An Ode to Mud

Exhibit A: Watch where you walk!
It's very squishy and slippery!

I thought I knew what mud was—back in Wisconsin: that slightly inconvenient, make-sure-you-wipe-your-feet-off-before-you-come-in-the-house type of mud. But really I knew nothing…maybe even less than nothing. When you live in a country where it rains pretty much every afternoon, you end up with a lot of mud. And generally it doesn’t just rain nice and gentle and stop after an hour or two—it pours. Hard. Sometimes for several hours, and, in the case of a couple weeks ago, for several days in a row.

All this rain turns the roads (no pavement in Ukarumpa!) into mud holes, the smallest incline into a slippery slope that rivals any ice rink, and the Primary Campus playground into a sort of mud wrestling pit.

Rubber boots and Chacos-love them!

There are a few ways to try and fight “the war on mud” (that’s how I feel some days!): you can wear shoes or sandals (preferably washable) and tiptoe around the puddles and avoid grassy areas—this is the approach I generally take. J Or you can just accept the fact that you’re going to get dirty and not worry about it; I’m trying to get to this point…but I generally don’t like getting dirty (unless I’m doing some kind of outside work—mowing or raking) but I still have a ways to go before I stop cringing every time I step in the mud!

Rubber boots are, in my opinion, a must have—they’re great to wear to market in the early morning, on the soupy playground when I have recess duty, and just in general when it rains a lot (which is pretty much all the time!).

Another lovely aspect of getting heaps of rain is the smell that emanates from my Chacos when they get wet. Think wet dog…following you around all day, sitting under your desk…yeah, not good. The nice thing about Chacos is that they are washable and they dry fairly quickly—so a fellow teacher and I had a “shoe washing party” a few days ago, which helped tremendously…until I stepped on the playground and sank almost up to my ankles in mud. *sigh* Oh well, at least I caught myself when I slipped, so I didn’t roll all the way down the hill in the mud!

He lifted me out of the slimy pit,

out of the mud and mire;

He set my feet on a rock 

and gave me a firm place to stand.

-Psalm 40:2