OCD

Well, I finally have to admit it to myself.

I am OCD.

Maybe a high functioning OCD. Is there such a thing?

I have been denying it for some time, though the subtle signs were all there, but this has finally brought it to full light. Okay, let me take you back to the story of a young mother.

In a town quite similar to the one I live in (it is the one I live in) lived a young mother not unsimilar to me (she was me). This mother was not ridiculously organized. In fact at times she was downright unorganized. She had many things going on in her life, and indeed many things that were not ideal and quite out of her control. Perhaps that is what drove her to it, but when it came to her son, she was fastidious about a few things.

1.) His outfits must be coordinated from the shirt to pants to socks. If possible the jacket, coat, or blanket shouldn't detract from the outfit either. In the rare event that laundry ran down to a level where she wasn't able to make this happen, the mother viewed herself as some sort of a mothering failure and that she had probably let her son down for life. This was also the day that he was most likely to be photographed and she would have to relive her non-matching shame in the form of a smiling face captured forever in pixels (I started to say on film, but who are we joking here).
2.) His clothes, when placed in his drawer must be folded in a certain manner and stacked in certain stacks. It would take way too long here to explain the system, for now, it should suffice to say that it was meticulous.
3.) Whenever the sheets on the bed are changed, the matching sheets on the changing table must also be changed as well as any and all coordinating blankets in use in the bed.
4.) He must only eat the African animals from the animal crackers. (in her defense, the mother realized she was doing this and the complete ludicrousness of it and did attempt to stop with only minor relapses.)
5.) His bottles must not only be to a certain standard, but they must be matching lids to bases according to their colors. Heaven forbid they ever be matched differently.

And therein lies the catcher folks.
Because one day the mother accidentally took a bottle which normally stayed at her house in to daycare. And daycare kept it for a day before returning it. But when they returned it, it was not the bottle she had sent. Indeed it was an altogether different bottle. The dishwasher at daycare had damaged some of the print off the side and the nipple was completely white from hard water stains. And in fact the top and bottom didn't even match according to color!
What could the mother do? She weakly accepted the bottle and placed it next to her son in the car to take it home. And there it has sat to this day. At least once a week she looks at it and contemplates just throwing it away because there is no way she can use it, but then she chides herself for such a waste of resources and not being able to bear to bring it inside her house, she leaves it there.

And that is the story I had to tell you today folks.
If this does not make you all want to rush over and make sure I am not going crazy, then I don't know what will because even as I am writing this I think I sound completely bonkers!

But then again, my writing is my therapy and if this helps me process... then by all means... I shall write about how crazy I have become until the day I die!

Next time: How to plan a wedding in no time at all, with no date at all, and no groom in the country!

Mushy Stuff

They say life never goes as planned.
And for my case that has been true.
I never planned to look up from my Americano
Peer over the top of my reading glasses
Whilst gently rocking my crossed high heels
And see you.

I didn't plan for you to slip the other waiters a bill to get my table.
I didn't plan on giving you my real phone number.
I didn't plan on you actually calling
Giving me some story about a party somewhere that I should go with you to.
I didn't plan on going to any party anyway, but you cancelled.
I didn't plan on you promising to take me out to make up for it.
I didn't plan on you pawning your phone to be able to take me out in style for that first date.
I didn't plan on having such a good time.

I didn't plan to go on seeing you
I'm pretty sure I told a friend that it was fun, but I didn't think I would see you again.
I didn't plan to slowly find myself liking hanging out with you.
How did you do that?
I didn't plan on going out dancing with you that night.
I didn't plan on you kissing me for the first time
Under the glow of a streetlight on the Kololo Bypass.

I didn't plan for the weeks to turn into months.
I didn't plan for our lives to get so entangled.
I didn't plan on hurting so much when you wouldn't talk to me.
I didn't plan on writing you that "Mr. Darcy" letter.
I didn't plan to feel such a flood of relief when you finally said that you forgave me.
I hadn't planned to care that much.

I didn't plan on loving the way we used to ride double on a boda boda.
I didn't plan to get used to your stupid blue crocs
Or your extreme hairstyle, or the way your eyes looked into my soul.
I didn't plan on it feeling so right to hold your hand
Or lean on your shoulder when we were sitting on the porch watching the last drops of sunlight be squeezed from the sky.
I didn't plan on falling for you.
I didn't plan for what your answer was to your mom
When she asked you in Luganda if I was the one you were going to marry
Not knowing that I had understood her question.

