Wind Blows Deeply

I gathered with my girlfriends recently to have our annual Christmas gathering. We eat a lot of food, exchange gifts (some tangible and some intangible), and generally catch up on life. We try to get together throughout the year but, when you think about it, this is our time of reflection of many days gone by.

When it was my time to share ‘what was new’, I said ‘not much, really’. This was met with plenty of objections. Consensus was that my life might be the most adventurous of the lot: I started a new relationship, bought a house, travelled to Africa, and won a national award. Not a bad letter to insert into the Christmas cards I didn’t send. Of course, here’s hoping that 2012 will be slightly more interesting [tongue inserted in cheek].

All 30-something-year-olds need to have a crisis or two. Mine came a week ago: unable to fall asleep, searching the darkness, then crying out into the empty echos in my house — I’m not perfect. That unwritten Christmas letter could certainly make it seem like I have it all together, that I’m successful and well-balanced and friendly and talented and, well, merely amazing. Except that I’m not. Sometimes I’m desperately insecure and unsure and floundering behind a facade.

I’m not sure if this has ever happened to you but sometimes, on occasion, I read a book that completely resonates to my core. Meandering through a local bookstore, I found ‘Grace for the good girl’ [E Freeman] tucked in behind some others on the shelf. After a cursory glance, I knew I needed to read the book. Although I’m 90% sure that there won’t be any miraculous answers or resolution of angst, it is sometimes simply nice to know that someone else has walked the same road.
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This time of year, days are thrust into darkness far too early in their short lives. There is no drawn out dusk, no lingering warmth on the patio. There is a busyness that happens. The kids are back at school with homework and field-trips and assemblies. Projects at work pick up steam. And moments after you pull the turkey out of the oven for Thanksgiving, you’re putting another one in for Christmas.

Still, these are the days I like best of all. Cool enough to necessitate thick sweaters, layers of clothing really. Brisk mornings and slightly warmer afternoons. The crisp crunch of leaves underfoot. Storing away of all those root vegetables; canning or freezing others. Blankets and afghans and snuggling by the fire. Evenings of cocoa and popcorn, tea and steaming hot muffins from the oven.

The past few weekends I have driven across the autumn prairie. At first surprised by an early snow; too early really. Awe-struck by thousands of Canada geese hovering above field and pond; a living wave, ebbing and flowing, swirling and lifting above the sea of golden wheat. Comforted by the endless sky stretching above yet instantaneously kissing the earth below. The intense glow of the setting sun striking the path ahead.

I have come to realize that while I may not actually have roots, this is exactly the way things should be. Unlike a tumbleweed, carried away forever and a day, I am always carried to. I am carried to family, to friends, to opportunities, to connecting. To connecting with God. I do not roam aimlessly, hoping to find adventure or meaning. There is purpose and intentionality, and these things do not require roots.
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May Day came at the end of a very interesting week and another busy month. “Doudu” and “Samba”, two volunteers I mentioned in the last update, returned home to Canada. My parents arrived and had a very full few weeks. I celebrated Easter with my family at a gathering upcountry.

Personally, I was able to have some time to rest and prepare for the volunteers coming this month. This past week was dedicated to time at the pharmacy department: storeroom audits, student exams and handling the influx of an unanticipated donation of
unsorted medications.

April Update
During Easter break, a three-day workshop-conference was held for local teachers. Topics discussed included classroom management, encouraging participation, review of teaching methods and how to
evaluate students.

Work continues at the community garden: produce is being sold, the compost is producing wonderful earth, the solar dryer is preserving fruit (mangoes!), and space prepared for the planting of
new crops. Such abundance!

Meant for this
Remember the story of Jesus appearing to some of his disciples by the Sea of Galilee? (John 21) Being closer to the ocean here than in Canada, I have enjoyed watching the bustle of fishing boats return with their catch, gulls circling, women with children bundled on their backs gutting fish.

With Jesus seemingly absent, Simon Peter goes back to what he knows: fishing. One particular night, they have caught nothing. At dawn someone from shore calls out some advice – try the other side of the boat. They catch a net-full, realize this is Jesus and come to shore to find breakfast prepared. It is after breakfast that Simon Peter’s calling is renewed.

What lessons have I gleaned from the life of Simon Peter? Well, I know that God gives each of us a purpose and asks us follow His leading. Sometimes I try to do things my own way and sometimes I fail completely. Yet God is faithful and will renew the purpose we are given.

The label placed under my experiences this past week would have to be “I was meant for this.” I audited two storerooms, dedicated time with one of the staff, marked an exam I gave to the pharmacy assistant students and sorted through an unanticipated medication donation (about seven duffel bags of unsorted items emptied onto the storeroom floor). Despite being busy and putting in long days (and long nights), my spirit felt renewed. Each day it was as though I was exactly where I needed to be and where others also needed me to be.

I am called to be a pharmacist. A desire to serve, plan, teach and mentor has been placed deep in my soul. I was pulled to
volunteer in a small African country. I was meant for this.

