A speck of sunshine

Woke up at 5 a.m. today and puttered around (as my Mom would say) until I noticed something rare and exciting.  Sunshine!

For the past few weekends Fany has been stuck at her in-laws house because she goes for a one night visit and it rains so hard that it is not safe for them to travel back home.  This week she was supposed to come home Thursday, but today is Saturday...  I texted her and told her to hurry home if it was as sunny on her end as it is here.

Then I got to work washing clothes.  You never realize how helpful a dryer is until you don't have one.  Especially for bath towels which get stinky before they get dry, or sheets which have cat hair stuck to them unless you pass them through the dryer.

By 10 a.m. the clouds started rolling in, but the clothes are all washed.  Just hoping the rain will hold off until they dry.

I have become a strategic washer.  The key is small loads.  My washer doesn't like big loads.  The smallest setting with only a few things at a time works best.  Never pass mid-way full.

First sheets so that everything else can just be hung around them on the clothes line.  Then darks because they are normally more heavy jeans, which take longer to dry.  You never know how much sun you might get.  Set jeans on lawn chairs in the sun and wash lights, then towels.  By that time jeans are part way dry.  Move the jeans onto the clothes line to finish drying there and make room for towels on the lawn chairs.  That is how I wash and dry clothes in Honduras.

Thank God I at least have a washing machine.  I am grateful for it, even if I do have to fill it myself with buckets of water and the hose.  When I first moved here I didn't have a washer.  Washing clothes by hand in the pila was a nightmare.  Literally.  It was very stressful.  But now I appreciate my washer more than ever.

It is now 10:30 and the sky is dark.  Welcome to laundry day in Honduras.

Do you speak English?

At the gym yesterday someone asked if I am French.  That's one I haven't heard before.  I think it's because he heard me grumbling when the trainer told me to do two more repetitions and I thought I was done.  Grumbling can sound like a French accent in Spanish.

Anyway, my Spanish is still not perfect which is why I loved the following conversation so much.

Samuel (4 years old) comes up to me with a shocked/perplexed/this can't be true look on his face and asks, "You speak English?!?"

Confused and wondering how I've spent almost every day for over a year with this kid and he doesn't know my mother tongue is not Spanish I hesitantly say, "Yes."

"No you don't."

"Yes, I do."

"No, " shaking his head adamantly.

"Yes.  That's why my Spanish sounds different than yours."

"It's not different."

"Yes Samuel.  My Spanish sounds different from yours."

"Not to me."

"I love you Samuel."

He hugs me, "I love you too."  And runs off to play.

Samuel