Twenty Years On (well, nearly)

On Saturday we made a two and a half hour trek back to All Nations Christian College - where Dan and I met in January 1996. Some of our fellow-students had organised a reunion for students who were there between 1994 and 1996.

All Nations is "the other" missionary training college in England (Redcliffe being the other "other".) I went there after two years in Zambia, to do an MA in Missiology. Dan came over for one term as a sort of semester abroad, whilst he was studying at CIU in South Carolina. 

At first on Saturday as I walked into the buzzing hall I felt detached, then overwhelmed as individuals loomed out of the crowd and back into my consciousness - names had to be checked on name-badges - adjustments made for aging, and huge great teenage kids beside now-mums-and-dads - but once those barriers had been crossed, it was amazing. 

The men had changed more than the women. Men actually change shape as they age - their necks and jaws widen, and their hairline changes (some more than others). Women simply fill out a little bit, maybe go grey, but usually cover that up, and generally get more beautiful. We all had changed since 1996 - we all had wrinkles and weight which we did not have back then, and we all had a burden of experiences, both great ones and hard ones. One lovely thing was that several of the tutors were there, all having left the college in the intervening years -so it was really touching and fun that they came as well. Our principal of that time, Chris Wright, and his wife Lizzie were there, seeming exactly the same, and Chris gave us a great and relevant talk from Deuteronomy (a book he taught a much-loved course on whilst we were there as students.) 

We had about two hours of sharing our stories and showing a few slides. It was uplifting and, honestly, exciting to hear of all the work that has been done, in countries across the globe, by the All Nations class of 1994. Most of us had been overseas for almost all the years since then, and a few are still working abroad, and happened to be home on leave so were able to come. Just a few have mainly been in Christian work in this country rather than overseas. Sadly four of our number had died, three to illness, but one, Dave Roberts had been murdered as he was intervening in a robbery. We remembered them and prayed for their families.

It felt so normal to be together again once the initial strangeness had thawed. It felt wonderful to see the teenage kids playing together - like a family reunion. It was gratifying and I felt proud (in a good way I think) of all the years of kingdom work that have been done since we were students together in 1996. And grateful to God for all these dedicated, kind, fun people. 

I also felt greatly encouraged in our work at Redcliffe, which is so similar - that our students will likewise be going on to dedicate their lives to God's work in various forms, and that in twenty years time they might get together and reminisce, and be glad. 

A bluetit and a harvest mouse

Today while Alex was a t a birthday party, Abby and I did some painting. It had been a long time... I had another go at a bluetit - they seem to be hard to get right! Abby painted a cute little harvest mouse. 

Castles in the air

We have had a crazy few days in Northumberland, visiting a part of England none of us really knew before. We were staying with a friend, who kindly gave us use of their house for our holiday. It was only five days altogether, but with the journey each way taking the whole day, we had three days only to see everything - so we basically made six day trips in the space of the three days, and went out each evening as well. I have been reminded that while my idea of a holiday is to relax in a beautiful place, eat well, and see some of the local sights, (without stretching yourself) Dan's idea is to rest for not one single moment, but to go go go go go and see everything there is to be seen, and eat if there's time on the way...

If I show you in pictures what we saw, you will get an idea of the amount of ground we covered...

Northumberland is the north east corner of England, with huge sandy beaches, rolling farmland, moorland including the Pennines, Hadrian's Wall built by the Romans to keep the Scottish hordes out, and many many castles, built over the centuries to protect this exposed coastline from the Scots, the Vikings, and the French in turn... It has so much going for it, including the lovely seafood literally jumping out of the sea into your frying pan (lobsters, kippers, prawns, salmon and much more). Its islands have some of England's beautiful but rare wildlife: seals and puffins. You will know how excited I was to see them, the puffins especially. 

A medieval gateway in Alnwick - the road drives right under it.

Alnwick Castle, home of the Nevilles if you read Tudor historical fiction! Also used as Hogwarts ...

Lindisfarne Priory, built in 635 AD as one of the first Christian sites in England, it was raided so often by Vikings that in 875 AD the monks fled from it with the coffin containing the bones of St Cuthbert and the famous Lindisfarne Gospels (which we saw in Durham). Although the priory was later restored, it was closed by Henry VIII as part of the dissolution of the monasteries, and the roof was ripped off then.

Lindisfarne Castle - built by Henry VIII to protect the coast from French and Scottish invaders.

Called Holy Island, it is joined to the mainland by a causeway so you have to choose your time to drive over. and back, or you'll get stuck... The islands around are the home of seals, who make an eery high-pitched moaning sound which we could hear the whole time.

Bamborough Castle, a Norman castle right above the beach.

a chance to swim in the sea.

A boat trip to see the puffins, at Coquet Island off Amble. Frodo was allowed on the boat and found his sea legs!!

A puffin??!!!

