Passing through Twilight Zones

by Christa Hillstrom

"He came to Simon Peter, who said, 'Are you going to wash my feet?'

Jesus replied, 'You do not realize now what I am doing, but later you will understand'
…When he finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place.

 Do you understand what I have done for you?"
-The Book of John

I never thought I would be the kind of person who quotes the bible at the start of a letter.  Really, that is uncool, right?   But someone told me to read this part of the bible recently, and I picked it up and found this kind of interesting.  I like these parts when Jesus says weird, cryptic things and everyone around him says… "Huh?" and shrugs at each other.   So I read this part, about Jesus washing people's feet, and them saying, "Why on earth would you do something so pointless, especially to those who are considered to be inferior to you?"   And Jesus tells them, yeah, you don't get it now.  But you will.

There has been a lot of death around lately, and this is pretty new for me.  Every death I've experienced in my life has come to me first over the distance of the phone, but I've never really been right in the crux of it.   And every time, without fail, there was the general consensus that death was a big deal....

 

 

This will not be a pretty e-mail.

I just thought I should say that from the outset.  So consider this a disclaimer if you are interested in reading it.  Some parts might come across as a little indecent, but then again I've seen some pretty indecent things lately.
 
Susan and I woke up, as usual, at 5:45 on Diwali morning.  Think of it like Christmas, only with firecrackers.  Lots of them.  We went in to the office to make coffee, as is our habit, around 7 and ran into Nino there.  We had quite an interesting conversation, and then he impulsively suggested, "Should we take the ambulance into Delhi today?"  I had still not been into the city with him so I got very excited.