also run by the excellent staff of MSF) closer to us. Since beginning treatment, her eyes have whitened considerably and her abdomen has shrunk, but she's still just over 11 lbs. at 14 months. The diagnosis is that her liver isn't working, a condition from birth that, at this point, would require a transplant to fix.
I've been spending a lot of time with Gifty this week, arranging caretakers, talking to MDs and PAs, and best of all just pacing the halls with her in my arms. I've never known a baby with such spirit before, which makes her prognosis all the harder to take. It's been a real joy to intercede for her and advocate for her, as the closest thing she has to a parent.
Please be praying with me for Gifty: for continued improvement of her immediate condition; for relocation upon discharge to a better home; and for wisdom in seeking a long-term answer for her condition.

From old to new

2008-09-27T09:49:00.000-07:00

So it's time for a change, I reckon. The old blog has served me well but, as I'm more and more involved in the craziness of keeping up with all of you, a Blogger blog seems just so much easier. Plus, it allows me to get a little more creative.

I've tried importing the entries from my other, but it doesn't seem to be working too well, so for now at least, you can visit the old site if for some reason you want to stalk me into the past.