Ethiopia, Pt. 1

Left for Chicago on Friday evening (6/22). Spent the night with Sara & Dave.  

Here we are at O'Hare on Saturday morning (6/23).

Waiting for our flight.

Found out it was delayed an hour.

Having fun taking Instagram pics.

Then we found out our flight was delayed again.

And we got to JFK as our flight to Amsterdam was leaving.

And then they told us we were going to Cairo, then to Addis Ababa.

The clouds were really pretty.

Then we landed in Cairo, a.k.a. the desert.

And we were really pumped to go see the pyramids because we had an 11 HOUR LAYOVER.

But then we encountered some obstacles.

First, the airline graciously paid for a hotel room so we could freshen up during those 11 hours.

However, the airport took our passports from us. And kept them.

(We were a little panicky. I was convinced we were probably going to be trafficked.)

So we were shuttled to this hotel about 20 minutes from the airport, sans passports.

Second, turns out that Egypt was announcing the results of its first democratic election ever.

And there were over 100,000 people gathered in Tahrir Square... incidentally, 2 miles from our hotel.

Thankfully, the masses were appeased by the election of Mohammed Morsi. 

Third, I was pretty drugged up on dramamine and slept almost the entire time we were at the hotel.

So long story short... we didn't go see any pyramids. Boo.

We arrived in Addis Ababa at 3:30AM Monday (6/25). 

Our bags, however, did not.

After waiting around trying to figure out where our bags were (JFK, cool EgyptAir...) 

and when we could pick them up (3:30am the next day, awesome)

we finally got to our guest house at 5:00am.

And proceeded to sleep until almost 4:00pm that afternoon.

.

Don't worry, the trip gets better...

the opossum story, pt. 2

The Night of the Opossum, Part II

When we last left off, Doug was taking photographic evidence of the intruders while Rachel curled into the fetal position as far from the rodent as possible. 

As the critter control guy (CCG) heroically carried the opossum out of the house, the upstairs neighbor shrieked, "That's that rat I saw before!" 

The CCG calmly said, "It's a possum," to which the neighbor hysterically shouted, "It's a RAT!" only to be calmly but sternly corrected again, "No. It's a possum."

Thankfully, the neighbor followed the CCG outside and returned to her apartment upstairs. In the meantime, Doug was speaking with the CCG outside about how the varmint could have entered the apartment in the first place. The CCG said his best guess was through the drop ceilings, but they'd send someone out the following day to examine more thoroughly. 

Rachel refused to sleep in their bed until they could wash the bedding, just in case the opossum had dared to set foot/paw on it. So they quickly located a nearby hotel and threw together some overnight items. Of course, Rachel wouldn't go in the bedroom, so she instructed Doug as to which clothes were in which drawers so he could grab her stuff as well. They arrived at their hotel at 1:15am and quickly fell into a deep slumber.

The next morning, Tuesday, Doug headed to work, where he emailed their landlord pictures of the opossum and described the whole situation. The landlord finally called him back and agreed to pay for the hotel fee and said he would also call and have someone come to the apartment to set some traps and investigate. Unfortunately, the soonest the company could get there was Wednesday morning. Doug and Rachel didn't feel like staying at a hotel again, but Rachel still wouldn't go in the bedroom, so that night they got out their air mattress and stayed in the living room, where there were no drop ceilings.

On Wednesday, Rachel made herself scarce all day while Doug met the critter control company to assess the damage. That evening, Rachel asked Doug about what they were able to determine.

"Um, I'm not sure you really want to know," Doug replied hesitantly. 

"Please just tell me."

"Well... they assume that the opossum entered through the basement, because there are entry holes everywhere under the deck and around the foundation. So the opossum probably climbed the stairs up from the basement and got in under the space under the door," (Our readers should know that their basement "door" was more like a sliding closet door, and the bottom of the door did not reach the floor, leaving about a foot-wide gap/entryway.) Doug began. "Plus, he found animal droppings all over the place in the basement. And... he lifted up some of the tiles of the drop ceiling... and there is rodent poop everywhere up there too."

"WE ARE GETTING OUT OF HERE." Rachel immediately headed for the computer and began Googling apartments for rent in Plymouth, MI. 

Now, while this may seem a drastic move, our readers must consider that this was just the final straw for our protagonists. If you recall, Doug and Rachel had known for quite some time that animals were scurrying about within their walls, and they had contacted their landlord (in October 2008!!) to make sure he was well aware of his illegal tenants. Doug even told their landlord that if said critters ever got into the house, it would be a big problem. Unfortunately, the landlord never did anything about it, so the problem did indeed escalate.

