at the mercy

This is my newest purchase on the way home on the bus,  my newest purchase for our home in HK.  This plant, riding up front with the sweet driver who just smiles every time I bring something like this on the bus, reminded me of the control I no longer enjoy.

For so long (until we reached this new land of ours) I had been driving a very large SUV to haul kids and animals and general stuff; and for so long I had been jumping in that SUV moving from errand to errand, store to store, event to event, with the ease of a woman who never thought things might be different.  I was in control.  I could go when I wanted to go, and I could go where I wanted to go.  I could run five to ten errands in a morning or afternoon, choosing to move from one place to the next with ease, as long as the grocery store was last (and the ice cream wouldn't melt). Or, I could break up the errands, making sure to stop by home in between to take care of an animal or drop off items to make room for a child or two or three or four. 

To be clear, we have an SUV in HK - our one car.  It's not the same fabulous Yukon XL from paragraph two that is now Texified and living in Summerfield with one of greatest friends on the planet. Our current vehicle, shown in earlier posts, is fifteen years old and technically holds all the children, as long as someone doesn't mind riding sideways in the jumpseat in the very back, which is what someone does every time we go to church or the beach.  Of course, I have yet to get behind the wheel of this car, although I am riding on the left hand side in the car and would be in the right spot to be behind the wheel in most areas of the world. It's the family car on the weekend or after 8pm at night; otherwise, it's with Jeff at work.

Back to the plant on the bus.  I bought the plant one morning and the shop keeper smiled sweetly and hoisted the plant into my arms and off I went to wait at the bus stop.  I couldn't stop by the grocery store and grab the milk we needed because of this plant, and I couldn't really stop by Watson's and grab a bottle of water; I was bound to the plant and getting home because I only have two arms.  On the bus, I can't hold the plant so I leave it up front with the driver and the lady sitting in the front row, who braces the plant as we make the sharp turns on the tiny roads.  And when I depart at my stop, I smile and take my plant and realize this plant would have been one of my many stops in the US.  

Now, I don't have the freedom to hop in the car and move so freely. I have to rely on the bus, I have to rely on the lady in the front seat to keep the plant from pitching over. I have to wait for the bus, I have to plan around the schedule of the bus, I have to think about the one place I want to go for the day, and work out how to get to that one stop and get back, which is never the same bus number. I have to remember to have an address written in Cantonese to give to the taxi driver just in case my bus situation doesn't pan out. It goes on and on, and this is the way most of the world lives. 

For me, it's very humbling.  I no longer have the control. I am in constant need of help from someone. I find I pray so much more often, and I wonder why it takes these moments in life to push me to this wonderful state of dependence. I once heard Tim Keller say people remember the times where they were the least comfortable as the times where they were the most alive.