Tuve un sueño

Whenever I'm cold at night, I have bizarre dreams. The first night on my trip to Guatemala was COLD! Of course, I had a strange dream that doesn't make much sense. My mission team was in a large two-story room with a staircase in the middle (mall? airport? I don't know). I was being chased, so I was running down the stairs to where most of the team had gathered. I don't know where Neal was, but he was shouting, telling me to stop running because whoever was chasing me couldn't chase me anymore if I stopped running. I heard him and agreed, but it's easier to run down stairs than it is to walk, so I kept running, and Neal kept yelling. He wasn't necessarily angry, but he wasn't happy either. Eventually I did stop and walk the rest of the way down the stairs. When I got to the bottom, he make me go talk to one of my professors I was arguing with. In reality, I've never had this professor muchless had a problem with her, but in my dream we were fueding, and I woke up before I could figure out why. (It's a dream... it doesn't make sense).

According to my hugenormous trip journal, this dream haunted me for days. To this day Neal gets after me for being mad at him for something he did in a dream. Eventually, I wrote, "I'm not mad at Neal for my dream anymore. I don't think. He was confronting me about an issue and making me take care of it. He was upset (but he wasn't livid) and he was holding me accountable for my actions. We all need people like that, even in our dreams, even when we don't have a clue what we did. I really hope I don't have any more weird dreams."

Fast forward to Thursday. We needed to paint the top corner of the exterior of a building except it was hard to reach with the ladder and there was a huge birds nest and thus an angry momma bird. We girls decided against painting it ourselves and sent a guy up there.

Neal was our lucky victim. He perched himself precariously on an incredibly unsafe ladder contraption (involving a brick, a peice of plywood, a rock, and a sloped sidewalk), and I held the ladder.

Three or four songs from my sign choir played on the radio (ok, iPod), but I couldn't sign them because Neal's life was in my hands.

"God's trying to teach you to listen," he told me.
Eventually, he handed me the paint buck and climbed off the ladder.  I signed with my one free hand.

"Stop it, Katie," he told me again.

I didn't stop instantly because it was my favorite part of the song, but I did stop a few signs later. I was moderately annoyed, but I figured he was probably right. After all, I'm not very good at listening.
For the rest of the work day, I didn't sign and I didn't sing. Under any other circumstances, I probably wouldn't have even considered not singing/signing. Yet I'm so glad I did because while cleaning the bucket that day, I had one of the best conversations with God that I've had in a long time.

In Christ,
<>< Katie

"Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing. In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you."
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18