A Gift of Providence…

Katy talked about, in her prior entry, our travel season.  We are back in Holland now, enjoying our time at home before we begin our next travel adventure.  I want to do a little back-tracking to tell  you about a gift that was given to us in the middle of a scary moment, a gift of providence.

One of our trips a few weeks ago involved a week of speaking in NW Iowa, Minnesota, and South Dakota.  Our concern was to get there without harassing Leila’s sleep patterns too much.   We got a great suggestion from our sister-in-law Heather.   She wondered why we just did not drive through the night.  Brilliant!   So we prepared accordingly.   We loaded up our little car on Friday evening, changed Leila into her PJs, put her in her car seat, and set the course on our Garmin for Orange City, IA (15 hours away).   Leila fell asleep before we left Holland, MI and woke up in Orange City, Iowa.   It was genius.   Of course, Katy and I had to take turns napping during the day because we did not sleep a wink as we drove through the night!  It still was worth it.   We made good time, and Leila was in a good mood.

After about 10 days of speaking engagements and various meetings, we found ourselves in the little town of Platte, South Dakota.   After the morning service, one of the elders, BJ invited us to join his wife and him for lunch at a local diner.  Katy and I almost NEVER refuse eating at local diners; we certainly weren’t going to skip out here.   After lunch, our friend while saying good-bye told us that if we ever needed anything, especially a new set of wheels (he owns a car-dealership), to let them know because they would be happy to help us out.   Katy and I enjoyed our lunch and began our drive out to our next and last speaking destination in South Dakota.   As we drove, we talked about how kind the offer was and if we did need a new car.   After some deliberation, we both agreed that while a bigger car might be nice, we just couldn’t afford it.

After our last day in Orange City, we packed up our car and began our trek to Holland.  The drive was hard but definitely worth it because of the peaceful, drowsy baby in the car seat.   Katy drove first.   A little before the halfway point, we switched up, and I drove the rest of the way.   The drive was very non-eventful, at least it was ALMOST non-eventful.   After about 12 hours of driving, our GPS showed us 4 miles from home.

That’s when it happened.  I shone the brights on just in time to see a glimmer reflecting back to me.   Katy and I were both awake and knew instantly what that was… a deer.   The deer tried to avoid us but there is very little one can do when traveling over 70mph.   The whole incident took maybe three seconds to unfold.   Katy and I remember every millisecond quite vividly.  Before we knew it, the deer plowed into the car.   It crushed our hood and skipped across shattering the wind-shield and caving it in.   Fortunately for us, the windshield held…just.   The hood popped up, the air bags deployed, and our horn got stuck (resulting in the disorienting blare that we heard when we finally came to a stop).  Everything was dark but Katy had the presence of mind to realize that we were in the middle of the highway. Our car had just enough life to pull us to the side of the road.  We dialed 911 and waited for our tow truck.

It goes without saying that this incident left us shaken quite a bit.  The initial thoughts that ran through my head as I tried to sleep later on was the many ways I could have avoided the deer.   Soon, those thoughts were replaced by thoughts that were far grimmer, thoughts about how much worse this could have easily been.   God protected us all.  We escaped without a scratch on our bodies.

Soon, we were forced to face the reality of life without a car.   Again, we were blessed by the generosity of friends who loaned us their car while we figured out what was next.   The first call I made with regard to a new car was, of course, to BJ in Platte, South Dakota.  BJ was kind and gracious and through his help, we found a new car, a car that we still find hard to believe is ours.   It is a car that looks sharp, is bigger, has fewer miles, and drives so much better than our old one ever did.  God is indeed good.

We are grateful for the safety that was afforded us.  We are grateful for the people who walked beside us as we dealt with the aftermath.   We are spoiled by God’s goodness.

Weekend Crazy-ness

Life can be sometimes so very hectic.   Jobs can become demanding, school work may pile up, while your social obligations spiral out of control.   To grant respite from that syndrome, we celebrate Labor Day.  A day in which we stop working so we can spend time doing other, more pleasurable things that will re-charge your batteries and celebrate the lives we lead.   It was exactly that sort of weekend for us.   Fortunately for Katy and me, life doesn’t change too much.  We constantly live into this chaos and love it (most of the time).  This weekend was no exception.

On Friday night, Katy and I went out on a date.   It was a double-date with our friends Dan and Teresa.   We got Leila a babysitter (the lovely aunt Betsy) and we drove out to Grand Rapids to have dinner at this new restaurant called, “The Electric Cheetah.”  As strange as that name might sound, it was one of the best restaurants we had been to in quite some time.  The food was delicious, the atmosphere…well… electric, but most of all, it was good to just head out and celebrate the weekend with people we love.   Leila did well that night!:)

Saturday opened up quietly.   Beula and her friend Becca stopped by to say hi and meet Leila.   Beula is getting married in January and has requested that Leila be her flower girl (even if she can’t walk by then!).   I (JP) will also be involved in the wedding as the emcee.   It was good to see the bride and her flower girl getting to know each other.  They got along splendidly.   Later that afternoon, Katy and I were joined by our dear friends Chris and Lindsay Zeller.  Our destination this time was the zoo!   This was Leila’s first excursion into the zoo.   She has lately preferred to ride on daddy’s backpack (versus the stroller) as she can get an unobstructed 360 degree view of everything.  And for those of you who have gotten to know Leila, you know that she is VERY curious about EVERYTHING!

