"Smile, You're in Spain!"

hi, friendlies! i miss you. so much has happened lately- i am hating this irregular internet access business. so, if you have a wireless laptop just laying around somewhere, be a champ and send it my way. that would be most helpful. i know its a long shot, but it cant hurt to ask...

want to know what ive been up to? here are some things i will hopefully be able to flesh out later when i get to have a REAL update (including pictures), but for now, here is the drive-by version:

- Seis Cafes con Leches will make you LOCO
- "El Rastro is just a bunch of b******t"- Chantal, Host Mom
- Death by Chocolate and Churros
- The Walk of Shame (documented in PICTURES!!)
- My Ever-Growing Portfolio of Star Wars Drawings
- Workin It on Metro Norte
- Sight-Seeing in Madrid
- Introducing: My Host Family

theres this ad that runs constantly on one of the tv stations here and ive been thinking about it all week. it says, "Smile, you're in Spain!"
i couldnt agree more.

i love this country, and i love you, and i wish you were here to share all this wonder with me. there is this warmth to Spain that penetrates everything and gives me a new kind of energy ive never had before. i think its that Mediterranean lifestyle; that joy and action and thirst for life. and yet....

Katie and i were talking about the time she spent in Russia on a mission trip, and how its so dark there in every sense of the word. you would never associate Spain with darkness. never. this place is positively overflowing with movement and color and sound and beauty.
and yet...

the darkness is still there, its just not as evident as it is in Russia. the people here live with a film covering their eyes; they are living, and living well, but not nearly as well as they could be if they knew the Author of life, the very Artist and Architect who crafted them, lovingly, tenderly, gracefully, purposefully. oh, that Katie and Denise and i would strive to push back the darkness in Spain, not in our power or for our namesakes, but for His and His alone.
amen.