Finding life in the ordinary

Lish, UNOH Klong Toey, Bangkok, Thailand

I came home exhausted ready to lock the door behind me, flop on to the couch and shut out the world around me. As tempting as the couch was, I couldn’t ignore a niggle within me to sit on my doorstep. There weren’t many people around that day and I felt a little silly, but soon my next door neighbours came and sat out the front of their place. We laughed and chatted about the events of the day and, as often happens, the conversation moved to food. Thai culture revolves around food, something I am pretty thankful about, and today was no exception. Before I knew it, we had moved from just talking about it, to actually enjoying an impromptu Thai style BBQ. The delight on my neighbours faces as they made me try different things was priceless, and the joy when they saw that I liked it filled my heart with joy also. A few minutes turned into a few hours and, when I finally went inside and closed my door, I knew I had experienced something incredibly special. Nothing glamourous, nothing spectacular, but something rich amongst the mundane.

It seems like a lot of life these days is lived in a hurried blaze of glory. We are always looking for the next best thing to make our lives more entertaining. We are so overstimulated, that often we feel disappointed with the normal, the mundane. We miss the joy hidden within those small ordinary moments, instead searching for the big, breathtaking things of life.

God’s big picture of life is beautiful but sometimes we can become obsessed with it, and miss that He is calling us to see the little things right in front of us. They are still pieces that fit into the big puzzle of life but we tend to place a lesser value on them, often ignoring them completely.

The beauty of living life here in the slum is that there is a lot of the mundane. I am learning that the little things of life are what make it the greatest. I am being reminded that being faithful in the little is what life is all about. Some days I sit on my doorstep for no particular reason other than to communicate “I am here” and to soak up the sights and sounds around me. Often it is a mundane experience, leaving me sitting there with no one to talk to but to stop and appreciate our little corner of the world. Some days I am swarmed by kids wanting to play or climb on me like I am the play equipment. Then there are the days when there are women sitting around in which a conversation begins and something rich is shared. I can’t explain what happens in these moments, as it is not something that would bowl you over, but often these conversations are far more than mundane. In these moments there is no glitz nor glamour, just a willingness to share life together, to open our hearts just a little to see more of each other. Never before have I been so grateful that the mundane has changed me and opened my eyes to the life that is found in the ordinary.