Missionaries are professional packers!!
Moving, traveling, and bringing enough Crisco, or chocolate chips, or
Crystal Light for several years makes us pros at packing it and getting our
luggage to the limit of the weight allowance. We can also be very picky
about suitcases - surprisingly opinionated, in fact. The all important
"carry on" piece is one of particular interest for many of us as it's
not safe to put any valuables in our check in luggage…..yet airlines are
becoming more and more strict on the size of the carry on. That said, I
just got a new carry on ….I love it. It's light, it's big enough for my
stuff, but not big enough to get me flagged. I can even fit it in the
smaller "United Express" flight overhead compartment when flying from
Chicago to Springfield, MO!!
WARNING: Random, bizarre subject change……and you
will see how all of this ties together if you make it to the end of this
post…….
We periodically fight a mouse infestation. In
the U.S. I would never admit this as, as sometimes it can have a certain “stigma”
in regards to housekeeping. Now no one has ever called me a meticulous
housekeeper. But I do have my limits of "mess" and in a
"normal" American setting have never had issues with mice. But
in Africa……well, let's just say it's more a question of "control"
than "elimination. We live in a city of over 10 million, with very
poor infrastructure. Waste is tossed wherever it's convenient, poor
drainage in the streets, etc. makes for a very habitable place for mice.
We also live on a very busy, populated corner. There's a taxi stop
right across the street, people are everywhere eating, drinking, throwing their
garbage on the ground, sewage backs up……you get the picture. So, although
we try to keep things clean, we do go through periods of having mice in the
house. I put out poison to kill them and after a few days, they're gone,
only to return again at some point. Remember – control….not elimination!
We just had one of our "mouse
moments"…….seeing little droppings of "evidence" here and there
and in the evening, if we were "lucky" we'd see one scurrying across
the floor towards the closet. So I did my thing and put out the poison.
A day or two later I was packing to make a quick trip to the U.S. for
Ben's graduation. I could smell the effects of my rat poison- there was
definitely a dead mouse somewhere. It was found in the closet and
removed. But all day (I was leaving that evening), I still kept smelling
it! I asked the man who helps me in the house to clean the area with bleach
water, thinking that maybe the unfortunate mouse had lingered a bit longer than
normal. In the meantime I was packing and preparing. The last thing to be
packed, of course, is the all important carry one…….are you seeing where this
is going????
I took my carry on into the bedroom and all of a
sudden I could smell dead mouse again. This was strange - my bedroom
hadn't been smelling like dead mouse all day. It hit me - was there a
dead mouse in my carry on???????? I took it to my wonderful helper and
told him I couldn't look inside, but to please look. He found
nothing….puzzled I went back to my bedroom to finish packing and there, lying
on the carpet was the mouse. It must have fallen out when I took my carry
on out of the room. We quickly removed the corpse and all was well.
I had my helper wipe out the inside of my carry on with bleach water,
just to make sure, packed up and was on my way.
However, at the airport, I kept smelling dead
mouse!!!!! Was this a curse??? Why couldn't I get away from that
stupid smell?? I was sitting in a lounge, taking with some businessmen
who were on my flight. My trusty carry on was right there next to me.
You know that little place on the top where the handle pulls out?
There's usually a little zipper there, in case you want to zip that spot
closed. And all of a sudden I saw it, on that opened zipper flap
……mouse…..bodily fluids. The mouse had not died inside the carry on.
He had died in that little zipper place by the handle!!! IT STUNK!!
I went into the bathroom and got hand soap and scrubbed and scrubbed.
It helped some, but the entire flight (in fact all 4 flights that it took
to get me to Springfield), every time someone opened the overhead compartment
where my carry on was stored……that awful mouse smell wafted through the cabin.
There is, of course, a spiritual analogy here.
What are we packing in our suitcases? Not the Samsonite ones, but
the suitcases of our lives…….if we're not careful, we can lug around a big ole
smelly something that is eventually obvious to everyone. And even if we
think we've removed the "body"…..we have to make sure we've given
everything to Jesus, dealt with everything we need to deal with - or that smell
remains.
But I also like the very practical lessons here - check all zipped
pockets before packing - you never know what might be in there!!
