An Unplanned Day

Some days just take an interesting path, like today. We had no set plans for today. A cool, rainy morning greeted us and we were quite content, sitting on the covered deck with cups of hot coffee. I had just read Tia's e-mail about a bilingual women's brunch at church today when her car pulled up in front of our house. She was stopping to cut some heliconia from our yard and asked if we were coming today. Kris and I quickly decided that we would go.

The brunch was wonderful and well attended with upwards of 50 women, most of whom were from the nearby colonia and who spoke only Spanish. The brunch was the work of the two mission teams who are staying at the church. Pictures were taken and small gifts were given to each woman. Esmerelda (our former Spanish teacher and a wonderful singer) led the singing in a time of worship. It was beautiful to hear all those voices lifted in song! One of the women from the team delivered an encouraging message to the women, telling them how much God loved them and how they could have joy even during the most difficult times in their lives. Several of the women wiped away tears as she spoke. They need hope. She encouraged them to be supportive of one another, to pray for each other. It was interesting to watch their reactions when the brunch was served - quiche, a banana nut muffin and fruit. They had no idea what quiche was and seemed afraid to try it. Some nibbled at the fruit, other bravely tasted the quiche and saw that it was good. Most took at least some of their food home. Some also wanted to take the plastic utensils home. They did love the coffee that was served and drank lots of it. After the brunch, bags of food containing (raw) rice and beans and other things were passed out to the women from the colonia. Quite a lovely morning.

I took Kris back to the house, and Don said let's drive up to our lawyer's office in French Harbor. I called to make sure she would be there and learned that she was in Coxen Hole. She suggested that we meet her there at the bank, so off we went. We sat in the (oddly quiet) bank lobby and visited with her, catching up on news and giving her another document needed for acquiring residency here. We popped into Warren's to get some rosemary (no luck) and salt...and they had bread! Lots of it! But I had just bought a freshly baked loaf of still warm wheat bread at the church coffee shop.

We decided to walk down the street toward the cruise ship pier and check out the new souvenier shop our friends Bob and Debi built to sell locally made artwork and jewelry. We bought a small painting by Luma who also attends our church. While there, we met a group of people from the cruise ship who asked directions to Yaba Ding Ding, another gift shop. We decided to walk them there since it was back just past where we had left our car. We had a nice visit with them; they were very curious about living on the island.

Next left the Hole, stopping by Walter's car wash and auto repair to get replacement brake light bulbs. He didn't have any but directed us to a shop near our bank back in the Hole. We drove by there but didn't find it. We'll go back and walk along there, maybe we'll find it. We made a quick stop at Plaza Mar, searching for some rosemary, which we didn't find, and ran into friends Lynn and Bob and spent some time catching up with them.

On the way home, we drove on up to Dennis and Merlin's to see the new house which we call the Starship Enterprise because of it's dramatic rounded design. It is pretty impressive. They had other guests and were watching a George Jones concert video and when that ended, a Tina Turner concert. They invited us to stay and watch, so we did. It was a fun afternoon in an interesting, unplanned day.