Bliss

It has been a busy last couple days, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. My weekends have become consumed with soccer and to be honest I have had enough of it. I love it, and I love being able to be busy with my youth groups, but it gets to be a little much when I find myself spending all weekend on the soccer field and walking back and forth from there three times a day. The basic schedule is that Saturdays are reserved for my youth group league and on Sunday I play with my adult league.

The big even this weekend was that I started working on forming a woman’s team. If I am so adamant about combating machismo in the community, why am I only working with the boys? Like all things there are two sides to each story and I need to make it socially accept o get the girls out of the kitchen and let them play as well. This wasn’t even my idea to start with. One day I was just sitting in my house doing Soduku when a group of girls came by and told me they wanted me to coordinate a team. Usually I am reluctant when presented an idea because they usually end in the same manner; the interested party loses interest. To put them to the test I told them to gather me a list of names of players and we would take it from there. Well the next day I had 15 girls at my doorstep ready to play and I guess that was the message that this was really feasible. Later in the week I was in Susuli, which is a community 2hrs away from my town and I was asked by the girls there about a soccer game this weekend. I guess news spreads quickly and before I knew it I had my first girl’s game organized of San Dionisio vs. Susuli. Just to fast-forward a bit, Susuli never showed this weekend which was no big surprise. However, my 15 girls from San Dionisio did! I was excited to see them make an appearance at the field, but I had no other girls team. I did however have a league game set-up of my boys team playing against one of the local barrios. I called it an exhibition game, but I organized two games of the girls against the boys. It was a slaughter, but everyone seemed to enjoy themselves and it got the girls interested enough to want to play again and hopefully spread the word to Susuli to get their act together.

This Saturday was one instance of my bliss. It is rewarding to see your projects actually come together and to see that my small little idea of having a soccer team has turned into a flourishing league. I am now directly responsible for over 70 kids and the list seems to be growing. Word seems to be spreading that I can guarantee games and we are much more organized than any attempt in the past. Thanks to my basic organization, I seem to encouraging others to follow in my footsteps and I no longer get lone kids asking to join, but fully rostered teams soliciting to join.

The last bit of my joy has to do with today. No, it does not have to do with soccer. I played horrible with my team today and I voluntarily substituted out of the game in the first 30 minutes. That was the downside, but it only accentuated the positive aspects of the day. Take my day for example. I woke-up late, 7am to not the blaring music of ranchero, but the sound of kids playing and crowing roosters. Believe it or not this is a pleasant wake-up. I put on some NPR Car Talk and made a classy breakfast. I went all out, I had orange juice, bacon, banana pancakes, and scrambled eggs. It was a relaxing morning of just cooking, doing Ken-Ken and then listening to Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me. The best part of my day was this evening. I learned that my mood may be directly affected by alcohol. This is not to say that I am an alcoholic, but that beer really does do wonders. My parents had smuggled in a 6-pack of Samuel Adams Summer Ale and I opened my first bottle today. Nothing gave me such sheer delight to have a nice micro-brew. I can positively say that the single act of drinking this beer may have been one of my happiest moments in a year. It is somewhat pathetic that beer can outrank many of my more interesting experiences, but I forgot how great it is to have such a beloved beverage. Another aspect is that I may be the only person in the country to even have Samuel Adams Summer Ale in the entire country of Nicaragua. It is entirely feasible that I just consumed 1/6^th of the entire national supply of this type of beer. I love beer, I am proud to say it. I see beer not as a party drink, but as intricate and cultured as wine. Yes, Beast has it’s place in the world, but I am a beer snob, I love my micro-brews. Sam Adams may not fall into this category, but for Nicaraguan standards it is close enough. Yet, this is not the culmination of the night. I went one step further. After my pathetic appearance in the soccer game I needed to just change my mindset and relax in my house. I made a quick stop at the local store, bought a half pound of chicken and made one of my most intricate dishes. It was no culinary feat, but again for here was much more than any of my neighbors were eating tonight. I caramelized some onions, sautéed peppers, garlic, and tomatoes and had some pasta boiling on the side. As my protein I breaded cut-up chicken breast and fried it in sunflower seed oil and Cajun spices. Perhaps I have too much time on my hand, but if I was going to make such a dinner I might as well go the whole way and set the ambience. Dusk was rapidly settling over the town and rather than turning on the lights I lit a candle, put on some chill music and was ready to enjoy the bounty of my work. What better way to end the weekend than drinking a cold beer, eating a truly flavorful dinner, and listening to music while the rain falls down around you. If that isn’t blissful, I don’t want to know what is.