For the sake of brevity, Doug and Rachel were fed up with their living arrangements (in addition to opossums, remember their lack of heat? The hot water going out, the dust mites, and the fact that the landlord went on business trips to Asia every other week and could never be reached...); they began looking for a new place to live while Doug and the landlord worked together to find an appropriate end date for the lease. Throughout the duration of their time in that apartment, the traps set up by the critter control company caught: 2 opossums, 2 raccoons, 2 squirrels and 1 groundhog. On August 25th, 2009, Doug and Rachel moved into their new apartment, sans opossums. And they lived happily ever after... but not without a few haunting reminders.

--

My piano bag, which was in the basement

... The other reminder was a petrified possum poop in an open box that was under our bed. That is not a lie.

the opossum story, pt. 1

Okay, okay. I wasn't going to write about this on my blog because it still gives me goosebumps, but too many people asked about it/made threatening demands. I give you...

The Night of the Opossum, Part I

a short thriller by Rachel C. Parton

It was a warm Monday night in July in metro Detroit. Douglas and Rachel Parton had arrived home from a mission trip to Jamaica the night before, and they were still elated and starry-eyed with fond memories of the trip. Rachel had spent all day Monday unpacking and doing laundry, while Doug had returned to work. As the clock struck midnight, the two were exhausted and greatly anticipating the soft cradle of a pillow around their tired little noggins.

However, as Doug entered the bedroom, something seemed amiss. The closet door was open, as laundry had been sorted throughout the day, and from the corner of his eye, Doug saw something move.

"Rachel - don't come in here," he called loudly, in a voice that immediately caused Rachel to freeze.

"What is it?" she asked timidly.

"... I don't know," Doug responded. At this, Rachel curled up into a little ball on the chair in which she was sitting. However, she wouldn't be able to sit still for long, because Doug continued, "Bring me a golf club."

Moments later, the door slammed. There was banging, and then the door opened, Doug ran out and slammed the door behind him quickly. Eyes wide, Rachel again questioned, "What is it?!"

"You don't want to know," Doug protested.

"Just tell me!" Rachel insisted.

Doug paused, then said disgustedly, "It's a possum." 

"WE ARE GETTING OUT OF HERE." Rachel immediately headed for the computer and began Googling critter control services and hotels simultaneously. Doug decided not to try to kill the opossum, because he "didn't want to get blood everywhere." So he got on his cell phone, trying to reach their landlord. This continued for about half an hour, until Doug was finally able to get ahold of a critter control company that was open 24-7. In the meantime, their upstairs neighbor, who was in the process of moving out due to a supposed mite infestation, got wind of the situation and came downstairs to join in the excitement. She was eager to see the intruder. 

The critter control guy finally arrived around 12:45am. Rachel cowered in the office, refusing to look at the offending opossum, while Doug got the camera to take pictures for evidence, and the upstairs neighbor kept rattling on about how opossums "have six babies - there must be tons of them!" 

To be continued...

warning: a tirade

Dear People To Whom We Sent Support Letters For The Jamaica Missions Trip:

WHAT?! A "missions" trip to JAMAICA?! You've got to be kidding me! JAMAICA?! All they do there is smoke pot, listen to reggae & lie on the beach, mon! Clearly this is just an opportunity for a bunch of kids to go on vacation together for 9 days. And what type of "missions" trip has students building classrooms for a local church, putting on a VBS, ministering at an orphanage and to shut-ins, and doing sports outreach in the community? SPORTS outreach?? That sounds FUN. Serving Jesus is NOT supposed to be fun. I mean, students in high school don't even understand the concept of serving or missions. 

Although - last year the youth group went to Jamaica for a "missions" trip, and it transformed the youth group. I suppose we have seen some of the students really mature in their relationships with Christ. 

And I suppose that there are maybe some problems in Jamaica that missions trips can assist. Turns out Jamaica has one of the highest murder rates per capita in the world. And I suppose, like many tourist attractions, Jamaica is a land of extremes - opulence v. poverty. And I suppose that there could be some opportunity for construction aid, since Jamaica also frequently experiences devastation from tropical storms and hurricanes. 

After thinking about it for awhile - and knowing our students and leaders - maybe it's not entirely a vacation. Granted, the students do have one "beach day" which, I suppose if you want to be really cynical, could overshadow the other eight days of missions work. 

Basically I just wanted to apologize to everyone who received a support letter - it was not my intention to ask for money for the Parton Vacation. 

But if you had a problem with it, you could have called ME before you sent a letter to our youth directors (who have worked tirelessly organizing a mission trip of 45 students and investing daily in the lives of young people) telling them that you "do not support college student vacations." 

Please - if you have any questions about anything Doug & I are doing, feel free to ask us in person (or, if that's not an option, phone, email - whatever). We're generally pretty reasonable people... 

... with the exception of an occasional snide blog post.

we just can't win...

