Today, in my caregiver’s world, things have not gone as expected, but have not gone badly either. For one thing, I did not make my bed and it set the tone for contrariness for the whole day.

The CNA coming to help with morning chores needed to hurry and be done, and it was unfortunate because I was needing her to stay with Dennis while I went to my study group. I called on my brother and he was able to come but it was a bother to have to come up with another plan. I was able to get to my Bible study group late, but I was there. My phone only disturbed the group twice before I had to leave – early, oh well. I spent some time thinking about why it is so easy to stay home in contrast to the effort required to go someplace.

One of the phone calls led to a new piece of equipment getting delivered today. The hospice nurse thought the husband would benefit from a suction machine and it was added to our little “hospital at home”. I worked with it and we tested it together until he said “don’t do that anymore” (he was being contrary too), after which he called me from another room to suction him again.

But while we were doing all this, I started watching a YouTube video that I could not get away from. I was fascinated as I watched this young Asian girl carve a homestead out of the tropical jungle, all by herself. She chopped bamboo, carried rocks from the mountainside, built substantial structures to live in and house her animals, got her gardens growing and even wired the place with electricity from a turbine set in the stream. She was so smart and good at all of it. She pounds nails without bending them or hitting her fingers. Her channel is called Ana Bushcraft, and she was very crafty.

I didn’t always know what she was building, but could not stop watching her work. Her patience and willingness to do things the slow way with whatever materials she could find made me wonder if I would be able to work like that. One project at a time, she transformed her part of the jungle. It was nice to lose myself in her world where there were no sick people, no meetings to attend, no technologies or devices to drive her crazy – just a lot of plain, old hard work. (But I also wondered who was behind the camera, out there in the rainy jungle day after day.) It rivaled the other channel we watch – the cooking show from Azerbaijan.

It was probably a little wasteful of my time, but as I said, I was feeling contrary. I should have been making my bed, but it will be a lot quicker to get into tonight. I’ll make it again tomorrow.