Silence

I have been accused of not contributing much to our blog. Although this may be only my second post in the life of our short online forum, in my defense I must say that my writing energies have been consumed by more pressing and demanding projects. However, school is now over (at least for a few months) and papers are done (at least until next semester), so here I am typing away again, but this time for the pleasure of our faithful readers, and not the requirements of my professors.

I said at the end of the semester that I wanted to spend some time reading blogs, mainly for the purpose of catching up on the culture of the day. I've spent the last semester studying the importance of culture and thought that I would engage in some hands on learning through the world of online blogs. I have made attempts to live up to my ambition, but there is just something about books that draws me in. In the time that I had set out to read blogs, I have already read two books. So even when the semester is over I cannot seem to escape reading.

I have done better at escaping writing though. I did spend the week after finals fine tuning a paper to submit for publication, but other than that, this is the first thing that I have written since the semester ended. It has been a much needed break because April was filled with papers. It really is a good thing that I enjoy writing, otherwise I might not survive school.

I have learned, however, that I have an uncanny ability of filling up my time with activities. Just because the semester came to an end did not mean that I got to slow down. Instead I practically bumped up to full time at the paint store and worked over 4o hours a week. Although this took a lot out of me, the paychecks look much nicer than when I was putting in 25 hr/week. I have come to enjoy working at Sherwin-Williams and I have always felt it was the practical side of my education. Beside learning about paint, I learn about all kinds of people and what life is like for them. It teaches me many valuable lessons that are applicable for ministry. In fact, I often tell my wife that one day I am going to write a book called "All I Learned about Ministry, I Learned in a Paint Store."

Work is now over for the summer. As much as I hate to leave those guys and girls to fight the summer rush, I am looking forward to going back to the Middle East with my wife. There is nothing like eating falafel everyday for breakfast and hanging out with Arabs drinking tea and coffee all evening. And on top of it all, this time I get to take my favorite person along with me. (by the way she is reading over my shoulder as I write this). Hanging out with the wife in the desert sounds like great fun. So stay tuned for the epic adventures of the Bouchers as they travel the world over. JM