I didn't plan on that test being positive
As my shaky hands could barely hold the cup to pee in
And my mind raced with a million different thoughts and emotions.
I didn't plan on being so happy
It was all I could do to keep from bursting into tears at the thought that I would finally be a mother.
I didn't plan on you losing your job.
I didn't plan on not getting my visa.
I didn't plan on us being thrust apart by the very thing that has tied us together for life.

And so it was that
I didn't plan on you getting down on one knee that day at the airport with ring in hand.
I hadn't planned for what I would say if you asked
And so in the rush of the moment and with a plane to catch
I said yes.
But I didn't really plan on everything that would mean to you.
And my mind hadn't even gotten to planning on such a promise.

But I didn't plan on you being so constant
If you had won my heart before while present, you now won it again in absentia.
I didn't plan on looking anxiously for your messages every day.
I didn't plan on you staying true.
I didn't plan on your gentle words, tender affection, and fervent prayers calming my fears.
I didn't plan on your candor and valor building bridges to my heart
That not even half the globe's distance could retract.

I didn't plan on your big, black eyes staring back at me through our son's
I didn't plan on wanting so badly for you to be here
And share every little giggle and toot that escapes out of him.
I didn't plan to go through every day constantly thinking of you
What you would be saying to me if you were in the seat beside me in the car
What kind of things you would pick out with me in the grocery store
If you would hold the door for me when I am carrying the sleeping baby.
I didn't plan on missing you so badly that sometimes a piece of my chest feels like its missing
Like a black hole is eating me from the inside.
I didn't plan on missing the warmth of your hugs or the feel of your lips
Even the toughness of your palms when they were pressed in mine.
I didn't plan on any of this.

I didn't plan on knowing what is to truly be loved.
I didn't plan on having hope again of planning a wedding.
I didn't plan to have someone know me so thoroughly and still love me so completely.
I never planned on anything like this ever happening to me.

And I am so glad that life doesn't go as planned.

*[To my dearest Moses, 
Today marks the one year anniversary of that day at the airport when you asked me to make you the happiest man in the world. I don't know if I have succeeded in that yet, but I hope that I have many more opportunities in the future. I wasn't sure of what I was promising that day, but if you asked me again today I would answer exactly the same. I would be/will be honored to be married to you and I hope and pray that it happens sooner than any of us can plan! 
All my love (except the part that D stole, sorry!), 
Your Jo.]

Random Musings on Pregnancy

1.) I had no idea how vain I was about my slim ankles until... BAM... pregnancy. I mean, I've always had big calves which I have just learned to live with, but at least my ankles were still small. Yeah, that's pretty much blown to bits now...

2.) About 30 min into sitting, resting, lying down my legs seem to regress to their 11month old state and forget that they ever learned how to move, let alone walk.

3.) I have been anxiously awaiting that awkward moment that they say happens when a complete stranger decides to touch your pregnant belly. I anticipated a complete action movie domination sequence where my karate rigid hand is at their throat with their offending hand bent behind them painfully as I tell them in my best Liam Neeson voice to never, ever touch a pregnant lady.

4.) I still go to work, I helped lift boxes when moving, I can push carts, carry my 17+ pound niece around, and lug my bigger 25 pound work bag around. I sleep in a lofted bed that I have to climb into every night. But when I go places people who never would have held a door open for me suddenly do and checkers even load my groceries into my cart after bagging at times. Its the strangest phenomenon.
Even my own family... they don't want to leave me alone for the weekend before my due date. I'm like guys... women in Kiibito, Uganda hike down from the mountain (2+ hour hike) while in labor to deliver at the clinic, deliver a baby, then hike back in time to peel matooke for supper... I'm pretty sure if anything happens I'll have the time/presence of mind to drive myself to the hospital.

5.) I don't have pretty hands. I never have. I got my dad's rather large handed genes... which impressively meant that I could palm a basketball from a rather young age and completely show up all the adolescent boys who were trying in vain to do it (a fact I rather exploited). Now thanks to pregnancy they are not only big in size but also in diameter. As I loose circulation intermittently (*cough, while typing this, *cough) and my engagement ring becomes hopelessly bonded to my finger, all I can think is: Oh the joys...

6.) As I pray for this little guy growing inside me and feel him kicking and squirming against my diaphragm and bladder... I can't help wondering how God will choose to use him, what his character will be like, even how his skin and eyes will look. One thing that I do know completely: I love my little boy already and I can't wait to meet him.

