Trinidad & Tobago

"The more difficulties one sees in the world the more perfect one becomes. The more you plough and dig the ground the more fertile it becomes. The more you cut the branches of a tree the higher and stronger it grows. The more you put the gold in the fire the purer it becomes. The more often the captain of a ship is in the tempest and difficult sailing the greater his knowledge becomes." - 'Abdu'l-Bahá

Last night my time, just was I was getting ready for bed, an earthquake of magnitude 6.3 shook Christchurch, New Zealand so violently that buildings collapsed in on themselves, roads buckled and ripped apart, cars were flattened beneath rubble falling from buildings, water pipes burst, and sinkholes opened up all over the city. I have a very close friend who lives in Christchurch whose family home was damaged so severely in the country's last major earthquake, in September 2010, that the building had already been identified as one that needs to be torn down and rebuilt in the near-future, so the news that another earthquake had struck, and only three miles beneath the city, had me worried sick for Pascale and her family. 

After watching video clips of the cathedral's steeple collapsing, the entire downtown area in rubble, and seeing images of people emerging from beneath buildings covered in blood, I got on Facebook to see if Pascale had posted any updates on how they were doing. 

Pascale is an amazing woman. She is a personal trainer who works with her clients not only on their physical fitness, but on their spiritual fitness as well. She is empowering and tremendously inspiring. But to be honest I did not expect to find three video clips of her experience of the earthquake online already. Clicking on the first, I watched as Pascale narrated a video of the flooded street outside her house, explaining that the street had literally gotten soft like a sponge as a result of liquefaction. Her second clip, which started with an image of one wall of her house which had completely collapsed on top of her neighbour's car, was titled: We told her not to park her car there. This clip then moved inside Pascale's home. The walls all have huge cracks climbing them like lightening rods. The ceilings are all cracked, the doorways and arches are cracked, and then there was that pesky entire wall that had completely dropped away and collapsed outwards. Pascale and her family had to move down the street to stay with extended family as their house, which had been badly damaged, is now unsafe to inhabit. Her third video clip takes a walk outside to have a look at the creek that is usually a small stream alongside her house. In the clip it had become a large pond that was the colour of gunpowder. Pascale commented on how much more water there was in it, but then she exclaimed, in a bright and cheerful voice: "But the ducks made it! Way to go Trinidad and Tobago!" 

Now I don't know about anyone else, but when your entire city is literally collapsing around you, you have no power or running water, your only car with a full tank of gas is stranded in a parking garage that may or may not still be standing, and all of your work for the week has been canceled, it seems to me like the lives of two ducks would be the last thing on your mind. But there are many reasons why I love this woman, and her endless optimism would definitely be one of them. Hearing her joy at the fact that Trinidad and Tobago made it through the quake made me laugh out loud. And the fact that she has two resident ducks on her property who she had the brilliant idea to name Trinidad and Tobago had me well-amused as well.

Since then, Pascale has gone on to find a well that she can get water from with a bucket, has nominated herself as resident tea-maker for anyone and everyone in the house, and even sat down to enjoy a hot bowl of meat stew with gratitude, despite being a vegetarian. Yes, I would say Pascale is definitely an example of seeing the glass as half full. 

As I moved through my own day, I found myself stopping often and thinking about Pascale and her ability to keep her cool, stay calm and positive and encouraging of others in the face of a tremendous amount of stress. She is someone I have a lot to learn from. As she presses forward into the difficult days and weeks ahead, and tries, along with her fellow community-members, to rebuild her life and her home, I will be praying for her and her fellow New Zealanders. I will also be taking time every day to find my own Trinidad and Tobago. We can't all have ducks, but finding and celebrating the joy, beauty and hope that exist even in the most dire circumstances is definitely within all of our grasp.

Finite disappointments

"We must accept finite disappointment, but we must never lose infinite hope." -Martin Luther King, Jr.

Sometimes you don't get the job. Or the guy. Sometimes you can't afford a haircut. Or a meal out. Or gifts for friends. Sometimes you lose your an entire day's worth of work when your computer crashes. The one person you really want to talk to is not responding to any of your calls. You order hot chocolate, and get served bitter coffee instead. Sometimes someone close to you hurts your feelings one too many times. Sometimes you lie in bed at night wondering where you belong in the universe. When the pieces of your world will ever come together. When you will find work you love again. Get asked out on a date by someone you are actually excited to be with. Find a community that feels like home.

And sometimes you get to plant seeds in a greenhouse in the middle of a rainstorm, and listen to the downpour sliding over the plastic, the wind howling around you, loving the sound. Sometimes friends invite you over for dinner unexpectedly. Sometimes you get to garden with a group of youth that help you to get outside yourself a little, and focus on serving others for an hour, or an afternoon. Sometimes the rain falling rhythmically in sheets outside at night is luxurious and calming. A quiet walk at night on wet sidewalks helps you to re-group and find hope in the reflection of stars and branches beneath your feet. Sometimes a stranger catches your eye in a coffee shop and smiles. Sometimes you win trips to a Caribbean Island in the middle of winter. Sometimes you go into the childrens' section of a bookstore for the first time in years, on a rainy day, looking for a birthday present for a friend's daughter, who is turning two, and end up spending a couple of hours hunkered down on a miniature chair at a little table, fully engrossed in planting a garden that grows and grows, transforming an entire city; or searching for your own colour like Mr. Chameleon, who was tired of turning the colour of everything around him; or trying to figure out where you belong in the universe with a little boy who searches high and low, only to find that he belongs right where he is, in the present moment. Sometimes you spend a Friday evening surrounded by 19 new friends whose company you enjoy. Who make you laugh, and remind you to be silly. Sometimes it rains and rains for days and days, and, instead of wishing it were sunny, you spend time listening more, inhaling the aroma of earth, and feeling blessed.

Sometimes you feel more than a little shaky. But your friends make you laugh. They make you laugh and laugh. They put things back into perspective. Sometimes you drive home after a lovely, long, rich evening with friends, still tender on the inside, but knowing that this moment, too, will pass. That life is full of finite disappointments, but that you are also surrounded with infinite moments of hope, beauty and courage. Sometimes you whisper prayers of gratitude into the night before you fall asleep, listening to rain endlessly outside.