Thoughts

I've been thinking about the "power of positive thinking" lately. Some people are just so positive, it makes me sick. I'm super skeptical of them. I always assume they're charismatic and are just always "filled". Then that makes me wonder what I'm filled with. Then you have the negative people. After you've been around them, you want to  1. jump off a cliff, 2. kick a dog, or 3. write a country song. Why can't there be a happy medium? 


I come from a family who laughs...a lot. We laugh at anything. Even people getting hurt. We're kind of sadistic, I think. But it all stems back to growing up in PNG, I think. When we first got there, we were little and of course like all kids, we were always falling. It may have had to do with the big parachute skirts we wore. Or maybe we were off balance because of our big, beautiful bangs. Or more realistically, there was a lot of mud and we were always barefoot, so there isn't a lot of traction. I remember my sisters and I were with a group of our friends walking to our village and I tripped over something and went down hard. I remember looking up and seeing Tracy and Robin's concerned faces and then hearing the shrieks of laughter from everyone else. Then, Tracy and Robin laughing as well, and once the initial pain wore off, I started laughing. I guess that's what started it all off. From then on, we laughed. I think it's made life easier...but just because I  laugh a lot, doesn't make me a positive thinker.


Over the years though, it seems that the more I see, the more negative I have become. I don't see the good in everyone. I look at them and wonder what they're trying to get. "Why are you being so nice to me?" This time back in Tonga, I've noticed it about myself, and I've decided to try and look at the positive.  Here are a few people that have given me positive thoughts.


Pastor Tony- When we went to church, he took time to give the kids and I an overview of the sermon in English...so we weren't just sitting there with no idea of what he was saying. He took a good 10 minutes giving us our own personal sermon while the church waited patiently.


The bus driver- No idea what is his name was. Bridger and I were coming home on the bus from town. He knew that I lived in Tofoa, and even though it wasn't his route, he drove me home. Then had to turn his big bus around in a vacant, muddy lot and go back to his route.


Beulah- my neighbor. She heard that the kids were sick and she came bearing a platter of bananas, coconuts and papaya because she wanted to make sure they were eating something while they were sick.


Happy- that's the name of the woman who saw the kids and I walking 2 miles to church today and stopped and asked if we needed a ride. Even though she was on her way into town to get some food for her husband who was sick at home, she went out of her way to drop us off at church. (side note- David is sick now as well)


I know there are more, but these are the ones that have made an impression on me...so far. I'm sure that there are a lot more to come, as long as I keep wearing my hair in two braids and being nice to even the grumpiest of people...oh wait, that's Pollyanna.


Thanks for all the prayers for the girls. They are up and around and a few pounds lighter, unfortunately. David is down but not being quite as dramatic as Elizabeth was. Miracles do happen!

A Little...Different

Here in Tonga, lot's of things are different. Did you know that they drive on the left side of the road? Sometimes they drive in the middle of the road and sometimes, they drive on the right side. I guess it just depends on their moods...or if the person in front of them is driving too slow, even if there is another car coming, they'll still pass and take their blessed time getting back to the right side...whichever side that is. I'm still confused. When I walk to get our milk, I watch the road all the time. Even though I'm safely on the side walk (or am I?), I'm still watching at all times. Sometimes I see people come within a couple feet of each other...head on. It's almost like they're playing chicken. I involuntarily yell, and then look around to see who heard, and sometimes I let out a little scream because I think I'm witnessing a deadly accident....and then look around to see who heard. But, somehow, they miss each other and go on their merry ways.


Did you know that toilet water flushes counter clock wise here? If you come to visit, I'll show you.
(yes, yes, I'll make sure it's already been flushed)


Did you know that men and women sit on opposite sides of the church? Women on the right-men on the left. Yeah, I didn't know that one until we went to church last Sunday. We walked to a church that is right down the road from us. They were already singing, so we were in a hurry. For some reason David got caught up outside the building, so I walked in ahead of him with the kids. I looked around and noticed some empty seats up front on the left. So I headed there.  There were only 3 chairs to each row, so David came in and sat behind us with a couple of the kids. We settled ourselves down and I decided to venture a "glance" around the church. I looked over to the right and saw a lot of women over there. They were smiling at me with a humored look on their face. It still didn't hit me. I ventured another "peripheral glance" to see who was behind us. I saw a lot of men back there. THEN it hit me. I was on the wrong side. I caught David's eye and  mouthed, "all the women are on the other side!" He looked around, then smiled at me and shrugged his shoulders. I would  make a distraction grabbing all the girls and finding a seat on the right side. So I sat there. The whole service. I contaminated the left side.  I wonder if they brought in the scrub brushes after we left that night and scrubbed the "woman" germs away. I hope they did because I sweated....a lot. Not just from the heat this time.
 Today when we walked into church, I walked to the right side and David to the left....and Addie to the left too because she thinks that a tomboy and a boy are the same thing. I looked around and the women smiled. I could tell they were still humored.