Sunday came along.   We were still not ready to breathe normally.  We took Leila to the nursery in church.  Handed her over to the lovely people at the nursery, slapped on a name tag on Leila, picked up our pager and made our way to the sanctuary.  We were able to sit through the whole service for the first time since October of 2008, without a baby that was ornery!   I must admit, Katy and I kept looking at each other and wondering when that pager would go off!  It did not.  Jayme Aalberts took wonderful care of Leila that morning.   In the afternoon, we headed back up to Grand Rapids to have a barbeque with our dear friend Lori.   The food was spectacular.  Katy and Lori can cook up a storm together.   I benefited greatly from that partnership.

Monday…yeah… we are not done yet.   Monday, the Wings had a family get-together at a park here in Holland.  The menu was chicken, both grilled and fried, from KFC!  Leila’s cousin Eleanor was there to join in the festivities with her parents.   We had, again, GREAT food, relaxing walks, and just good ol’ fashioned family time which was good for the heart.   Monday night, my friend Miki joined us for a couple of days.  Miki and I went to college together over 10 years ago.  She is from Japan but currently just finished up some grad work at the University of Washington.  Before heading back to Osaka, she decided to make a quick jaunt over to the mid-west to meet up with us.  It was truly special to have her with us.  I enjoy introducing Katy (and Leila) to people in my life who were such an integral part of my college experience.  Miki was an important section of that chapter.

Miki left this morning.   We have a “quiet” week to negotiate now.  Sunday begins the first of many Sundays when I will be speaking in places all over the U.S.  It was truly the perfect way for us to celebrate with friends and family.  We trust that regardless of where you are, you have weekends like that (even if it is not that busy or full).   Here are a sampling of pictures… enjoy!

Lori Aunty and Leila

Space Monkey?

The Other Monkeys

Beula and Becca with Leila

Katy and Leila

My beautiful women

Learning to walk with Ava

The Gang

The Chaos of Summer

This summer has been a whirlwind of sorts. Katy and I are currently looking into purchasing tickets for our next India trip. In some ways, it seems like we JUST got back to the US. Time does fly, especially when you have a precocious 10 month old dictating the pace. Added to that is, of course, our busy lives. We have had weddings to attend and be a part of. We have had numerous gatherings, almost all of which involving yummy food, with fun people. All of them were good for the heart (and stomach). Our home is beginning to resemble the home we have in India.

And oh yes! I have been learning how to swim. Tonight will be my third lesson. And if you ask the instructor, our dear friend Lori, she’ll attest that I have come a LONG way from the floundering brown bear I was the first week. Hopefully I’ll be able to swim and breathe at the same time tonight! In addition, Katy’s parents are in town, which has been an added blessing, especially for little Leila. While we all do keep busy with our lives, it is nice to be able to drop by and say hello when we want to! Lots of people… lots of love… our cups overflow!

This summer in Michigan has been cool (which is putting it mildly). Lots of rain, lots of cloud cover, and precious few sun rays. The Sundararajans, however, do not feel like we missed out on summer because we already experienced the Indian summer earlier this year. However, it is a little disappointing to not be able to walk down to the farmer’s market as often as we’d like, or maybe play with Leila in the neighborhood parks, or grill out as much as wanted to.

While this pseudo-summer has been flying by us, we find ourselves in the eye of the storm. In the next couple of weeks, life again gets busy with speaking engagements and travel. Stay tuned… this should be a fun ride!

Some photos from the past couple of weeks…

The analyst and the color commentaries

So…  in the world of sports broadcasting, there are usually two people doing the play-by-play.  One is usually someone with a background in communication while the other tends to be a retired player or coach.   The job of the ex-coach or player (analyst) is to announce the plays being run and other intricacies of what one might see on screen.   The other commentator is there to provide the “color.”  His/Her job is to make sure people are still interested.  They ask meaningful questions, provide thoughtful insights, and help the analyst along in this new world.  So, I’ve figured this out.    I am the analyst in our life while Katy provides the color.   (Note: I know that this is not a hard and fast rule.  I am able to provide color on occasion and Katy can be quite observant.  I am just generalizing.)