Our photos were hopeless, so this one is from Google... but they really do look like this, they are beautiful and funny!

Again a lifted photo as it was quite dark when we were there... but this is the Tree in the Gap on Hadrian's Wall,  - you might recognise this from the Robin Hood film Prince of Thieves. It is a beautiful spot.

Our family at Hadrian's Wall, including Canis Canis Frodoensis.

Frodo visiting Durham Cathedral.

Another "borrowed" picture, of the Lindisfarne Gospels, made on Lindisfarne in the 700s AD. When the monks fled with it and Cuthbert's coffin, it fell into the sea, but was undamaged. They all ended up at Durham Cathedral, (as did the tomb of the Venerable Bede.) It was trimmed and re-covered by the Victorians. But the illuminations are incredible, original and unspoiled. 

Durham

A medieval street in York. With quite a few tourists in it...

... and a ghost

 I actually feel as though we did "English History 101". It was amazing. And slightly exhausting...

Re-set

I've had a little hiatus from writing this blog, and I have been thinking... why should I start writing it again? I saw a hilarious cartoon of two dogs sitting down talking to each other, one saying, "I took up blogging for a while... Now I have gone back to meaningless loud barking into the night..." But I know that I enjoy reading people's blogs, and, I enjoy writing, so, I might just keep on barking. The blogs I enjoy most are either people writing their inner experiences, what they went through, what helped; blogs that are more like newsletters, with pictures, telling stories, just to keep us caught up; and blogs about books, as I am always looking for recommendations of good books to read. So those are the things that I will write about.

One reason why I hadn't written anything for a while is that it has been a non-stop few weeks. Dan has been away in Uganda. He went at the worst time for me, but, it wasn't his fault. He left just as the children entered the ridiculously busy last weeks of summer term: Alex is in his school play and needed an Elvis outfit, he is in two cricket leagues both trying to fit in their games before the summer break, Abby had sports day at a stadium in Cheltenham, oh I had a job interview... On one day I had a WTC (my workplace) conference, Alex's induction morning at his new school, Alex's old school summer fayre, our church Women's Evening, and both children to social events. One parent really can't do it all. How do single parents manage??? I had just stopped taking my amazing answer-to-all-my-problems tabs about two weeks before this hecticness started - maybe bad timing, but, there is always something coming up and so I just went for it.

Began to feel wound-up about coping with all these events and in some cases stresses (job interview...) Began to feel tense inside. Got very angry with our second child when he displayed grumpiness about doing a chore, so much that after shouting I rushed upstairs into the bedroom with slammed doors and heavy breathing and some crying. Woke up in the mornings with my brain ranging around for the thing to worry about. Stopped writing my gratitude list, as it seemed pointless. At church last Sunday, I went for prayer at the end and told the two people who were to pray for me, that I was worried I was reverting and that I just so want my security to be in God, and in his care for me, not in jobs and finances or in my own ability to do the things that I have to do. The lady had been at the Women's Breakfast in May when I talked a bit about anxiety and the resources I had found for dealing with it. She said to me, "Are you still writing your gratitude list that you told us about?" I told her I had kind of stopped. She urged me to get back to doing it, and she said,"It is spiritual warfare when you do that. Every time you write down something that you are thankful to God for, it drives satan away. The actual writing of the thank you's is the important thing."

Then this last week, the lady who wrote the book called One Thousand Gifts, Ann Voskamp, wrote in her blog (aholyexperience.com) about how she had just been in a time of doubt and fear - and another blog I read, called A New Name by Emma Scrivener (mostly about anorexia and related issues - no I don't have it but I find her thoughts on self-esteem, judging yourself, redemption, and much more always helpful) at the same time talked about how she had hit a time of despair and was fighting back from it - and these two amazing women going through these dips, made me feel so hopeful - that even such insightful, Godly, able women still had to push off bad times. So my dip doesn't mean I have failed, it means, it is a battle and I am in it. And I have resources to call on. So, use them. Keep going. Fight for the joy and peace that I desire.

So I am now on "Things I Am Thankful For" number 542. And the most recent one is: Dan gets back tomorrow!!!

Rats!

You know I have always been a fan of pets. We have had a respectable list since Abby and Alex arrived - multiple cats and kittens, pint-sized tortoises, a chameleon, fish, more fish, beautiful hamsters, A Dog, three mice... and most recently, two gerbils and two rats.

Pets are the best. They are lovable, dependable, grateful, cuddly, friendly, funny, shaggy, and beautiful, in varying measures.

Pets teach children to look after another being. They teach children the values of loyalty and friendship, and tolerance (by modeling them). Children learn to take responsibility, to remember to feed the creature that depends on them, and to persevere in keeping their territory clean. Many times children don't remember and don't persevere, of course, but eventually they get the hang of it.

