Contentment: An excerpt

I was writing to a friend and thought maybe I'd save myself some time and send these thoughts to all of you about what I think God is trying to teach me, and how today I am not learning. I think, based on some of the things I've read lately, or talked with people about, or struggled with, that God is trying
to teach me about contentment and joyfulness. It seems ironic to write about it today since today I am decidedly discontent but today I have the time-- the time, perhaps, both to write and to be discontent.

Saturdays (here it is Saturday) are hard because I feel like I should stay in my village/suburb with the family and see what happens-- maybe bonding will happen like a lightning strike. I've turned down three Saturday trips with MCCers thinking that I should try to do what I say is important-- to be present in a place. Alas, my family and I have yet to bond. The closest we came was some shared TV time and nail-painting. I now have nice little strawberries on each nail. I had a french tip but chipped it off, thinking I could ask for it again, to be sociable.

So, I generally take the day to do laundry, cleaning, reading, wishing I could nap,etc. I think about visiting the teachers who live at the dormitory next door but don't feel up to the struggle with language that that would lead to. Eventually, I get really anxious and say, as I don't feel like I'm being present anyways, in any way that is more than physical, head into town. Then I call my all of four contacts in Vientiane and hope someone is around.

Nobody is around today, so I read the blog of a SALTer in Vietnam who is loving it, whose family is lovely, whose stories are funny and wise. Oh dear. I feel discontent. A devotional I'm reading is about joy and fighting for joy and choosing joy and God's gift of joy and I read it and then don't know what to do. The Word says that I'm a new creation, that a new covenant is written on my heart, that God's Spirit dwells with mine, unworthy as mine may be, that God loves me with an everlasting love. And I have been gifted with people who love me, whom I love. And I know that God is present in this world and at work. Oh, these are reasons for joy!
But I'm tired and lonely and not sure if I'm doing this whole living cross-culturally thing well and I can't feel this joy. What to do?

Recount times that do bring joy, I think: when class goes well (when visitors come and my kids introduce themselves and then want to sing-- Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes they (we) did and a song in Lao); when I walk under a bouginvillia bush; when one of the thousands of dogs in the street don't bark as I go by; when I go to a birthday party where I can't really talk with people but can still laugh and enjoy the food and and dance (the traditional Lao dance I cannot do, but the simplified
move-in-a-circle-with-arm-bobbing I can pull off) and sing (oh, thanks, that the happy birthday song is, apparently, international, if not universal...); when I go swimming; when the air smells like candy from a nearby flower; when I feel cool instead of hot, sweaty, sticky; when I buy a bunch of cilantro for the equivalent of 10 cents...

Wishing you a joyful day,
Renee