Life as normal

I've often wondered what normal is. I've begun to think it's a social construct. Normal depends on where you are and what society around you says. Often I think "Oh, there's not much to write about. Life is going on as normal". And then I realize that normal here is different from normal in the States. So I thought I'd write about normal life here in Peru to give you an idea of what normal is like for me these days. Peru is a relationship-oriented culture, which means that spending time with people occupies a lot of my days. Often these times with friends happen very spontaneously, thus inciting the comment from John Kreider, a fellow missionary, that here in Peru, things are set in Jello, as opposed to cement.
Case in point, I began this blog entry this morning, then received a call from one of my friends inviting me to go play racquetball with her and some other friends. Since today was a transportation strike, I walked for an hour and a half to get there, then wandered around being lost until I found them and played racquetball for about an hour before having to head home for a missionary team meeting. Now it's evening and I'm still updating my blog. :)
If you'd look at my proposed agenda in my head at the beginning of the week, it would look very different from what actually happens by the end of the week. A typical day in my mental agenda looks like this: wake up, go to school, come home from school, spend time with Marga doing what needs to be done around the house, work on schoolwork, go to bed. However, a typical day generally actually goes somewhat more like this: wake up, go to school, at school learn that someone wants to do something together in the afternoon or needs help with English, come home from school, do something with someone, do a little schoolwork, go to bed.
But there are many blessings that come with being a part of such a culture. Sometimes these times of spending time with people doing whatever we're doing are the best times to really get to know someone and/or make memories. The other week, I came home from school and Marga asked me to help her make wedding cakes for a wedding that was to be the next day. Valeria, who was supposed to make the cakes, had to travel, so she had asked Marga to make the cakes. Valeria has a large wood-fueled oven in her house, so we could bake them all at once and do it very quickly. So we went to Valeria's house, where we met up with about 4 other people. Working together, we mixed up 10 large cakes in a very short amount of time. Then we stuck them in the oven. 5 minutes later we quickly took them out of the oven because the oven was way too hot and the tops burned black in the short amount of time that they were in there. We covered them with wet pieces of paper and finished baking them. As they came out of the oven and cooled, Frida cut the burned parts of them off with a knife. They turned out fine! But it was definitely a bonding experience for all of us. We had lots of laughs trying to figure out how to fix our problem and what we were going to tell Valeria.
And then there was the conversation I had with Marisol the other week, walking from school to where she needed to get a combi to go home. We were able to share from the heart as we walked along, eating popsicles. It was totally a spontaneous, spur-of-the-moment thing, but it was so great! Another day the same week, Marisol asked me for help with English, so we went downtown and ate pizza, then spent a while working on English. She also decided she wanted to get her hair cut, so the next evening we went downtown again and spent time at our friend Norma's styling salon.
And then Juana calls sometimes wanting help with English homework. So she'll come over and we'll spend more time talking and catching up with where each other's at and what's going on than actually working on English.
When I'm in Huacarpay the same phenomenon happens. I have yet to get out to Huacarpay and right off the bat have worship team practice. I doubt it will ever happen. I usually get there and no one's at the church. So I walk down to Rene's house, where something is always going on. This past week I got there only to find her in the midst of making her son's birthday lunch for the next day (which I had no idea about but ended up going to). Once that was finished, then we had worship team practice. And then I usually go back to Pastor Celestino and Ines's house and crash there for the night, spending time with their family.
Living life relationally is very different from living life in a planned, structured way. Sometimes I wish I'd have more time to work on schoolwork. But then I think about all I'd miss out on if my mental agenda looked more like my actual agenda. And then I decide I'm really actually glad that I live in this new kind of normal, where people come first and relationships are forged in the midst of these spontaneous times of togetherness. It's a blessing and the energy I pour out is more than replaced by the energy generated by friendship and fellowship.
So when I say my life is normal, what I really mean to say is that I am forging relationships in the midst of this culture and feeling very blessed to have the opportunity to do so.