Hello and welcome to the August blog. The rainy season continues with its high humidity and heat. It's amazing how wet you can become just sitting on a chair inside or outside the manse while the sheer pleasure of the luxury of two or three showers a day, in the circumstances, has to be felt to be fully appreciated! The hurricane season is also well underway and though we have experienced some "tropical weather disturbances" we offer our heartfelt thanks that apart from a very few minor inconveniences such as rip tides and heavy rainfall we are now safely into September the last of the months in which hurricanes are anticipated to be the most dangerous and prolific, even if the season lasts until November! We have experienced only one day in which the many species of birds around us were not chirping and singing. Quiet birds in the manse garden leave us with a rather uneasy feeling as we begin to wonder what the birds know that science has not passed on to us yet! The last harvest that we had from that same garden was beans. Those have now been replaced with cucumbers and Dannie has forecast that they will be edible by the end of September. Fresh cucumber sandwiches anyone? They are particularly good with some of the local low fat spreading cheese instead of the usual margarine we use. The lushness of the trees and bushes and other growing things such as the fruit around the manse has to be seen to be believed. The variety of their greenness and the girth of the upcoming grapefruit crop for example are to be marveled at and when drops of rain reflect the sunlight from the leaves and fruit it can be an amazing sight even if we are experiencing the wet of perspiration instead of those rain drops! The roads are another concern as they continue to deteriorate where the rain causes the surfaces to be washed away or to be piled high with mud. Thus the road through the mountains to St. George's becomes even more exciting than usual! August is also Carnival month here in Grenada. The community of Sauteurs celebrates with a parade, loud music and much drinking of rum over a two week period. It has little to offer us old folk. The lack of sleep because of where the manse is situated becomes such an issue that we need to escape to the quiet of Dorothy's home in Levera and do some catching up there.
All our school work is in abeyance thanks to the summer holidays, however, we held, with the help of some of the youth and adults of the Belair congregation, a Vacation Bible School which was attended by some thirty of our three to eleven year olds. We sang some well loved songs of praise and learned a few more, had bible stories, crafts, black and white drawings with bible verses to colour, games and food and in all this learned what Jesus meant when he told us to love God and each other. We also learned what it meant to share; a very hard lesson indeed when you are not used to having much stuff to share. Some of our older youth went down to St. George's to take part in the Vacation Bible Camp that the PCG ran there. When they arrived home they were full of enthusiasm for the Camp and its leaders. Great memories and many lessons learned for everyone!
Our return to Canada has been set for late November. There are, of course, details to be worked through and for those of us who will admit to "seeking perfection" in all we do these details have to be worked through for a while before a degree of comfort can be taken from the upcoming changes. I spent some time this morning reading Luke 6: 1-5, where the story about Jesus and the disciples in the grain fields is told. Those Pharisees (in their black hats!) are trying to preserve their structures and constraints and in so doing have lost sight of ordinary human needs. Jesus calls them to a better understanding of what is important. Let's hope that Jesus hears what distracts us as we begin our time of transition and calls us to truth. Isn't it true that it is not others who won't let us away with anything but ourselves? We get so busy with our own concerns and forget when it's time to let go. Pray, please, that with Jesus' help we will be able to discern what is really important and to let go of the rest!