The universe is conspiring against us.

How else do you explain the fact that, when Doug was preparing to start the car this morning, THIS happened?

Guess what? That’s the only key I have for Bessie.

Simultaneously comical and annoying... seems to be the story of my life lately!

dreams and doors.

Dreams I've had recently:

-Jeanette & I go to visit the Dooce. She is much older in person than one would expect from her pictures. She thinks Jeanette & I are awesome (duh), and proceeds to invite us to coffee.

-I'm being chased by a child-abductor. I am trying to scream, but my throat is dry, and I can't. I eventually make some sort of noise, and wake up suddenly, and immediately seek the comfort of my husband. "Did I scream?" "No, you just sort of yelped."

-Doug & I take some of the freshman boys on a small group trip to Chicago. We're at a stop sign, when suddenly one of the boys jumps from the vehicle and starts running, and we have to chase him down in the car.

-Doug is gone and I've locked myself out of our apartment. No, wait, that really happened.

Okay, here is the long-awaited story:

As I've mentioned, Doug was living la vida sunshine in Florida last week. I was actually pretty excited about a night to myself - I had the whole night planned out. I was going to go grocery shopping, rent a movie, come home, make pancakes for dinner, and watch the movie while making ornaments. I set about to accomplish that mission - put on my jacket, grabbed my purse, locked the door, closed the door... and looked through the window to see my keys sitting on the counter. I managed to stay relatively calm and called our landlady, who conveniently didn't answer. I left a message, then called my beloved husband to inform him of what happens when he leaves me alone for too long (literally half a day at this point).

After I got off the phone with Doug, I called the landlady again and there was still no answer. I proceeded to call the landlady every 5 minutes from that point forward. In between my calls, I completed the following:
-I brought the garbage and recycling bins back up to the house.
-I got the mail, and sweet bliss - my Country Living magazine had come! I sat down in the enclosed entryway to our apartment, grabbed one of Doug's big coats and put it over my legs and flipped through Country Living.
-I went to Taco Bell and grabbed something to eat. I brought my food back to the entryway, because there's no way I was going to sit in a restaurant by myself to eat. My pride had not fallen that far yet.
-I called my friend Sara to see what she was up to. She didn't answer, so I left a message, just saying that I was wondering if she wanted to hang out - not telling her that I've locked myself out of my apartment, I'm freezing and can she please rescue me.

By this time, I've been locked out for 2 hours and none of my calls to the landlady have been returned. So, I called Doug and told him I was going to punch through the window and open the door. Doug, shockingly, did not like this idea and decided to call a local locksmith and have him open the door. All in all, I ended up paying to get into my own house. I am good for the locksmith business.The landlady called me the next day to apologize - she had left her cell phone in her car overnight. If only there was a way I could blame her for the whole incident, then I could justify being annoyed with her...

my silent scream.

Our school has lost sight of its purpose. We have a staff meeting tomorrow to discuss all the impending changes, so I’m clinging to the hope that this meeting will bring some dark areas to light. Every time we’re told that things will improve “from this point forward,” my hopes surge again, only to be dashed and disappointed by the immediate return to normalcy (what a word to use!). Normal? Why is this normal? Why is this accepted? Why are students allowed to roam the halls, wreaking havoc at every turn? Why doesn’t the administration provide support to its teachers? Why do I drive home with a clenched jaw and grind my teeth in the middle of the night? I’m frustrated with the administration (if you can even consider 2 counselors an administration!) and the people running the school. I’m frustrated with my students. I’m frustrated with myself. I do not know how to make education exciting for students who are not interested in learning – it took us 2 months to get through A Raisin in the Sun (not a difficult read). The book has beautiful themes displayed by intricate, dynamic characters, and somehow I could not get that across to the vast majority of my classes. I do not know how to continue to love and respect students who show nothing in response. I am out of cheeks to turn. I do not know how to find the balance between treating students like adults and asserting my authority as a teacher. I’m not even sure I deserve the title. I was not prepared for this. I’m left clueless, floundering in front of blank faces that won’t let me inside and refuse to come outside.
~

[stolen, adapted, however you choose to view the following...]

Even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream.
I have a dream that one day my students will rise up and live out the true meaning of that creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.”
I have a dream that they will pursue their equality through the profound imparting of knowledge that is only achieved through education.
I have a dream that my 92 children (which is supposed to be 172 children) will not judge themselves on the circumstances of their past, but on the potential of their future.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that in the streets of Detroit, the little girls and boys from competing neighborhoods will join hands as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plains, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
This is my hope.
This is the faith that I go back to that school daily with.
With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope.
With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our school into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood.
With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together…
If my students are to grab hold of their lives and make a difference, this dream must become true.