But still, rats... I was a bit reluctant, to put it mildly, when we embarked on the rats. Especially when we discovered they would need an enormous cage for them. EBay came up with the goods though, so, we moved on in the ratward direction. When Dan and Alex came home with two male Dumbo rats, they were shy to tell me why the males were available while all the females were gone... male dumbo rats carry the most enormous testes under their tail! Oh well, we politely ignore them.

Otherwise, the rats are cuter than I had anticipated. These rats have white bodies and black head and shoulders - so they look like they are wearing medieval hoods. They are quite handsome really. They are called Sneaky, and Spotsy. They will play and sit on people's shoulders, but at the moment they are still scared and scurry for their little log house when we come close to the cage.

Meanwhile Abby has two gorgeous gerbils, Peanut and Conker. They are far prettier, with furry tails and bright semispherical eyes. I love the gerbils! They spend all day springing in their wheel until they tire and fall out, and pawing through their food bowl; they burrow into the sawdust to rest and crawl out all sleepy-eyed and adorable.

I doubt the rats will win me over as the gerbils have, but, you never know.

Our Zimbabwe experience in a teeny tiny nutshell

Since I gathered a few photos of our time in Zimbabwe, for my talk on Saturday, I thought I'd post them here. There is loads not included. We loved Zimbabwe, and left reluctantly.

I went to Zimbabwe with Crosslinks, to teach Old Testament in a small Anglican theological college, called Bishop Gaul Theological College. It was the provincial college for the Province of the Church of Central Africa, ie for Zimbabwe, Malawi, Zambia and Botswana. But, since it was such a large Province, students normally trained in little local colleges - and we only had twenty something students at the provincial one!

After one year, I married Dan, and we had a wedding celebration in Harare, in our friends' garden. Since I had become close to an older couple called Joe and Zilla Chiphudla, they demanded some bride price for me, so Dan paid them a goat for me! The goat then had twin kids - so they were really pleased!

Both our children were born in Zimbabwe. Babies are much loved there as you would expect. This is Pilani, one of our friends, meeting Abigail. She wasn't loving it...

This is when Alex was born - as you see, everyone comes to visit the newborn! These were some of the gorgeous ladies from our church, All Souls Mount Pleasant. Alex was only one day old! The visitors would always sing some hymns and say prayers aloud for the baby - it was a very special time, for me, and for the white farmer's wife in the bed next to mine!

A typical Jacaranda-lined suburb street of Harare. We lived right in Harare, a modern city (although it felt like it was still in the 1950s - but clean, wide streets, potholes fixed all the time, nothing like Kampala... at least, it was then; now, it is getting more like Kampala.)

This is me with Chad, the principal of the Anglican college. He is such a lovely man. He is now the Bishop of Harare, a job which came in very difficult circumstances, although things are better now.

Because I had previously lived in rural Zambia, I always longed to get out of the city into the other Zimbabwe. We made friends early on with a couple called Cuthbert and Shylet, and Shylet's mother lived in what were called "communal lands" about 45 minutes drive from Harare. (ie villages, in farming land, but, rough stony land, which the settlers allowed the blacks to live on - Zimbabwe's history is not all sunlight and roses...) This is me with Shylet's mother at her home.

In Zimbabwe, you usually did not use a person's name once they had children, you called them "Mama eldest child's name" - so we never learned this lady's own name!! Although we went there very often. I was called Mama Vimbai once Abigail was born - as her Shona name is Vimbainashe, shortened to Vimbai.

Dan meanwhile worked in an interdenominational college called Domboshawa Theological College. He was the academic dean there, and acting principal for a while.

We ended up leaving at very short notice, because a new bishop (before Chad) was appointed who was a political appointment, and found reasons to terminate all the contracts of white missionaries or clergy. Many Zimbabwean clergy also left the country at that time. It is a long story, but it involved Dan being accused of being in an assassination plot!! and getting phone calls from the War Veterans' Office accusing him of mistreating a war veteran (which would lead to many scary things if found to be true). Needless to say, neither of these things were true! It was all quite exciting, in its way. Alex was a newborn and Abby less than two at this point... In the end we found out we would be leaving, because a journalist rang us up and said, "I am hearing that you have been fie-ad - is it true?" It was the first we knew of it - but it came to pass.

God had already prepared a way for us and our young family though - and we were able to move to Redcliffe College within a few months, and start teaching there as Visiting Lecturers, while we looked for our next placement in Africa - which turned out to be, Uganda Christian University...

The beautiful world

These are some photos we took at the weekend, which we spent in Devon staying with my parents, with my sister-in-law Charlotte and their children, cousins to Abby and Alex. We went on a walk by the River Teign, on a beautiful day - it could have almost been Spring! Alex and April Grace especially get on like a house on fire, partners in crime and all that.

