Pausa

A brief pause before going to Nuestra Casa to begin the watercolor project. I feel a little more fatigued than yesterday, but that may be in anticipation of the long afternoon ahead. Time always goes slowly for me at Nuestra Casa with the girls on account of my slow and clumsy Spanish and the general awkwardness of being there. But we will do the best that we can to open up spaces for creativity, curiosity, and compassion (and other positive things that begin with a C). There have been a couple of new arrivals, including a teenager who is nearly blind and suffers intense headaches or migraines. Sadly, there have also been departures, or as Señorita Pamela put it, escapes. Two of the older teenagers ran away late last month. The shelter is by nature a transient place, but you do not want to have episodes like this. I worry for those two girls because it is not safe for them to return home, and it is definitely not safe to live on the streets. Where have they gone? I can only hope against hope that they had plans to be received by responsible elders or peers they could trust to protect them without violence or compromise to their well-being. Please send your prayers to all the girls and women of Bolivia who live at risk of abuse or worse traumatic events. 

Yesterday evening: a pleasant couple of hours in the company of the Mennonite volunteers, with good food and good conversation. I hope to visit a couple more times before I depart in August. 

Today at Maryknoll: acquiring knowledge of the various usages of the conditional tense and the imperfect subjunctive tense and the future tense. Hats off to Profesor Osvaldo for making it all easily comprehensible and leaving Grace and I amused in the process. The weekly conference was about the new year celebrations observed on the first day of winter, June 21, by all indigenous peoples of Latin America, and particularly the Andean and Amazonian peoples. Time prevents me from going into detail about it, but perhaps I will write a retrospective post after my trip to Salar de Uyuni, where I will be next Friday when the new year celebrations commence. We thank Señora Vicente Mamani, a friend of the Maryknoll community from La Paz, for visiting us and giving us a brief but comprehensive exposition on both the new year celebrations and the rituals associated with the feast of Saint John the Baptist on the following days, June 23 and 24. Eucharist followed at the Maryknoll chapel; I have attended Mass here for three consecutive days and participated as lector in the liturgy. I feel confident and competent proclaiming the readings. 

A brief lunch, and now to post, then to the shelter, then a brief dinner back at Convento San Francisco and evening prayer before going to Teatro Adela Zamudio for the benefit to support pediatric heart surgeries. A full day today and a full life here in Cochabamba, with its frequent changes of pace, with its ups and downs, with its sunrises and sunsets.