Joy springs forth

This past 2 weeks were quite busy even by my standards. We had two different visitors at the same time doing two different things and I was supposed to be heavily involved in both. This type of thing is very exhausting since I was also responsible for entertaining them for dinner in the evening and breakfast in the morning. For a couple of days I was getting up at 4 in the morning to get some work done and going strong until 11 at night. The only problem I had with this is that it didn't actually exhaust me. It was energizing and refreshing. I had forgotten how these types of situations do that to me. The important thing was that I was excited to be doing what I was doing. If I'm excited about something, I can and will push my body to its limits and take great joy in doing it.

Day go by and Seasons Change

This past week I have been in Dhaka doing some work and I took the opportunity to invite some friends over and make a full dinner for 8 by myself. Not something I would advise everyone doing but I really did enjoy it. I ended up making honey-mustard chicken, baked potatoes, coleslaw, rolls, deviled eggs, and cookies for dessert. I had hoped to do some of the things a few days ahead of time but ended up watching after some MCC A Common Place writers instead (not punishment by any means). So I ended up doing it all in two days. It worked out fine even if I lost out on some sleep and it was lovely having wonderful people over for the evening. I had an invitation to a birthday party the next night and someone at dinner suggested I take some of the cookies I had made the next evening. I didn't think I had enough of those, so I made some chocolate cupcakes to go with them. The cookies turned out to be quite popular, though I must say that they are my mother's recipe so I can't take any credit for them.

In other news, I had a great time at the birthday party and met some cool new people. I even met one person whom I found drawing a positive view of Bangladesh out of me. I don't think I've ever had anyone start with the positives of Bangladesh without at least joking about some of the negatives first. I thought that was pretty cool and it reminded me of how much my view of this place changes over time. Now it would help if I could just remember their name so I could add them as a friend on facebook.

The next day I went to the Dhaka office picnic. Highlights of the day included: getting to talk to Alison D'Silva on the phone after she called her dad whom I happened to be watching birds with, playing football (soccer) barefoot with the kids (even if I did manage to kick the ball into the river), a walk around the grounds of the picnic area that included the sights and smells of a cow barn, and good conversations with the staff. The only complaints of the day were that it was a bit hot and gotten eaten alive by mosquitoes on the way home (pretty average and anticipated terrible occurrences when you live in Bangladesh).

Life has really been pretty good this week.

Windows

You may have noticed by now that I'm someone who likes to ponder. Sometimes they are worth sharing and sometimes they aren't. Recently I did some pondering in a conversation that I thought I might share here.

I'm not sure I'm ever going to understand why people worry about hurting my feelings or ruining a friendship with me. Do I seem like the type of person to blow up on people or harbor a grudge? My family knows that I have a temper but I would guess that they also know that if I am given a minute to think, I will cool off and apologize. As much time as I spend reflecting on life, being angry with someone is the worst feeling and always leads to the reminder that I am just as often guilty of causing that hurt in others. If I can't forgive others, I can't forgive myself (and can't hold out hope that they will forgive me) and if I can't forgive myself, I can't like who I am which is a really dark path that I've been down before and don't ever want to go down again. I recognize that this is a bit of a selfish rationalization but suspect that on some level we all have to be selfish and think this is probably a pretty healthy form of selfishness.

At the same time, people really do baffle me sometimes. They leave me wondering if how I act gives them the wrong impression about who I am and if maybe I am lying to the world, or myself for that matter, about who I am. I wonder how much of my inner dialogue and convictions really come out in people's interpretations of my actions. It isn't something I can ignore because I am convinced that who we are as people is shaped by both us and our environment. I am me but I think there is some real truth to the fact that who "me" is, is influenced by who you believe "me" is to some extent. I guess what I'm saying is that when things in the communication loop that is my communications with others don't match up, I begin to wonder if I'm bending the mirror that I view myself through.

...and that my friends, was window into my mind.

Motorcyle

You ever have those moments where almost everything goes terribly wrong and yet you get invigorated when things end up all right? One of those occurred to me last night. I was driving the motorcycle home rather than the usual bicycle ride because I wanted to come into the office early this morning. Unfortunately, another motorcycle (I didn't see it because it was black and not in throttle so his lights were dimmed) tried crossing the road and cut me off. I couldn't go right because that is the direction he was coming from and I would have clipped him. I couldn't go left because there was a CNG (think steel cage on wheels) that he was corralling me towards. So I slammed on the brakes and started yelling to catch his attention. I had the back of the motorcycle sliding sideways but never locked up the front tire and never laid it down. By the time I reached him, he had stopped, I popped down a couple of gears, and slowly drove through the 3 foot gap he had left between him and the CNG while giving him a dirty look. That was when I realized that there were 15 or so people standing alongside the road mimicking my alarmed yell in what I think was an attempt to chide him (or maybe me?). I laughed at this and drove on without looking back at the guy again but feeling pretty darn good about my evasive maneuvering skills. That said, for my sake and my mother's sanity, I need to drive even more defensively than I already do here.