Life Moves in Mysterious Ways...But You Knew That!

No Hair? No fuss, no muss!

I won’t dwell much on the subject of my adventures in cancer as many others have been written or spoken extensively on the subject.  Let’s just say, for me, it’s been both a challenge and a joy. Although there are bad days and worries about the future, there are far more good ones.  When I’m feeling good, I’m living life to the fullest.  Yes, there have been “losses”, if you will, in my life by having to surrender to this.  But there have been far more silver linings, I count them every day and take delight in their gifts.  I’m now on round two of four cycles of chemotherapy. James is taking outstanding care of me physically and emotionally.  He has no other pet name for me other than “gorgeous”, which he started to call me the first time we met and has not stopped to this day--bald eagle and all!  I feel loved, pampered and protected.  I couldn't ask for anything more. :)

I continue to work at my job from afar via Internet.  My boss, Pamela, at CONAPAC has been a shining light and picked up where I left off.  This is our busiest time of year with annual Adopt-A-School deliveries coming up in April.  Both experienced and new volunteers alike have agreed to step up to do everything they can to execute this very important program.  I have no doubt that, once again, 4,000 students, teachers and community leaders will be provided with school supplies and related classroom materials.  Flooding is a concern—again!—this year so we may need to make delivery adjustments, but with last year’s flood experience under our belts, I'm confident things will work themselves out and a great time will be had by all!  

Newly Certified Water Operators

I’m working on a new pilot project for this year in the area of clean water.  Last year we hosted an intern from the University of Colorado who really helped beef up our operator training program. Many operators were certified with more to follow later in the year.  Our expectation is improved water quality and consistent access to clean water by community members.  For this year’s pilot project over the course of six months, will we place 100 Sawyer clean water bucket systems in three of our partner communities.  These individual bucket systems could allow us to provide clean drinking water to our more remote and smaller villages. We are eager to see the results.  Although I won’t be there for most of the year to oversee the pilot project, my staff, the CU-Boulder students and the Detroit Zoo Volunteers will do a great job implementing and monitoring the project.  If we decide this is a winning approach and we want to place more Sawyer bucket systems (we have about to 2,000 eligible families), watch out as I’ll be looking for donor dollars! Check out the Sawyer link: http://www.sawyer.com/sawyersaves/

Yes, I still wear many hats!

A final observation about living in Australia.  Although they speak English it’s often quite a challenge for me, not just the accent but the use of different words for common items.  I find I’m becoming tri-lingual by speaking American English, Australia English and Spanish. We all know they say boot instead of trunk and bonnet instead of hood for a car. And no matter how old you are or what sex, if it’s a sweater, jacket, sweatshirt or coat, it’s a jumper. But some other little turns of phrase are subtle.  Instead of math it’s maths; instead of “sports” it’s “sport”; and instead of cereal it’s cereals.  They don’t say what’s your given name but what’s your Christian name? They don’t say business hours but trading hours.  Come around for tea usually means dinner, so go hungry. They don’t say lakeshore or the river’s edge but they call it the foreshore.  For electrical plugs they’re not grounded but earthed. Kids don’t color they color in and old bitties are old ducks--and I’m not a chick but rather a bird. The final odd thing that I never knew but maybe you all do is that the letter Z is not pronounced zee it’s pronounced zed (like Ned).  I guess it’s the same in the UK and Canada, too.  Well, just another way to expand my mind and ward off Alzheimer’s. Now I just have to remember which country I’m in when I open my mouth!