I will saturate my day in prayer. My success will not so
much depend on the things I have done, the people I have impressed, the money I have made, or the honours I have obtained but on my ability to imitate Christ.

I will seek to love and serve beyond the call of duty. I will endeavour to become humble, patient, selfless, joyful, grateful, kind, honest, and merciful. I will practice with self-control, empathy, commitment and persistence.

The patient’s well-being and personal goals for health will be my utmost priority. Whenever possible, I will seek to assist and empower them in self-care. Together, we will be proactive in obtaining their optimal health.

I will seek to fulfill the most urgent needs of society for the distribution, education, consultation, selection, monitoring, and evaluation of pharmacotherapy. I will try to balance the individual’s health with the interests of society.

I will become a team player by building collaborative relationships with the patient and other health care providers. I will respect other health care professionals and honour their expertise; whenever necessary, I will seek their guidance or refer my patient to them.

I will be open to change; I will be an instrument for change. I will become an autonomous thinker, using critical and creative thinking skills. I will endeavour to stay current with advances in the practice of pharmacy.

I will take care of myself so that I can take care of others.

I very well may have blogged on this topic before, but it has been haunting me for some time now. So, after some procrastination, I have plopped myself down in front of the computer and am determined to get this thing written.

I happen to think I’m a darn good pharmacist. And, at times, I truly enjoy being a pharmacist. I’m just not sure I’m completely passionate about being a pharmacist–and somewhere in my deep dark recesses I seem to think I should be passionate about what I do.

I’m not confident in the fact that I’m doing what God wants me to be doing (more on this later), but I trust that He will use what I am doing in His plan. I don’t know if I’m right, but I’ve formulated the idea that God wants us where we are fully using the talents and abilities He has endowed us with. Perhaps my problem exists as I blur the line between my definitions of passionate and passion and passions and calling and vocation.

And I’ve been reading Oswald Chambers’ My Utmost for His Highest, and for 3 days in a row (August 3-5) Chambers has discussed purpose. A few excerpts…

The great thing to remember is that we go up to Jerusalem to fulfill God’s purpose, not our own.
At the beginning of the Christian life we have our own ideas as the what God’s purpose is–”I am meant to go here or there,” “God has called me to do this special work”; and we go and and do the things, and still the big compelling of God remains. The work we do is of no account, it is as much scaffolding compared with the big compelling of God.

… if you have let Him bring you to the end of your self-sufficiency then He can choose you to go with Him to Jerusalem, and that will mean the fulfilling of purposes which He does not discuss with you.
As Christians we are not out for our own at all, we are out for the cause of God, which can never be our cause. We do not know what God is after, but we have to maintain our relationship with Him whatever happens.
The main thing about Christianity is not the work we do, but the relationship we maintain and the atmosphere produced by that relationship.

The call of God can never be stated explicitly; it is implicit. The call of God is like the call of the sea, no one hears it but the one who has the nature of the sea in him. It cannot be stated definitely what the call of God is to, because His call is to be in comradeship with Himself for His own purposes, and the test is to believe that God know what He is after. The things that happen do not happen by chance, they happen entirely in the decree of God. God is working out His purposes.
If we are in communion with God and recognize that He is taking us into His purposes, we shall no longer try to find out what His purposes are. As we go on in the Christian life it gets simpler, because we are less inclined to say–Now why did God allow this and that? Behind the whole thing lies the compelling of God. “There’s a divinity that shapes our ends.” A Christian is one who trusts the wits and the wisdom of God, and not his own wits. If we have a purpose of our own, it destroys the simplicity and the leisureliness which ought to characterize the children of God.

So that’s that. I still question my materialism. I don’t understand why I take my family and friends for granted. I regret that so often I fail to allow God first priority. I do not want to live with these regrets–or any regrets for that matter.

OK, here it comes. Before I start, I should mention I’m thankful for a few ‘God-interventions’ this week:
1) I was taking the elevator at work one day this week (up to the ICU floor) – all alone in the elevator – when a man got on. As he selected his floor, he noticed my own selection, and probably glancing at my white lab coat, he asked if I worked in the ICU. I said yes, and he responded by saying something like ‘it takes a lot of heart to work up there’.
2) Another day this week, the -70 degree freezer in which I was storing 300+ samples for my major research project for this residency began alarming. I was a tad stressed with other things, so it was a panicky hour while I searched the hospital for another department with freezer space I could beg/borrow. It turned out our freezer was fine. The samples are ok. I could have used a few more deep breaths.

Now on the other side of things …
I need to figure out the rest of my life pretty soon. I have the opportunity to sign a contract to stay here for a year once I’m done – which means extra money. I am not sure if I want to stay here or go back to home (or somewhere in betweeen). Then there’s also that missions stuff I had postponed for this year.

I’ve really been trying to look for God in the everyday stuff. If I see Him in the small stuff, it might be easier for me to see Him in the big stuff too. I just thought it would get easier at some point.