The Miracle of the Towel

When we came back to Tonga, I had a great idea. I decided to pack light. No hauling 6 huge suitcases with 4 kids, who each had their blankets and backpacks. I still had nightmares of going thru security with all of the afore mentioned things.
So this time, I was going to attempt, yet again, to be the Proverbs 31 woman that I've heard mentioned just a few times in my life. I would pack only what we needed. Nothing unnecessary.
 As I had everything laying on the floor of my sister's basement, with one of the 9 kids running thru it, I decided I didn't care anymore. Whatever went in, is what we took. I do recall a bag of bath towels by the suitcases...but for some reason, I decided we didn't need them. Because we only shower twice a day in Tonga. We only constantly use towels in Tonga.
When we got here, I got to unpack my 3 suitcases, and found only 1 beach towel. Hmmm. There's six of us. It wasn't going to work. I went to town to look for some bath towels. The price on a towel was astronomical. I once again decided, yeah, we can do it with one towel. I'll be washing it a lot, but that's ok. All the germs are in the family.


 The miracle happened when we were cleaning Elizabeth's room. The house we rented came furnished. So we had to clean. Really clean. As we were moving Elizabeth's bed to sweep up all the termite damage, we saw that there were little drawers on the side of the bed. David opened them up, because I was afraid something would come jumping out. There were three drawers, and the last one he opened, yes, you guessed...had a huge, white, fluffy towel in it! It was covered in dust and other things, that I won't mention, but I got it into the washing machine right away and washed it as good as new. God takes care of us!


We have two towels now! But only for another month, until our crate gets here. Unless....that bag I recall seeing, had all of them in it. In that case, whoops.

A Life Lesson

This evening we decided to take a walk to find fresh milk. We heard that this little place down the road sold it in the morning and evening. The kids were super excited about tasting such fresh milk. Especially after drinking UHT milk. So we all took off out of our yard and hung a left to the main road.
 Addie was in the lead, riding her imaginary pony, galloping down the sidewalk. The cars were flying by and I had just turned to tell Elizabeth to walk on the sidewalk and not on the edge of the road, when behind me, I hear a scream from Addie. I whirled around and saw a dog come running out of the house we were walking in front of and, not sure if Addie's screaming scared it, or maybe there was another dog on the opposite side of the road, but that dog bolted out into the road and within 5 ft of the kids and I, a car slammed into this dog. The car didn't slow down in the least and drug that poor thing for about 20 yrds, until if finally spit it out and the dog proceeded to yelp and turn circles in the middle of the road. All of the kids started yelling and/or crying. Their eyes were huge. The girls immediately came running to me and buried their faces in my stomach... (just to clarify, that's why I have such a large, cushy stomach. For times like these. Wouldn't want to take away the kids comfort) and Bridger started pacing back and forth with such a look of terror in his eyes, it made me almost lose it. I couldn't reach him because of the other 3 hanging onto me.
  Amazingly, the dog crawled over to the side of the road. He knew he had to get out of there. The owner came out of her house and started apologizing to the kids and telling them not to look. Grandma came out with her grandson and told me how bad that dog was, always trying to play in the road. Then started up a conversation about how happy she is that we are her new neighbors.
 The dog got carried to her home to die and we proceeded on our journey to find milk. We walked a mile to the shop, with Addie crying at every street we had to cross because she was afraid of getting hit by a car (because David had decided to take this incident and put the fear of God into them about the roads in Tonga).
 We arrived at the shop , only to find it closed. Maybe tomorrow. We started the mile back and it was much better because the kids spotted a little calf and they stopped to pet it and they forgot the horrific accident of the previous hour. Our family walk ended up good...and interesting.
 Btw, the dog died...and went where all good or bad dogs go in Tonga. Into some one's belly.