Road Trip in Sumbawa

I’ve been back in Sumbawa for almost a week now after a beautiful month in Bali recharging my batteries for teaching and for life. The last term of the semester was one of the most trying of my professional and personal life, and, to be honest, I barely made it through the long ten weeks.

But, being back with my family, being back in Singaraja, being back in Kampung Bugis, gave me the breathing space that I needed to re-evaluate my life and my priorities. Part of the problem was reconciling myself to the end of my brief retirement and the extension of my working life for another six months.

I’ve always been one for speaking in absolutes as my therapist once pointed out many years ago, and I’ve worked on modifying that mindset. The key point here is that absolutes negate the possibility for change, and my life has been a continual unfolding of change, a crooked path of zigzags and weaves, doubling back sometimes, leaping over logical progressions, and sometimes just moving in circles. But, all that has lead me here to Sumbawa and Bali; and this is the place right now where I am happy and, at least for this time, fulfilled.

The last vacation was eventful: my 60th birthday, my eldest daughter’s 18th birthday, a new granddaughter, a new closer relationship with my youngest son, and an accepting of some new limitations brought on by the aging process as well as the realization that there are still new possibilities ahead.

I’m content – what more can I ask for?

Another link for new blog

This blog has now moved to wordpress. The new links are:

1. Podcast

2. Blog

Life on the farm, or why I love village life

I was out getting ready to cut the grass in the back yard (a major undertaking) for the first time since I was hit by the rock while cutting the grass which led to the two operations on my ankle when I noticed that we have some new little chicks (10, and how is this for a convoluted sentence). Since our dog, May, died the animals around here have been much safer. Dave, the dog that we have now, likes to chase and bite the chickens and geese and ducks and rabbits, but he doesn’t have the killer instinct that May had. So I’m hoping that the chicks can survive until they are large enough and fast enough to avoid Dave when he’s in his playful mode. As I was examining the chicks, Su pointed out that our female duck has laid eggs. This is the first time that we are going to have baby ducks so we’re all excited to see them hatch.

We’ve decided to sell the goats. They’re just too much trouble to take care of the way that we want to. Most people around here just let them wander around the village grazing here and there. We’ve always keep ours in the back yard (moved now over to the garden across the road) which has meant that we have to get food for them everyday. We’ve also usually had a gardener to take care of this. Now that they boy we were paying to do this has gone back to Bali, I’ve decided that we need to sell the goats just to give us less to do on a daily basis. Su says she agrees, but I know from past experience just how hard it is getting here to sell something of ours. We’ll just have to see how that goes. I’m going over to the garden to check on them today.

So the title is why I love village life; the animals are one of the main reasons. Tomorrow a few more.