New Territory

Today I am Samwise Gamgee, pausing at the edge of the Shire.  With a sudden stop in his stride, and not a little anxious, he marks a line.

"This is it.  If I take one more step, I'll be farther away from home than I've ever been."  

Only for me, it's not one more step, but one more day.  Tomorrow I will pass the three week mark.  That's the longest I've ever been in Thailand before.

To be honest, I almost didn't notice.  This day has been just one in a string of increasingly pleasant days as the jet lag and preparation/travel fatigue have worn off and the temperatures have come down just a little.  One day among others that are settling into good rhythms of work and rest and play.  There's a normalization happening.   I'm finding my groove, and it's good.

Leave the guest house in the dark at 5:15 a.m. to head over for morning worship.  Spend the first 30 sleepy minutes of the day focused on the Someone who brought me here in the first place, in prayer and song, and in Suradet's morning encouragement to the children.  Breakfast is always a pleasant surprise.  Then some solid concentration time at the table with my computer and/or kindle reader soulishly engaged in the learnings I've come here to acquire, ponder.  Or preparing sermons for Sunday morning or the prison visit planned next week.

By 10 or 10:30 the heat has built up and it's time for a break anyways.  So I might head down to the dining shelter and bring markers and paper and initiate a creative frenzy of sorts....if the children are not at school.  Or just sit for a few moments in companionable silence with Pi Dao (cook and nanny),  Or or go for a walk with Yupa and sundry kids in tow, to the chicken house to see how the dog-wounded ones are faring, and maybe feed the fish in the pond.  After lunch I retreat to my room, read, usually nap in spite of myself, put final touches on tonight's English/Devotional lesson.  And then almost every other day, go for my 1 km swim.  Back in time for supper, then evening worship (where we've advanced to verb tenses!), and then back to the guest house to do some processing and writing until I just can't stay awake any longer.

Embedded in the day is this perpetual language learning that presses me mentally enough that the times alone in the guest house become as much about resting my brain as escaping from the heat.  And inherent in that language learning is the need and the joy of being fully present with whomever it is I'm talking to.  Focused attention, deeply engaged, fully present; there's a lot of that.

And it all feels more and more normal.

There's always a few odd and unexpected moments when I am reminded that I'm 'not in Kansas anymore'.  Like when there are live crabs in a bag on the kitchen counter.  Or when I come across a squirming mass of large, bright orange fire ants swarming over a dead scorpion.  Or when I'm the only 'farang' at the market and it's clear, from the not so discrete double-takes and the surprised comments directed towards Yupa, that this small village doesn't get a lot of tourists.  In those moments I remember that, actually, I'm not at home.

But most of the time, I feel at home.  With the advantage of this being my 15th time here, this life is feeling more and more 'normal'.

In an odd way, maybe it's this normalization that marks this never-before part of the adventure.  I'm not sure I've been here long enough to feel quite this acclimatized.

At least, that's how it feels this side of tomorrow.  Tomorrow is a new thing.  A never-before thing.  And there are some potentially disorienting events planned, not the least of which is an overnight stay at the village where Suradet's parents live.  I'm told it's an 8 hour gut-churning drive up the mountain to stay in a one room house with no running water and the need to sleep in a mosquito net.  I'm wondering how 'at home' and 'normal' I'll feel then.  

Frodo's response to his friend seems full of the foreshadowing great stories are famous for, and make me curious as to what these next weeks will reveal.

 

"Come on, Sam. Remember what Bilbo used to say: 

"It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. 

You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, 

there's no knowing where you might be swept off to."