Back to reality

I have safely returned to the land of Lakes and Volcanoes.  Quick word on Lima first, LOVE IT!  Maybe I’m jaded because Managua is, well, awful.  So super jealous of the Peace Corps Volunteers in Peru.

But back to work.  And by work, I mean traveling to a new part of Nicaragua!  Our business program had an in-service for us volunteers and our counterparts.  So two teachers from Condega and I traveled to the “Black Forest” hotel in Matagalpa.  My German heritage felt right at home with the Bohemian décor.  The training was more targeted for the Nicaraguan teachers but it was great to see all of my friends from training again.  We spent 2 nights eating good Italian and Mexican food while catching up what’s new in our lives.

Unrelated to the in-service, one of our fellow volunteers, Michaela, told us the following story to motivate us.

A Thousand Marbles
 

The older I get, the more I enjoy Saturday mornings. Perhaps it's the quiet solitude that comes with being the first to rise, or maybe it's the unbounded joy of not having to be at work. Either way, the first few hours of a Saturday morning are most enjoyable.

A few weeks ago, I was shuffling toward the study with a steaming cup of coffee in one hand and the morning paper in the other. What began as a typical Saturday morning, turned into one of those lessons that life seems to hand you from time to time. Let me tell you about it. I turned the dial up into the phone portion of the band on my ham radio in order to listen to a Saturday morning swap net.

Along the way, I came across an older sounding chap, with a tremendous signal and a golden voice. You know the kind; he sounded like he should be in the broadcasting business. He was telling whomever he was talking with something about "a thousand marbles." I was intrigued and stopped to listen.

"You see, I sat down one day and did a little math. The average person lives about 75 years. I know, some live more and some live less, but on average, folks live about 75 years. Now then, I multiplied 75 times 52 and I came up with 3900, which is the number of Saturdays that the average person has in their entire lifetime."

"It took me until I was 55 years old to think about all this in any detail"; he went on, "and by that time I had lived through over 2800 Saturdays. I got to thinking that if I lived to be 75, I only had about a thousand of them left to enjoy."

"So I went to a toy store and bought every
single marble they had. I ended up having to visit three toy stores to round up 1000 marbles. I took them home and put them inside of a large, clear plastic container. Every Saturday since then, I have taken one marble out."

"I found that by watching the marbles diminish, I focus more on the important things in life." There is nothing like watching your time here on this earth run out to help get your priorities straight."

"Now let me tell you one last thing before I sign-off with you and take my lovely wife out for breakfast. This morning, I took the very last marble out of the container. I figure that if I make it until next Saturday then I have been given a little extra time. And the one thing we can all use is a little more time."

Then Michaela gave us these jars and marbles to actually participate!

Only 52 marbles remaining!