My day...

It began early. Rather typically actually. Samuel fixed the coffee and then we sat with our Bibles, praying and drinking with the sunshine flooding though our windows. Love mornings like that! I'm reading The Fisherman by Larry Huntsperger right now. It's a great book from my Daddy's old library about the way Peter experienced those few years he spent with Jesus. It's amazing. So far, my favorite line read like this, "I sometimes think the greatest gift the Master ever gave me was his permission to be myself. It was a gift he gave me most of all through all the things I never heard him say.... Amazingly, he seemed well content to have me forever blundering along at his side, knowing the only thing that would transform my life was the discovery that even my worst failures would never separate me from my Master's love."

Then........ Sam got a call. A unexpected job actually. Just for today and tomorrow at a Volvo factory. Needless to say, his work clothes were dropped off and he was out the door...

In the meantime I got a call from my daddy and mama in Hawaii! They're doing me some favors, calling embassies all across the states, trying to figure out what my best plan of action is in obtaining my "permission to stay" in Sweden. Looks like The Big Island is in my near future after all. I can almost feel that sea-spray. Almost. Well mostly, I just imagine it. It's hard to feel any kind of summer warmth when I'm living in this frigid cold! Oh my, it's cold.

So after a few moments in a quiet apartment, I decided to set out on the town. I bundled up and headed toward the ocean where a special BOKIA REA (book sale) was taking place. I was a little disappointed with their selection, mostly because there was not one English book in the building (except for the English-Swedish dictionaries), but I did find one sweet treasure!

A really wonderfully great Indian cook book - in Swedish! Two cultures and languages I long and dream of understanding more deeply! What a great new project! Can't wait to master it all! The Indian chai was just my little treat for inspiration :)

You should know, life in Varberg takes place on foot. I love this idea mostly, except for when we have to grocery shop and when my digital thermometer in the kitchen is reading -8 degrees celsius outside (plus wind chill), I just don't want to leave! My African bones are screaming for sunshine and desert sand and my American blood is longing for my old car. I suppose this new adventure is just going to have to give me a little grace. I'm European now. I was out for two hours this morning in the city center and my new tactic is simply to pretend like I'm really interested in all the little shops I kept going in and out of for warmth.