According to Abby Bartels, I love nature because I love perfection,
and nature is pretty much perfect without my intervention. I also love the peace, how undemanding, and pleasing and gentle it all is on the eyes. Give me fields, trees and streams, sheep, flowers and birdsong, any day.

A fleeting dream and a realisation...

So after a whole wonderful week of being a young, free couple again, we collected our two best-beloveds from my parents, first spending two days all together in Devon before bringing them home.

Yesterday we dipped happily again into the Tudor history of England - I had forgotten how close all our colourful and varied history is and how much of it is preserved here.  We went to an ancient house called Buckland Abbey in Devon - originally in the 1200s a monastery, then owned in the 1600s by Sir Francis Drake (an explorer, naval captain, friend and defender of Elizabeth I, victor over the Spanish Armada, first circumnavigator of the globe, treasure-seeker, bowls-player). Now it is owned by the National Trust and is full of Tudor furniture and artefacts and is beautiful.

This is Abigail dressed in Tudor clothes, in front of a portrait of Sir Francis Drake.

On the way into the Abbey, there were various panels depicting some of its history.

One of them described the original function of the place as a Cistercian monastery, with the words: "The monks lived here a life of peace, discipline and dedication."

Those words flowed through my soul and body like warm oil, or, like a long soothing sip of hot tea...

oh, to have our home be a place of "peace, discipline and dedication"... 

I mentioned this to Abby, Alex and my Mum who were standing with me, and we all just laughed. OK, we all know which of us would have the most trouble with "peace" (Alex, our real boy) but I have to admit that the "discipline" would be hardest for me, not least the getting up at 2.00 am for prayers... 

Coming back home this evening, I have been surveying our cosy, untidy home with a new eye. I could look at it as a place that badly needs organising, cleaning up, and hoovering. I could wish that the TV wasn't yakkering on with the Olympics every minute right now, and that Alex would be a bit quieter and more relaxed, and that it was all peaceful and clean... but then again, I was not called to live in a monastery after all, I am a mother of two fun, energetic and creative children and wife of a husband, ditto. I am happy with that, and I love our home. 

A taste of the future?

We are having a funny peculiar week - our children have gone. They are staying at my parents', for a whole seven days! Because my job carries on through the summer holidays, Mum offered to have the children stay for a while to cover some of my work days - not purely altruistically but, it is also hard work for her! But they are all very happy, and surviving. It is one of the benefits of moving back home, moving back within grandparental reach - and it is a good one.

We feel so strange because in the past we have left Abby and Alex with other families and friends, while we ourselves went away - but we have never stayed at home while they went away. It is actually bliss to eat supper in front of the TV and watch what we want to watch, and to get up for breakfast when we want to, rather than when Alex begins to starve noisily and digest his insides... It is peaceful... and restful... Dan says I am not a born mother. But, I know some of you will relate.

But also, I MISS them! Alex's funniness, Abigail's sweetness and little chats, the hugs, the piano playing, the giggles. But I don't miss the arguments, the fuming, the computer sounds, the scooter and waveboard lying in every corner of the kitchen I need to get to. But, it will be good to have them back...

Anyway, we took advantage of the weekend and went away, the two of us and Frodo, to the Brecon Beacons, across the border in Wales. Wales is part of us but a separate country as well, with its own ways, scenery, and language.

That town is pronounced Boolck. I believe. We called it Belch though.

We stayed in a gorgeous cottage B and B, with fabulous views from the windows of our room.

And a beautiful sunset - almost African.

On the Saturday morning we blithely picked a seven-mile hike, up the highest of the Black Mountains, called Waun Fach (pronounced Wine Vaack)... The scenery was out of this world, the sheep were fluffy, the hillsides were green, the sky was blue, Frodo was in heaven. We all got new hairstyles in the powerful wind that blew up on the hilltops. Gliders were whooshing past us with gentle sighs, sometimes below our eye-level. It was exhilarating and fabulous.

But at a certain point I discovered that one can't sit around and eat chocolate for nine months, and then expect to leap and bound up a Welsh mountain like a gazelle after all... I came over "all funny", when we were almost at the top - but we still had a climb and then about two hours more walking to get down again... I had to have a lie-down, twice. I came out all over in freezing sweat, and my legs went first heavy and then useless, and Dan nearly had to call the helicopters! It was actually scary and I began to feel panicky, which was unfortunate. It was worse than getting short of breath and achy legs. It was kind of systemic. I must be wildly unfit.

Anyway, thankfully, with Dan's calming presence, and the thought of cups of tea and a bath sustaining me, and with the help of a bar of chocolate which a couple passing by kindly gave me, and after two good lie-downs, I made it on and down without the help of the rescue services!

On Sunday we wended our way back home via Hay-on-Wye, the town of books (a town stuffed full of second-hand book shops, where there are posters saying the Kindle is banned there!), and then Hereford which is a beautiful historic town.

And so back to the Olympics and all Team GBs near-misses...