Garganta

Making homework for myself this weekend. I finished a few pages on the past participle, the preterite perfect tense, and reflexive verbs in my activity workbook. I took out a book from the mission center library, a thin volume of witch fairy-tales for adolescents. I worked out the vocabulary and practiced reading one of the stories aloud. I would like to share it with the girls at the shelter tomorrow or Wednesday, depending on their other activities and their interest in our art projects. This first one is interesting: a witch falls from the sky, landing in the house of a goblin who takes exception to the way she treated Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. It is a revisioning of the Hans Christian Andersen tale: the witch says the dwarfs were exploiting Snow White, and she was better off without them … and the prince, for that matter. Mischief ensues between the goblin and the witch but ends on a note of concord. 

News from the home front: In less than two weeks my Capuchin brother, Scott Leet, will arrive and join me in Spanish studies at Maryknoll and community life at Convento San Francisco. I have known for some time that Brother Scott would be joining me. This is very good news that has filled me, the Maryknoll community, and the Franciscans here with gladness. Brother Scott lived and studied in Cochabamba last spring and summer, and he is remembered fondly by one and all. We are all looking forward to his safe arrival on May 17. 

News from the convent: tomorrow afternoon there will be a visit from a few Franciscans who are bishops here in Bolivia. They will join us for lunch, but they are not staying the night with us. They will stay at the Seminario Mayor San Luis here in Cochabamba. I remembered prayerfully our Capuchin brothers in the United States who are bishops, Cardinal Sean O’Malley of Boston and Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia; and also John Corriveau, former minister general of the Capuchin order and retired bishop of Nelson, British Columbia. 

On the personal health front: the good news is that I slept for what felt like a full night last night. If at times I woke, I fell back to sleep shortly. Plenty of dreams, too. But through the night I felt a soreness in the back of my throat, and it stayed with me today. A little nasal congestion, too. My first cold outside the United States, but a minor inconvenience compared to the fatigue of sleeplessness. Surely these many days of less than adequate rest are catching up with the immune system. In fact, this afternoon I had a nap (gasp!) for what must have been an hour, or an hour and a half. The body wants rest, and it got it. What that means for this evening, I don’t know. But I don’t regret the nap. It’s the first one I’ve had in weeks.