A Rough, Blessed Week

This week has been really hard.  I've been plagued with feelings of isolation, ineffectiveness, and heartbreak.*

And yet - 

• I've been the recipient of unsolicited encouragement emails from friends back home.
• Two of my Chinese friend have gone FAR out of their way to explain to me - at great length - exactly how I've impacted their lives.
• I threw out my pain into an anonymous FB-group I love. (DFTBA)  After a couple of hours I had some truly insightful and kind words of encouragement from strangers in Glasgow, Florida, Ohio, Norway, and Australia.

I feel incredibly blessed that God has responded to each struggle this week in such direct, specific ways. It's like finding a buoy in open water when I'm exhausted.  Isn't that wonderful?

A few kind, insightful words from a stranger on the internet that I turned into a sign for my wall.

*Finals are also looming, so grading, preparation, and skyrocketing stress are all working to tie my shoulders in knots.

Picking up the Pace

An excerpt from an email to a friend.

She said: "Hey, what's up with you?"

I said:

Hey.
- Grades.
- Final Reviews.
- Meetings about MORE employment next year.
- I met the UN head of Women's issues for the country of Morocco. She's going to connect me with the UN Director of NGOs in Palestine.
- Applying for a professional Fulbright Grant to do research.
- Considering getting a second Masters next year in sociology.
- I think I have a new mentor - a fascinating French Canadian woman who studied the rise/fall of the women's movement in the M.E. We had an immediate connection.
- And hey, I mentioned grading and finals, right? Ugh, stress.
- Still no airplane tickets. If there's no improvement, I'm buying a kayak.

There are sooooo many things going on right now, fascinating things, exciting things, motivational things, ALL-THE-THINGS!  I have two partially written posts explaining what's been going on.  I hope to have a full-ish report to give you all by this weekend.