Impending Hiatus (Most Likely)

Hello my dear readers... I've been absent from writing these last few months as I took time to re-evaluate/reorganize my life and process everything that's been going on.

As many of you may have realized by now, I am pregnant with my first child. My pregnancy was a bit unexpected for many obvious reasons. However, regardless, I am very committed to first of all loving this child to the very best of my ability, and also to caring for him in the best ways possible.

This of course necessitated my relocation back to the U.S. for the time being. My dear country of Uganda, which I hope and pray God may lead me back to someday, has had to be put on hold right now for the immediately foreseeable future.

Instead, I have found myself buried back in a world of trying to make ends meet and learning all about the cost of baby diapers. A very rude awakening if I do say so myself.

I can but say that I will attempt to meet this challenge as I have the many that have come into my life in the last several years: With a little bit of coffee and whole lot of Jesus.
(no, literally... a little bit of coffee... they don't recommend more than one weak cup a day... don't ask me who "they" is!)

That much being said, I have no idea how often this blog will be posted on over the next several months/years. I optimistically hope that I'll have time to reflect and write about everything that God has been teaching me through these infant eyes, but lets be honest... between work hours and long nights and poopy diapers and drying crying eyes (most likely mine, not his) I doubt I'll have a terribly large amount of time to write on here how it is all going down.

So consider this your official notice... if this blog goes fairly inactive it was not from the best intentions of the writer herself, but from the very complicated circumstances of what we commonly refer to as life.

May God Uphold Thee

I am not now, nor have I ever been, a very politically motivated individual. However I find myself watching so many things in this world recently with a growing urge to add my voice to the masses protesting.

And... I probably would... if I had not learned time and time again that few things are won in arguments which could not be more effectively won on my knees.

The lack of satisfaction grows in Uganda as a 30 year long economically stagnant regime proceeds to rather sketchily "claim" power for another 5 year term. Amidst clouds of scandal, claims of voter bribes, claims of ballot rigging, and other forms of potential corruption and general incompetency... I can't help but wonder if the "Pearl of Africa" that I have grown to know and love will long keep itself from turning inward in anger at its own members who would sabotage any chance at a productive future.
I desperately wish for change in this area. Uganda has so many rich resources, so many willing and able workers, so much to offer the world in the way of forgotten beauty and intricate culture. I would wish nothing more for this country than to see its full potential of economic growth. And, a bit selfishly I might add, I want my son to have something to come back to someday. Something worth giving his time and talents to, something left in what is fast becoming a hollowed out shell of wasted hopes and disappointed dreams.

Then I see my birth country, and I have little more hope for them. We are riddled with unrest and disquiet. Seething with the tumult of a thousand issues that have long been repressed under the surface. Deep scathing wounds from hundreds of years of racial repression and the hate that it has bred in hearts that never knew the sting of whip on slavery's bare skin.
I hurt for the fact that my son will also know the cruel face of this tension as his skin color belies his heritage and he is assumed a descendant of an oppressed people. I hate that my country will teach him that he can't trust the police, that politicians just want power and fame, and that he should be entitled to anything he wants as long as he can complain loud enough.
I fear my choice in the next election may be between equally ridiculous buffoons. Already, we have come up with a system whereby we penalize people for simply having good health and not buying into medical insurance schemes. The system slants against those who want to work hard and be good upstanding citizens with morally responsible values.

At the end of the day, it all comes back to this:
I know no other form of combat against all the evil, corruption, and disillusionment I see around me than to cry out to the only one who can permanently and irrevocably affect change in our societies.

Less talking, more praying.
First lesson of being a mother.

Welcome My Dear

Mark 9:36-37

"He took a little child who he had placed in their midst. Taking the child in His arms, He said to them, "Whoever welcomes one of these little children in My name welcomes Me, and whoever welcomes Me does not welcome Me, but the One who sent Me."

4 Year Old Wisdom

Convo between my nephew and his mom today as she was talking to him about listening to his parents:

"Sometimes Auntie Jo tells me what to do."

"Well, yes. You need to listen to Auntie Jo, too."

"But Baby Cousin isn't going to listen to Auntie Jo."

"Well he has to because Auntie Jo is his Mommy."

"Well he's not going to."

Oh, 4 year old wisdom! Most likely he will not. Darn that fallen human nature of ours! But for those days, I pray that I have as much patience for him as my Heavenly Father has with me.