Anna's honest blog...

Hi, this is Anna. I spent Tuesday morning staining wood for Mom, so in exchange, my kind teacher is allowing me to write a blog for this week's paper. (Score for homeschooling!)

We are finally done with painting and staining the kitchen cupboards! Nothing particularly interesting has been happening, so I am going to write about some things that we have been experiencing, like stress.

This past Sunday I was having personal time at the Fort and thinking about life, and how we have very little routine in our lives right now. Each stage of the house changes things, plus there were holidays, my college decision, teams, and now we will travel north for a medical team. We have a week, start to get a routine, and then poof, changed again. But missionaries are supposed to be flexible right? We should be used to it by now, so why are we all so on edge? And then I realized something. Even contortionists need bones to function. Without bones they would be writhing blobs rather people with a interesting/slightly creepy talent.

We had quite flexible routines before, but with the added discombobulation it is also hard to keep routines like daily alone time with God. I know, shocking, since we live on an isolated mountain top.

Let me explain. Lots of isolated spots exist with gorgeous views. But most of them require several minutes of hiking. That is not so bad, since we hike a lot. But during the day we all work, and usually by the time we finish school or work, it is time to prepare supper, and then it is dark. NOT good hiking conditions with the abundance of ankle twisting rocks lurking around, even during the day, let alone under the cover of dark. Plus, my parents don't exactly let this 16 year old go hiking alone at night.

Then there is house stress. When to put up the inner walls, will the house funds cover the cost, etc. In case y'all don't remember, my mom is a family practice doctor / home-school teacher and my dad is a fruit horticulturalist.

Neither of those jobs exactly prepare one for building a house... on the top of a mountain; while house-sitting for another missionary family... and living with three teachers. Though let me tell you house sitting was a life saver compared to the other options. I also happen to room with two of the teachers, and they are both great roommates. One is American and one is Haitian, so I am continually learning about both cultures.


But it still isn't quite the same as living in your own house. Oh, and I personally have the delightful stress called home-schooling. My days include school, cooking, and occasionally working at the house site. Now imagine if all your school stuff is either in a crate, or in a cubby under the random object you shoved in there earlier since you have roommates to consider. Oh, not to mention when you accidently leave one of your schedule books in the North and don't find it for a 1/3 of the school year (luckly it was the ONE schedule book I could manage without). Put these factors all together, and it becomes very easy to accidently forget about some aspect of school, until you are six weeks behind and suddenly realize why you had that nagging feeling you were missing something.

So yeah. We are all a little stressed out. Hopefully going North for the medical team and then staying at Fauche a few days will help reset us. Dad will get a chance visit his gardens, and I will certainly enjoy a week of not coming up with meals (and hopefully playing some volleyball).

So those are some of the stresses in our life. Speaking of meals... I need to go.