nica church reflections

I meant to post these thoughts ages ago, but well, with moving and all, my mind and energy have been elsewhere.

Several weeks ago I was talking to some friends who are still living in Nicaragua, and we were discussing what the North American church might be able to learn from the Nicaraguan church (side note: I am thinking specifically about the evangelical/protestant manifestations thereof, with whom I had the most contact-I believe there are things to be learned from the Catholic church too, but unfortunately in Nicaragua a cultural form of Catholicism tends to dominate rather than the authentic faith and expression of a smaller remnant).

I remember that my initial impressions of many evangelical churches (pentecostal and charismatic for the most part) was that they tended toward the legalistic side of the spectrum. Rules about dress, hair, makeup, jewelry, drinking, dancing, etc abounded. Having developed a strong theology of grace over the years, I admit I found these rules excessive and unhelpful for the most part, and for that reason sought out a more relaxed church while I lived there.

Back in the USA however, I found myself more sympathetic toward the attitudes and practices of the Nica church. I was able to see how those rules were an attempt to "set themselves apart", to take a stand in a culture where a cultural form of Christianity that involves drunkenness and idolatry has taken hold. I could see more clearly the rationale for wanting to adopt a lifestyle that was so clearly different, even if I didn't think the particular rules that some evangelicals lived by were necessarily the ones I would adopt myself.

I found this line of thinking much more compelling because I realized I have the same desire to live a life different than the culture around me, one that clearly points to my personal values regarding simplicity, justice, and hospitality...and their roots in my faith in Christ. Maybe I don't go so far as to call them "rules" but I have standards for my own life, ways of thinking about wants and needs, ways of making decisions about how to spend money and time and energy, etc. I desire consistency, even if I don't always succeed at maintaining it.

And this is what I realized that motivated my Nica brothers and sisters as well. And it caused me to wonder whether in our rush to be "seeker sensitive" in this culture (USA), if the idea of being "set apart" and "different", a lamp on a stand as believers, has not been sort of neglected. Certainly I am speaking in broad strokes, glittering generalities, if you will. But I realized the global northern church now tends to opt not only for "grace" (which is good), but also in many places (not all), "blending in". And I wonder if maybe there is something to be learned from our southern brothers and sisters...

after one week in my new digs

+ I'm really happy that my new bedroom is finally decorated, even though it hurts sometimes to see all my Nica art and pictures and be so far away. But it's nice to have a place of my own after house hopping for 3 months.

+ My new condo-mates Christie and Jody are fun, extroverted, food and exercising loving, and frugal! Example of the week: they came home with a bunch of stuff my second night here and told me they had just gone "dumpster diving" (not literally of course) and picked up a bunch of other people's rejected stuff (still in great condition). I followed suit the other day and picked up a lamp someone left in their yard a few blocks from my place.

+ I really love jogging in Hyde Park, my new reparto. I stopped for about 3 weeks after my accident but am back into it and almost up to 3 miles again. I signed up for my first 5k next month and a half marathon in November. I think I'm getting serious about this running thing, and I'm excited to be disciplined about something in my life.

+ There's so much to love about Austin, I hardly know where to begin. Related to the above, I love the respect I get as a pedestrian/runner (people stop for me!). I love all the parks and green spaces. I love all the hole in the wall restaurants and coffeeshops everywhere (not that I can afford most of them, but it makes me happy to see independent business flourishing somewhere, instead of just chains.). I love that there is a decent (free for students) bus system (that I still need to figure out). I don't think I can really love skyscrapers, but I like that the architecture downtown is artsy not boxy. I love that a river runs through Austin too (just like San Antonio, only here they've made in a hike and bike trail rather than a commercial center).

+ I'm glad SA is only an hour away and I can be a more involved aunt and big sister again. I went back this past Sunday to see Alex and Robbie sing at church and then was able to hang out with my sister and brother for a while afterwards.

+ Some days, I am really glad to be here. Other days, it still feels like a dream.

austin, coffee and dishwashers

I hadn’t cried in a couple weeks, so I guess it was time. It’s always an unexpected, small event that produces my sometimes disproportionately emotional response. This time, it was the dishwasher.

I just moved to Austin on Saturday, and among my few but prized possessions is a blue ceramic coffee mug decorated with a hand painted scene depicting volcanoes, lakes, and palm trees with a cursive Nicaragua adorning a small corner (if mugs have corners….). This mug was a Christmas gift to me from Andrea, my roommate, our first year in Nicaragua, and it became my beverage holder of choice for all the shared mornings that followed. It managed to survive the trip back to the USA, and five different moves around San Antonio this summer. I drank out of it every day, always remembering the many mornings I sat at a small wooden table in Managua, where Andrea and I drank our French-pressed café, talked a lot, laughed, and cried together.

