Envying My Neighbors

There is more to our lives than the electricity rationing, internet outages and water shortages, but it just happens that those things send me down a road of pondering. For instance, today the power and water were turned off way before the scheduled time, which sent me into a mental frenzy of reorganizing my day. Deciding to turn on the generator was even a struggle, not knowing how long we would need it and how much gas there was to be used. Still, I was so thankful for the option of an alternate power source. (And what I am about to say, doesn't mean that I am ready to do without it.) That made me pity my neighbors, who don't have any other options. But wait, my neighbors don't have washing machines, refrigerators, and computers to do their chores for them. The course of their day is not altered by the lack of electricity. So in the end, I find myself, not pitying, but almost envying my neighbors for their simple way of life and lack of complications brought on by excess.

I guess this goes to show that I've been in Africa long enough to have pretzel logic - a twisted way of seeing things.