Day 34: Late night reflections

I have waited until almost midnight to start this blog... which makes me... tired! Haha. But this is my discipline, my devotion and my fast! And, I had some pretty cool experiences that I've decided to just journal... like in old past diaries! Where you just talk about the day and do a play by play of what happened. It will be in that fashion... maybe!

Well today started with week 2 of Mommy and Me, a program we are doing at SOAR in BSL, designed to assist children developmentally and give parents the tools necessary to not only be good at interacting and helping their children, but also in being good advocates for their children in school! Very cool. And it was just really amazing to realize that there were two giants in the child education and development feild sitting in the same room, talking around the same table, discussing issues that have been circulating the education system for years and having real, solid, graspable solutions and intelligent assessments about these challenges! I was once again reminded of an amazing opportunity that I am standing in the midst of, and I have to say, my arms are outstreched wide ready to pull in anything they are willing to offer and teach me. Plus I got to watch baby Hunter interact with the world and that is always a fascinating, miracle of an experience!

Then, later today, Brother Dominic stopped by to ask Morgan about a question she had asked him earlier on his voicemail. He had his hand on the door and was wrapping up his "hello-goodbye" as he asked us how our day went. Suddenly it was three hours later and we had touched on an uncountable number of intriguing discussions and philosophies and topics. We talked about SOAR and all of our programs. We talked about the city and how city government works, which trickled into state goverment and kept going past federal government all the way into the current economic status of our nation. Brother shared an incredibly intelligent and very well articulated philosophy on American life and the current state of the average American physically, emotionally and spiritually, and he gave me some interesting ideas on things to write about in the future.

But the most profoundly impacting part of our discussion was listening to his testimony about being in the Vietnam refugee camps and the poverty and oppression and hopelessness he had come out of because there was no freedom or opportunity there. He said, "When I first came to America I was so sad." It took me back a little. I would have thought he would be absolutely exstatic to be away from there, and sad was not how I had heard the "promise land" spoken of before; but what he said will stick with me forever. He said that when he was in the refugee camps and there was nothing there and all you wanted was to have the resources, the money and the influence to get out, to help your friends and family and to make a difference, America had always been such a dream of all of those things. But when he got here and he saw all of the freedom that we wasted, and saw what we chose to do with our lives, and how we squandered our time and our money and our purpose, he said he was just so sad.

In Vietnam, when a child is smart and blessed enough to make it into one of the few colleges in the country, the entire family goes to work to support that student. And that student becomes a doctor or an engineer or something amazing so that they can be successful, make it out and help their family. In America, we can all go to school if we want. And when the going gets rough we drop out or change our major or only take one course a term. We take such advantage of our opportunites! I felt a little pull on my own heart when I thought about the choices I have made with my opportunities... and the ones that still sit out there... unused.

Then tonight, we went and sat with Di and talked and conversed, and she shared her own experiences of healing and realization over the last couple of weeks. And I realized after a few interesting stories and discussions tonight, that I have some healing of my own that I need to deal with. UGH. And that there are things that I thought were gone that aren't. We talked about "pink eyes", which are better than "rose-colored glasses", because we can take glasses off, but our eyes are in there! Pink eyes is an expression to describe a steady optimism and bright sided view on the hardships of life and the misgivings of the world. And I have prayed for pink eyes since I realized that I am still only wearing the glasses, taking my "pink" off in some of those more painful areas of my life. So I kind of came face to face with some of my own "issues". And that was... kinda frustrating, kinda relieving.

So overall it was just a "kick ya in the butt" kinda day, that was really intense sometimes, but really really cool!

So there. That was my day! Now GOODNIGHT! :D haha