Then, this morning, after my first jog around my new neighborhood, I came back and went looking for this mug to pour myself some already made coffee. After searching the cabinets, it occurred to me that maybe it was in the dishwasher, which one of my roommates had loaded the night before. It was, but when I pulled it out, I was not prepared for what I saw. Half the paint had disappeared, other sections had become distorted, and all that remains in one solitary palm tree trunk and parts of a few leaves. Ni se dice Nicaragua ahora.

I stared at it for a few minutes in disbelief. Then I proceeded to cry. It never occurred to me to tell my roommates that mug shouldn’t go through the dishwasher--I’ve been hand washing everything for years now. And I have a lot of things that I brought back from Nicaragua, which had they broken or disappeared, I might have been fine. But of course, it wasn’t any of those things. It’s one of the things (if not THE thing) that most connects me to my very best friend from those three years we spent together.

So even as I’m excited about all new places, new people, etc. in my life here in Austin, I’m also sad. My damaged mug is a symbolic reminder that things are changing, that I can’t hold on to everything from my life in Nicaragua, and how I choose to adapt to all the changes happening in my life will have a big impact on how things turn out in this new etapa.

a stains story

This story actually begins in March of this year, when los muchachos (the Nica friends I went to church with) were out to lunch together having a post-trip-to-the-Atlantic-Coast reunion. It was a crowded day at Mi Ranchito (as the place was called), and suddenly a waiter with a tray full of glasses bumped into a customer while passing by our table, and bright orange soda spilled all over my hair and my clothes.

Normally, this would have been an annoyance, but nothing to cry about. Except that I was wearing a hand-embroidered blouse I had bought in Mexico a few months earlier. A one of a kind shirt. One of my prized memories of that trip. Within seconds I rushed to the bathroom, took off the shirt and soaked it in the sink, hoping to keep the orange liquid from setting permanently in the fabric. A couple of my girlfriends followed me into the bathroom out of solidarity, and one of them (Yaoska) offered me the brown tank top she was wearing so that I wouldn't have to put my soaking wet shirt back on. (She was wearing another shirt as well.) This was sweet but sort of funny since Yaoska (pictured with me above) is like a size 4, one of the most petite girls I know. But she was like, no worries, it stretches. So I put it on, and sure enough it fit just fine.

Back in the dining area, I arrived at the table sourfaced and even a bit desconsolate. But one of my friends' moms who was present with us offered to take my shirt home with her to try to get the stain (still VERY orange) out. "I have sons," she explained. "I am an expert at stain removal." Skeptical but grateful, I handed her the shirt, which sure enough a week later she returned to me in perfect condition. As if nothing had ever happened. Meanwhile, Yaoska told me I should keep her shirt "as a way to remember" the experience. I smiled, and sheepishly agreed (she probably thought I had permanently altered her tanktop anyway, so....)

This all came back to me today because I was wearing that same brown tank top on my way to Austin today. I was very excited because I had managed to take a large travel mug full of coffee with me all the way to Austin and back, but as I was making the last turn into my neighborhood...well, I forgot about it, and turned too sharply, and sure enough the last of the coffee and a few grains came pouring out onto the passenger seat. I immediately dumped some bottled water on it, and when I got back to the apartment, sprayed Shout all over it, soaked it, and tried to sop up the stain-filled liquid. I failed to calculate adequately, however the amount of paper towels required for this task, and feeling too lazy to go back upstairs to get more, I took my tank top off instead and used it to sop up the rest. Then I ran quickly back upstairs to rinse it out before the coffee had a chance to set in Yaoska's shirt.

Back in the car, my laptop in tow in a hand-embroided bag given to me from another Nica friend, I threw it on the passenger seat on top of some papers I had placed there, thinking that would be adequate protection. No such luck. The remaining liquid seeped right through the paper and onto the cream colored bag.

Thankfully, this time the handsoap in the coffeeshop down the street and some warm water was enough to get that stain out. :-)

el presente es el unico que tengo

It's been my mantra of late: Live in the present. LIVE in the present. Live in the PRESENT.

For various reasons, that's harder than it might seem. Whereas my tendency 4 years ago might have been to live in the future....[see: "when [fill in the blank] happens,, then [choose positive consequence].], now my strong temptation is to live in the past. Like when I had my car accident 3 weeks ago, and was missing $2 taxi rides in Nicaragua. Or when I tried to chooose my favorite 200 photos to print for an album, and found myself wandering down memory lane for hours at a time. Now it's "I miss [fill in the blank] from Nicaragua." All the time. Especially on the first major Nica holiday I missed (July 19th, anniversary of the triumph of the Sandinista Revolution) or when, like yesterday I am sitting in the bookstore minding my own business and de repente a family I have seen multiple times walks in and proceeds to sit down next to me and start talking en español and all I can do is smile and hold back tears at the same time. I desperately want to interrupt them but know that would probably be kind of rude here (but in Nicaragua, well,....)

