Expectations

Long hikes can get dirty

Sometimes things don't go the way you expect them to go. Like the outing I went on recently with some islander friends. We were prepared for a fairly easy walk up a river. They were dressed in nice wraps and even had makeup on. Several hours later we were clinging to rocks to keep from falling in the river and bushwhacking straight up a large hill. In retrospect, it was a fun outing. Just not as expected.

This last weekend I went to a conference for English teachers that was organized by colleagues on another island. We had a wonderful plan. There were 4 teachers from my team, plus 6 islanders all signed up for the conference and we were all going to take a boat together on Thursday. The conference started on Saturday, so it seemed like a good day to travel.

Waterfall on the hike

Wednesday night our team leader's house helper saw on TV that our boat wasn't traveling Thursday, but was delayed until Friday. Well, that's fine. Bonus day on island! We had a picnic to celebrate a birthday. I hadn't packed at that point, so it really wasn't a big deal.

On Friday we were supposed to be meeting for the boat at 11:30 AM. At 10:15 I was packing my bag and heard the news: "The boat's not going until Saturday or Sunday."

OH NO!

Lookin' good, right?

That meant that anyone going on the boat (if it traveled at all) wouldn't arrive until the second day of the two-day conference. Not good. So we started the scramble. Our team leader was giving the opening address, so he really needed to be at the conference when it started. Another teammate was also speaking, so she had to be there. My housemate and I didn't want to miss out on the weekend we'd been looking forward to, so we all scattered different directions: boat office to get a refund on tickets and both of the airline offices to see if they had last-minute tickets available for flights either the same day or the next morning.

And what about the islanders who would go with us? It's not all that easy to find money quickly for plane tickets that cost more than twice that of boat tickets. Three of them managed to get the funds and go anyway. PTL!

And our team? The team leader got the last ticket for Friday's afternoon flight. The rest of us, along with the three islanders who were going all caught a morning flight on Saturday. We arrived at the conference a little late, but we arrived!

A bunch of the English teachers from Clove Island

In the end, the conference was a great thing to be part of. We got to see a large number of islanders on the big island who were teaching English and get inspired about the possibilities for our island. The islanders who came with us all came away with new ideas and excitement for the future. It was also neat to see colleagues from the other islands and swap news with them.

So, expectations had to change. There are all sorts of areas in life where expectations must change. Sometimes it takes more grace than other times when change is necessary. But if we look for it, the grace is always there.