I’m not in Malawi anymore. But I am in my grandparents’ back
garden. And it is, much to my surprise, beautiful. The sun glitters on the dew,
and the birds dance in the still, blue-white English sky. There’s a mossy stone
sun dial, a lopsided bird-feeder, a huge great apple tree heavy with fruit. And
yeah, maybe I can’t give God all the credit for this place like I could for
Mulanje plateau, or the lake, or the rolling bush, but then again maybe I can.
Because God created birds, and flowers, and the kiss of dew, and apples, but
then, even better, he created my Grandpa – and he created him with the
imagination and dedication and patience and creativity and skill to grow this garden.
And isn’t it the mark of the greatest genius to be able to inspire brilliance
in others?
This has, actually, been a big part of what it’s been like to come back for me. I’d love to write you a blog about how horrendously materialistic and wasteful and lonely the western world is – and if I thought about it I could probably generate quite a bit of material – but that hasn’t been what I’ve noticed coming back. I haven’t had time to notice it, I’ve been too busy spending time with wonderful, wonderful people. People are awesome. They’re funny, and loveable, and loving, and they do nice things and say interesting things and do stupid things. And sometimes, just sometimes, they understand. They take a beautiful moment and they dance in it with you. I’m getting pretentious now but I’m just trying to express the incredible privilege we have in other people. And when people ask me what the best thing about Malawi was, it turns out the answer is “the people I got to love”.*So now in just the same way I discover the best thing about being home is not any of the stuff I had been so eagerly awaiting: fresh milk, my awesome shower, bed and no mosquito net, carpets, cars with less than seven people in them, cheese, cheap fruit juice, transport that works... The best thing about being home is loving and being loved by my family and my friends and Rachael. It sounds a bit silly because it’s so simple but it is that simple.
The one challenge that I am struggling with a bit, is not being lonely often enough. At Chimbowe, there was a lot of time where I didn’t really need to do anything, and no one was really around, and I could go and sit on the back step, or walk somewhere, and properly spend time with God. I could sit down and talk to him about how I was doing, and tell him what was hard and how I was messing up, and ask him to help me and ask him to change the world. I could read about Jesus and listen to what he was telling me, I could try to find the challenge, I could ask him to help me help him, I could remember what I was born to do and who I was born to be. I loved that time. Sometimes it was boring and flat because I was tired or distracted or whatever, but other times it was the most beautiful, most profound, most exciting bit of the day. And I haven’t really found the time for the last few weeks, and I miss it. I just wrote in a message to my friend that it feels a bit like when you’ve been with someone all week but you’ve been too busy doing stuff or with other people all the time and not once have you sat down and had a proper chat. And it’s great, you’ve had great times, but you kind of miss your mate. It happened last summer when Rachael came with my family to see Dad’s family in Northern Ireland – we were all together all week and by the end I was really missing Rachael! It’s like that.
Anyway, the last thing to say is this. I’m going to keep writing, and just hope that a few of you want to keep reading. I know I’m not in Africa anymore, but I’m determined to live a life worth blogging about. So, perhaps good bye, but hopefully, au revoir.
This has, actually, been a big part of what it’s been like to come back for me. I’d love to write you a blog about how horrendously materialistic and wasteful and lonely the western world is – and if I thought about it I could probably generate quite a bit of material – but that hasn’t been what I’ve noticed coming back. I haven’t had time to notice it, I’ve been too busy spending time with wonderful, wonderful people. People are awesome. They’re funny, and loveable, and loving, and they do nice things and say interesting things and do stupid things. And sometimes, just sometimes, they understand. They take a beautiful moment and they dance in it with you. I’m getting pretentious now but I’m just trying to express the incredible privilege we have in other people. And when people ask me what the best thing about Malawi was, it turns out the answer is “the people I got to love”.*So now in just the same way I discover the best thing about being home is not any of the stuff I had been so eagerly awaiting: fresh milk, my awesome shower, bed and no mosquito net, carpets, cars with less than seven people in them, cheese, cheap fruit juice, transport that works... The best thing about being home is loving and being loved by my family and my friends and Rachael. It sounds a bit silly because it’s so simple but it is that simple.
The one challenge that I am struggling with a bit, is not being lonely often enough. At Chimbowe, there was a lot of time where I didn’t really need to do anything, and no one was really around, and I could go and sit on the back step, or walk somewhere, and properly spend time with God. I could sit down and talk to him about how I was doing, and tell him what was hard and how I was messing up, and ask him to help me and ask him to change the world. I could read about Jesus and listen to what he was telling me, I could try to find the challenge, I could ask him to help me help him, I could remember what I was born to do and who I was born to be. I loved that time. Sometimes it was boring and flat because I was tired or distracted or whatever, but other times it was the most beautiful, most profound, most exciting bit of the day. And I haven’t really found the time for the last few weeks, and I miss it. I just wrote in a message to my friend that it feels a bit like when you’ve been with someone all week but you’ve been too busy doing stuff or with other people all the time and not once have you sat down and had a proper chat. And it’s great, you’ve had great times, but you kind of miss your mate. It happened last summer when Rachael came with my family to see Dad’s family in Northern Ireland – we were all together all week and by the end I was really missing Rachael! It’s like that.
Anyway, the last thing to say is this. I’m going to keep writing, and just hope that a few of you want to keep reading. I know I’m not in Africa anymore, but I’m determined to live a life worth blogging about. So, perhaps good bye, but hopefully, au revoir.
*That includes Jesus, who I grew to know and love a lot
more. And in fact, the best times I had with my friends were whenever they
asked me questions about my Best Friend, and I got to share him with them a little
bit. Footnote over.
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