2012 December 8 (Saturday) : "What?" is the question. / To Dream the Impossible Dream

December 2012 December 8 (Saturday)

The question.

I am not one who has kept much of a journal before, but I have seen how the hand of the Lord has been working in my life in the past six months like I have only dreamed possible, and I do now understand that if I was not to keep a record of these events, then I for one would be worse off for it.  Last night I remember asking God “Why am I here,” since in the words of Pam, I feel as if I am in heaven without having to have died first.  I honestly believe that God told me he has a plan for Kim’s book, and He has sent me here to help her write it and have it published. Nine months ago, after I met Kim, she invited me to the United States of America.  All my life, I have wanted to do this, but it felt to me as if it were a mammoth undertaking.

Speaking for myself, it seems we Zimbabweans see life in America every day from American movies and American news, but to actually visit the country seems to be impossible.  I have also been more and more frustrated recently about the effects of Communism on all countries, (not just Zimbabwe, but wherever in the world it is) and to visit the “home of Capitalism” as it were, seemed previously to me to be to be dreaming Don Quixote’s Impossible Dream. 

I have heard and believe with all my heart that God is the God of the impossible, and I confess to having believed that He would have sent me here after having won the Lottery, since I believed that was the only way I could afford a trip such as this one – as it is, I have benefited hugely from the generosity of the family and my own father paying for the air ticket to send me here.  While it may seem to some that winning the lottery is a far bigger event and less likely occurrence than being a real friend to someone, and having her parents be willing to invest in me enough to have me come around the world to visit their daughter, my thinking was that God who knows the end from the beginning, knows what numbers will come up in every lottery on the planet before they do.

It seemed good to me at the time to do all that I can do, and stay faithful as far as I can to God for Him to bless me with a Lotto win in order to pursue my dreams.  Yet, here I am in the middle of my wildest dream without having won the lottery and that, I feel, is the reason that only half of me actually believes I am here!  I have been asking people recently, have you ever encountered something so awesome that even the word awesome is not sufficiently awesome to describe how awesome it is?  I think that is the reason why the writers of Mary Poppins came up with the word supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, since they knew what it was to be in the middle of their wildest dream and not just to dream the impossible dream, but to live it.

I was walking the streets of Chicago yesterday afternoon, looking at the biggest Christmas tree that my eyes have ever seen in Bloomingdale’s with a princess on my arm, still in the stupor of the man who “accepts what he sees because he is expecting to wake up.” 

We first went to the Signature Room on the 95th floor of the John Hancock building and enjoyed wonderful strawberry smoothies and the best possible view of the Waterfront.  They advertise themselves as “the restaurant the rest of Chicago looks up to.” 

I would like to offer my apologies to anyone in advance to anyone reading this and thinking that my thoughts are not in order.  I would agree with you!   I remember showing baby pictures of my brother and I and my dad as a young man, with his dog Ziggy, if memory serves.   I remember thinking that never in a thousand years would I have imagined I could feel so happy.

We also went to the waterfront and took pictures in the icy wind.  Now when Zimbabweans talk about an “icy wind,” I am sure that many appreciate that anything below -10 degrees C is not really icy – please understand!

As I grow older, I am finding that so much of life is about perspective, and many of the offences we pick up are soon finished, because we find something else that adjusts our perspective from where it is, to a place closer to the perspective of the person we have just encountered.

After the waterfront, we also went to Chick-Fil-A.  I remember walking down the busy streets of Chicago thinking “surely it is cold enough to snow!”  I watched Roger in a simple leather jacket, walking quick enough for Kim to ask him to slow down and I realize that his blood must indeed be thicker than mine, since there I was in the snow jacket that they had so generously given to me as a present thinking it was cold.  At Chick-Fil-A, we had delicious chicken fillet sandwiches and waffle chips and I got to taste what Doctor Peppers was like for the first time in my life.  We also ordered a strawberry milkshake and understood to some extent why indeed some Americans find the temptation of good food too much to resist.

So indeed, "what?" is the question.