The Agony and the Ecstasy

I felt a lot like Michael Angelo yesterday as I spent hours painting a ‘sky’ on the ceiling of the boys’ room.  It was agony holding my head back and standing high on a ladder with blue and white paint dripping on my face.  Being in Italy for the last 10 months has also represented a lot of agony but also ‘ecstasy’.  Agony driving on narrow streets with motorcycles cutting in front of you plus trams, buses and every other aggressive Italian driver sharing the same small street.  Not to mention parallel parking anytime you want to park anywhere and cars beeping because they have to wait on you.  Also getting lost all the time because the street signs are poorly marked.  Agony not understanding our childrens’ teachers, showing up to school the first day at the wrong time, having to return to the dentist to ask him exactly what he said, having to ‘by faith’ give a teacher an extra 80 euros for something she explained and we didn’t understand, looking clueless when the cashier at the grocery store asks for our ‘tessera’ (what in the world is a ‘tessera’?), wondering what Italians do with no ‘Staples’ type store, ‘Michaels’ or ‘Macys’ (do they sale file cabinets in Italy? fake flowers?),  getting a funny look from the paint guy when we tell him we want to paint over the bright orange kitchen tile (he gives us a look like ‘why would you want to do that?) and the list goes on and on.  Miscommunication happens on a daily basis.  If we don’t look like fools, we sure feel like ones.   Our children express their agony of going to school without knowing how to speak, by reverting to babyhood behaviors (talking baby-talk, wetting their pants or crying).  ‘Agony’ in living with boxes still unopened from leaving America in January.  But there is also the ecstasy of living in Italy.  Slowly we are becoming like Italian drivers swirling around Milan becoming familiar with where everything is and getting it right the first time we parallel park on the sidewalk.   The language is becoming more familiar (by the way, ‘tessera’ means the store card).  All our children are settling into a routine at school and are advancing by leaps and bounds in the language.    They are also very cuddly and close to their parents and have lots of fun with each other.  The ecstasy of eating delicious Italian food and losing weight.  The ecstasy of experiencing a new culture and seeing one of the most beautiful countries in the world.  The ecstasy of settling into our new home.

Please praise the Lord with us as He has led us to attend a good church, has opened up a school for Jordan to go to, is ‘holding our childrens’ hands’ as they confront going to school everyday, has provided us an apartment in Milan that fits our family size and for allowing us to paint and decorate rooms to fit us.  Back to the ceiling art paint, we ended up roller painting it a solid color blue.  I’ll try my ‘Michael Angelo’ skills on a canvas.

In His name,
 Amy