What happens with friends? I have had a long and consistent history of falling out of friendships slowly and with no other cause than lack of communication. The annoying part is that there is no moment of turning around and realizing that I have not spoken to someone in years; I know it is happening the entire time. But I give the time it takes ( Read more... )

Missions are a strange topic for a lot of people. People who are not naturally affected by bouts of empathy look strangely upon the idea that our entire life could change during a one-week trip to a country that most people cannot locate on a map. Something always struck me as odd when I heard testimonies from friends coming back from foreign ( Read more... )

For those who do not know yet, I am returning to Guatemala (which implies I have been there before). My flight leaves at 05:45 Monday morning. I get back on Tuesday, July 3rd and will likely be out of communication for the entire trip starting right about now.

( Full flight information )

( The other water balloon fight )

I found another Guatemala story to tell. Unfortunately, I find the subject irritating and may slam the poor guy more than he deserves ( Read more... )

Perhaps the attraction to places like Hermano Pedro is the sudden freedom to be what we have always known we should be. As a dear friend mentioned in an email, it is to "be free to love and serve without pressure or strain to be what and who I need to be... instead knowing that I am loved for whatever I can or can't give ( Read more... )

I have been trying this whole last week to think of another fun or interesting story from Guatemala but could only think of a few scattered nothings and a bunch of really not-so-fun stories. I also discovered that my mind naturally turns most stories into an analysis of life. Go figure ( Read more... )

Hermano Pedro ( Read more... )

I was once told that the current politically correct term is "developing country". What does this term describe? In my opinion, a developing country is any place that you have to know the particular quirks of the a) building's plumbing system, b) shower head and/or faucet, and c) timing of the water heating apparatus before you can reliably get a ( Read more... )

The picture post has been updated twice. I am fairly confident that those using an RSS reader will know this, but I do not know that Xanga's subscription thing pulls updates from old posts. I tried figuring that out once and gave up. I am also fairly confident that LJ does not put old updated old posts on the friend's page ( Read more... )