The present. It's pure paradox. On the one hand, it's been really fulfilling to see a lot of old faces, go to some familiar places, eat some comfort food, and enjoy the air conditioning. On the other hand, driving stresses me out (though I had a really nice road trip to Dallas last week--thanks Brett's family for hosting me!), I have no structure or routine to give my days meaning (other than exercise, which is really the only thing I have managed to maintain thus far from la vida nica), and the simplicity I crave from my former life seems perpetually elusive here. On the one hand, it's nice to go to the restroom and not worry that my stuff will be gone when I return. On the other hand, people's lives are so totally overscheduled that it's almost impossible to make plans with anyone without a couple weeks notice. And some people I thought I would surely see upon my return have disappeared...while others who were not a part of my life at all before I left are suddenly the most important people I know and want to hang out with. [I have managed to see my siblings quite a bit though--pictured above.]

The present. It's all I have. I'm trying to live in it, but it's making me crazy to live out of one suitcase. Maybe I'm ready for the future after all. 9 days til I move to Austin!

americana

Stars and stripes
Hung far and wide
Rojo, blanco, y azul
Worn with pride
Paying homage to the souls
Whose valentía was inspired by a dream
The sweet sound of a campana called liberty
Accompanied by a harmony chorus-- e pluribus Unum

Yet the fabric of America
Extends beyond nuestras fronteras
And the colores that we celebrate son mas diversas
Que imaginamos

So let us lift up el rojo, de la sangre y la salsa
Y el azul de la fruta y el mar caribe
Let us sing for el blanco del algodón y nieve
Y el verde de los chiles y los prados
Let us remember el amarillo de las flores y el maíz
y el rosado delicado de la madrugada
que llena todos nuestros horizontes

And las melodias that we sing
De libertad y justicia for one and all
Of equality and brotherhood
Son para todos de este hemisferio
Porque de costa a costa
Argentina a Canadá
somos todos americanos

two months

Today marks 2 months since I left Nicaragua. It has been a whirlwind of emotions, reunions, and surprises along the way. This past week was no different.

Friday started out wonderful. I had lunch with my old friend Sarah, with whom I co-led a bible study in college for 2 years, along with two other friends from Trinity, at Panchito's (which, btw, has some of the best breakfast tacos in all of SA). Then, in an attempt to escape the South Texas heat, I headed downtown to check out the American Sabor exhibit at the Museo Alameda. American Sabor is a fabulous historical yet hands-on exhibition about the many strands of Latin music that have woven their way into the fabric of US culture (from mambo to salsa to Latin rock/punk to Tejano) over the last 60 years. There are oral history interviews, song samples, a dance floor, video performances of famous musicians of all the genres, and more! It was just delightful to be standing in a room dedicated to celebrating a positive aspect of Latin America's contribution to our culture today (especially when so much media attention is only focused on the problems caused by illegal immigrants, for example. But I digress.)

I walked out afterwards into the stifling South Texas heat and didn't even care. I had just paid $2 for 3+ hours of beautiful enriching culture and I was looking forward to a quiet evening at home, or maybe a last minute social outing (I still like those more than the planned kind). Everything, however, was about to change.

I headed north out of town towards 35, quickly realized I wasn't going to be able to make the 281N cutoff and slightly frustrated, headed toward an exit. Rush hour traffic was quickly backing things up, and I just wanted to be home. A little emotional, I cut back downtown and headed up Broadway. I had almost made it to my turn at Hildebrand when suddenly out of nowhere a car was crossing in front of me. I had no time to brake, nor even really think. I slammed into her. Next thing I know my airbag is in my face, steam and smoke is coming out of my engine, and the folks in the car behind me are helping me out of my vehicle. I am a mess. I am crying. In shock. Disbelief. Horror.

It was my first accident. Thanks to the kind strangers, I got my car off the road, and then the police came and took our statements, my car was towed, and then my dear friend Paul (thank you!!) came to pick me up and take me home. After crying for almost 2 hours, I finally called my insurance company (and hers).

It's been a long week since then. I've felt the full measure of emotional trauma that comes with having one's life flash before one's eyes. The fear of driving. The aches and pains that come with a major accident. The stress of bureaucracy. The beginning of treatment and healing. And the blessings of friends who have called or written and offered to help. Thank you--you all know who you are.

[Today also marks another important event--the return of my dear roomie from Nicaragua, Andrea, to the USA. The photo in this post is one of my favorite memories we shared--our first trip to Ometepe together for her birthday.]