A thousand words

I find it rather ironic that after almost two weeks on wanting to write and not having time I am finding myself with an acute case of writers block.

I keep wanting to say that things have been busy…busy but so so good.  I am just starting to realize that the longer one is here the more responsibility is accrued; the more things there are to be involved in, people to see, and amount of things there are to manage at work.  And so my life has become busier and busier, a series of choices and longer shifts and piecemeal time with friends, and over it all the knowledge that I am here to serve and I have been given the opportunity.

It’s hard even to know what to write sometimes.  There is so much that happens even just on a daily basis.  The adventures that have become my life are hard to sum up in a simple blog post or a few words and photos.

How can I introduce you to each one of my wonderful patients…they are all mine, with their own stories and struggles and lives. (Don’t worry, I’ll still try!)  How do I express the challenge and frustrations and responsibilities and exuberant love that are charge nursing?  How do I share my life: the flying hugs from Mohmed and Ada every time I just walk onto C ward, drawing up medications with Abu Bakar clinging stubbornly to my leg, the games and worship and prayer in 7 different languages, meaningful midnight chats over fresh croissants, poda-poda dust baths careening through the streets packed with people, the days without showering during a water shortage so that surgery can continue…and not knowing when we’ll be able to shower again?

I want to share my life here in such a way that you can taste the dust, feel the crush of people in the market, smell the chicken poop and hear the incessant beat of the drums until you just can't help dancing.  I want to make you understand the excitement and the sorrow that comes with working on a surgical hospital in Africa...but how?  If I take a hundred pictures, use a thousand words, can I bring you here into my world?