02/27/2010 - Torrential Rain

We all use words like "hot and cold" or "near and far". All of these types of words have different meanings to different people. Obviously someone who thinks a flight to New York from Florida as being far has a slightly different perspective than someone who travels to Ukraine ;)

However, I have discovered a new word which also falls into this category - rain. When someone in Ukraine says it is raining, they typically mean that there is barely any rain falling. Sure, there are times when the rain is heavy, but these occasions are seldom when compared to the rest of the year. However, to a Floridian, heavy rain is a frequent occurrence ... such as for me today.

I have forgotten how harrowing it is to be travelling at 110-120 Km/h (70 Mph) in a deluge of rain ... it is worse than driving on ice because at least then you can see where you are (or theoretically should be) going. Today it became even worse when travelling down the interstate highway only to be passed by an 18-wheeler going in the opposite direction in a construction zone and spray the car with enough water that it was impossible to see for about 3-5 seconds. I was seriously scared.

Yet, it is remarkably these small and subtle differences which make me love Ukraine even more (and miss it even further). The perspective that Ukrainians have on life is so different than what I once had.

I don't know that I have any real point to this except to say, "It rained a lot today and I got scared on the Interstate highway" hehe. Maybe, in some small way, I'm just finding ways to miss Ukraine even more.

Anyways, back to the point of everything! The last couple weeks have been busy. Most notably we've been struggling with trying to get Christina some Medicaid support for our upcoming delivery. Praise the Lord, she has been approved so we won't be going destitute! At the same time, our new computer has had significant problems since we first turned it on so it is off being repaired (I only mention this because it took a lot of time to convince Hp there was a problem). Along with it though went all our bookmarks, email, etc so I blame HP for my lack of blog writing ... blah, yeah it is still my fault ;)

Christina is doing ok - remarkably better than she ever was in Ukraine which is a huge blessing to me. We've had our struggles with illness, but overall she is doing fine as long as she gets enough rest.

Leah has had a hard time adjusting. When we first arrived she did ok - slept and ate ok, but right now she isn't eating well (being picky) and waking up a lot while sleeping, usually because she rolls out of bed - too used to the crib walls, I guess. She's doing ok too, overall I think.

We've had a couple of times so far to share about Ukraine and what God is doing there, but mostly that will begin this week as we have at least 3 meetings to go to each week - 5 of them being home group meetings! It is all pretty exciting and we hope God works on peoples' hearts. I pray there are some "sleeper" missionaries out there that God wants to bring up.

Last night there was a missions service which is a one-a-month service held in one of the smaller rooms at our home church. We heard the results from a Guatemala outreach and how God used the medical team there to reach over 200 lives for Jesus. Pretty neat what God is doing around the world.

Yup, that is it because I had no more time left to type - Leah just woke up from her nap again :) Oh, and no pictures until our computer comes back. I'm using a loaner and can't install anything.