Am I strong enough? Why do you ask that? Just wondering. Ah. Strong enough for...? Stuff. Oh c'mon. Spill. Let downs. God has never abandoned you now, has He. Noo.. He hasn't. What I mean is... Well... Well? Being let down as a result of my own selfish and narrow-minded expectations. [silence] Yes, alright, I've been through that one numerous times already. There are other stuff that's bugging me too. Like... Deciding not to go to Chiang Rai, but instead pledging to aid the team in their preparation, and... [bites lower lip] ... feeling guilty that I don't seem to be helping them as much as I thought I would. Or could. Oh, bo-ther. So many things flooding my mind right now, I can't think clearly enough. Hah. You know how it is, one issue starts bugging you and the rest all decide that they too deserve my fretting over, pronto. Phooey. Them buggy issues are as pesky as flies, and far less swattable.

Gargh. I do so long to go back to the Samaritan Hostel with them. To see those faces I remember, faces that would be 2 years older now; to proudly initiate a conversation in Thai and then fall flat on my face with embarrassment when my vocabulary's exhausted; to eat sticky rice and rambutans with the children; to wake up in the morning to the sound of the broom sweeping the pavement in the hostel's compound; to do a hundred and one things, half of which boil down to a desire to depart for a place where the pace of life is... slower.

Ah. You already know that there's more to all of this. Commit to interceding for the team even as you remain here.

Will you?