July 11, 2015 Day of Rest

We are back in Ecuador, since Monday of this week, getting re-acclimated to altitude, food, new bed, etc. I've been feeling guilty for not continuing the daily blog, but Vincent reminded me it was only I who thought it had to be every day. So here goes. The woman who rented us our last apartment kindly reserved another one for when we returned, so we are now on the second floor with a nice view of a tree-covered hill, but to me even more interesting, our neighbors' homes. These are small one or two room structures made of concrete and roofed--haphazardly--with red tile. It appears to be two related families, sharing a structure in the middle which may be latrines. Each of the families washes every other day in a concrete tub outside the shed and hangs the clean clothes on lines strung all across the yard. It looks like Buddhist prayer flags. They dress traditionally. One of them, an elderly man, was working in his garden (very overgrown) with a machete the other day. He was very expert with it.

To me it is a great pleasure to watch them. They chat and work together, a lot in the open, with chickens and dogs roaming the yard in peaceful coexistence, all seemingly oblivious to the presence of tourist hostals (longer-term hotels) all around them looking by contrast garishly modern and sleek. Ours is an older one, painted pastel pink and built in an add-on fashion very familiar to Ecuadorians. You build another floor or wing when you have the money. We adore our landlady, Lilia. She is a single mother of a sweet toddler. She works very hard, moving furniture and linens and kitchen supplies from floor to floor as required by her tenants. Once she even hung our laundry when we forgot and left it in the washer! In the old place, we had very bad internet reception at first. She kept on nagging the cable company until she got it improved, and it seems in our absence she got it fixed to work perfectly. We are very grateful, as it means we can stay in touch with "back home" better.

The week before we left, we received an offer on our house. It was much, much less than the house is actually worth, but we accepted it. The inspection was this Tuesday, while we were here, so the week before we left, we spent all of each and every day working to strip our house of our belongings. Everything we own except the car is now stored in 150 square feet. It was a delight to be able to bless our friends and neighbors with gifts of furniture and dishes. We held on to only our bed, my worktable (because it took us so long to find one that was low enough), and our two rocking chairs, one a wedding gift and the other a Christmas gift. It was wrenching for me to say goodbye to our home for the last 16 years--so many happy memories were created there, and our yard was a gift of grace in many ways for us. To eat breakfast while watching the birds and squirrels managing their own lives all around us, to see the beautiful offerings of the flowers, to enjoy the largesse of our now-grown trees, then say our prayers for the day, reminding us of the gratitude we owe to our Maker, that was heavenly. Interestingly enough, there are more birds around our backyard than we have around here, I don't know why.

We will reestablish that practice again here. Now we face into the tasks of furnishing the new office and hiring the new manager. We are not solely responsible for this--we are just the arms and legs of the people who will make the decisions, but that feels good to be helping. I personally am missing everyone, particularly my daughter and granddaughters. We had some wonderful times with them in June when we were in Illinois. We return to the U.S. in early October. Then we will jump right in to holiday sales events, selling fair trade items once more. If the sale of our house goes through, and right now we are not sure that it will, we will have to hurry up and find a place to live, at least until January 1. We don't know how that will happen, but we're on a journey without a clear destination, so we'll just have to trust in God's providence.

During our time in June, we were able to launch our new book, Transcendent Joy, which can be viewed on Amazon.com. It is a book that makes ME happy to read, so we brought a copy back here for the "down days," if there are any. Vincent suggests that I start another, writing about the artisans we have met who have touched us with their courage, grace and determination to make a better life for their children than they have had. If there is time in the next three months, I will.

We are still adjusting to and learning a different way of life. I am told (by the Ecuadorian consulate in Chicago) that jobs are very scarce. There are a lot of small business enterprises--micro, really, for many--where people combine their work with their daily chores. If the children are not in school, they play in the yard or the shop, wherever their parents are, or if they're old enough, they help. Some people do daily agricultural or cleaning work, others have small convenience stores in their homes, others are fortunate enough to have skills in producing crafts for export. The big factories are on the coast, not here, so there's no real slave labor. However, life here is much simpler, much less expensive (for us, not necessarily the ordinary citizens of Ecuador), and at a much more steady pace. When we were back in the U.S., for example, we felt literally bombarded whenever we entered a retail store or grocery--too many choices, too much pressure to buy, buy, buy. It was also very difficult to fit in visits with people we really wanted to see--either their schedule or ours was full. Not a problem here, but maybe that is because it is necessarily a smaller number of people, having arrived here only six months ago. No one expects a dishwasher or a vacuum cleaner or a car or a dryer for laundry or hot water in the kitchen sink, even though Ecuador is not a poor country. It's just not a part of the landscape, and I had no idea how much I did NOT miss those things, nor how much they complicate my life in the U.S. until now.

I was very happy to witness the regrowth of Ten Thousand Villages Evanston, which you know Vincent and I played a big part in opening. They had been in some bad straits early last year, so it was good to see the renewal of hope and energy, brought about by the staff and the new manager, Joseph. I thank him for taking such good care of "my baby." I know some of the artisans their work is benefiting, and they are grateful, too.

This afternoon, we will get ourselves unpacked and buy groceries for next week. Tomorrow we hope the sun will shine and we can do the laundry. Thank you all for your friendship and love. We are very blessed whatever country we are in because of you guys.

Love,

Susanne & Vincent