So… here are my thoughts since we got back to the US.  We are quite aware that the blog has been quiet for over a month now.   As always, there is good reason for that!  We have hit the road running.   We have had to deal with sickness, jet-lag, family obligations, weddings, and speaking engagements.   Leila took a while to get into her stride.  She had a skin issue to deal with.  The dry-ness here in the US made her cheeks get chapped. She also was teething on our trip.   That combined with the cold Michigan weather slowed things up in terms of getting re-adjusted to life here.   Meanwhile, I was preparing for an ordination service where I lead worship (in Chicago) and for a wedding, the following week (in Iowa).   And as Murphy’s law would have it, when I was getting ready to perform the wedding, our basement in our home in Michigan got flooded.  Poor Katy was alone with Leila.  Fortunately, our dear friend Lori was there to help her out.  Together these two amazing women moved everything we had in our basement up to our main floor and out to the yard.

It took about three days to get the basement completely dry before we could begin to move things back in there.   We are finally getting to that point.  We did find a silver lining in all this though.  This flooding helped us purge the unnecessary junk we had been collecting all these years.  My workshop area is again lined up and raring to go.  Hopefully, I get some projects done there.

So there you go…  my analysis of the month or so since we got back!   I know that the color commentary will follow soon enough!;)   Thanks for checking in with us.   Photos will be coming soon too!

Jet-lagged

It is a beautiful sunny day here in Holland, Michigan.   The thermometer in our house is hovering at a gentle 70 F.   We left for the US exactly a week ago and cannot believe in some ways that it has only been a week since we boarded the Paris bound Air France flight.    

I know a lot of you have wondered how we fared in our trip.   Our flight from Bangalore to Paris was the longest leg of the journey.  This was also, coincidentally, the most problematic flight for Leila on our way TO India.   I was a little nervous but Leila did sleep for about 5-6 hours on this flight (this was a 10 hour flight).  I was quite relieved to arrive in Paris.  We were hopeful about the shorter (6 hours) flight to NYC.   However, that hope vanished in a couple of hours.  It was a noisy flight.  We had a baby that wasn’t sure what was day and what was night.   Needless to say, I walked the aisles of the airplane for almost 3 hours.  Now, I must preface all this by stating first that Leila was a really good girl.  She just did not sleep.  In over 36 hours of travel, our little wonder got maybe 7 hours of sleep TOTAL.   That began to wear on her and exponentially began to wear on us.  

We landed at the JFK International in New York City.  We found out at this time that while all our luggage made it, our stroller did not.   This was a pretty big blow because now we had to negotiate 7 hours at JFK with 7 suitcases, 3 carry-ons AND a baby.  For as great a city as New York City is…JFK leaves a LOT to be desired.   We had to switch over to the domestic terminal which reminded me of a crowded bus station in India.   The only difference being that we were hauling a lot of luggage on a rickety little trolley up and down elevators and over floors that were carpeted heavily.  (Note:  Katy and I try to avoid O’hare Airport in Chicago and Heathrow in London.   After this trip, I have sworn to not make fun of those fine cities ever again).  Our journey was, however, not over at JFK.  We had to catch our connection (2 hours) to Detroit.   In all honesty, the passengers (well…one loud mouth and his friend) on this flight were probably the most inhospitable to new parents and a baby.   That made the 2 hours extra long.    

We were so glad to see Katy’s parents waiting for us at the Detroit Airport at 9:30 PM on Monday night!   We spent the night with Katy’s brother Ben, his wife Heather and Leila’s cousin Eleanor.   Best sleep we had in a while.   Sometime on Tuesday, we loaded up the car again and began the three hour ride to Holland.   Leila did well in her car seat.  

Anyway, we are still battling jetlag.  Our stuff still lies strewn about in the living room as we unpack, do laundry, and get things back in order.   Thank you for your prayers.   We are glad that the travel went well.   How did we fare?  I’d say that I’d give the trip back to the US a B-.  

Leila is slowly beginning to behave like the Leila we know.   We are excited and happy about that.  For a little 7 month old she sure is quite the traveler!   

We hope to update more now that we are settling in.

Tulip Time

Back in Holland, I know that Hope College has just graduated the class of 2009 (CONGRATs to my beloved students!!) and Tulip Time is in full swing.  This is always a favorite time of year for JP and me.  For as long as we’ve been married, Tulip Time was a signal.  Seeing the spring rains arrive, and the tulips poking their colorful blooms into the fresh, bright world was just one reason to smile.  JP would gladly admit that Tulip Time is a favorite time because of the carnival food carts that line up along 8th Street.  (In fact, JP loves those visits to the food carts so much that he occasionally talks about organizing our trips to India so that we can be gone during the worst of Holland’s winter, but make it back in time for Tulip Time!)   And, while I admit that we both like to go for a corn dog and a fat ball– which sounds gross, but tastes like a Boston Creme donut, but better– I think we both love Tulip Time for the way that it marks a change of season, a change of attitude, a change of pace, and even a change of place for us.  Tulip Time, for me, always indicated the close of another school year, with lovely hints of sumer beginning to loom before me.  It was both the end of something, and  a sweet, blessed beginning.  It was the scramble and rush of life and work at the college giving way to hopeful piles of books to be read, walks to be dilly-dallied along, and grilled meals to be savored.  In addition to these things, Tulip Time generally pointed toward an imminent trip to India for JP and me.  Tulip Time, rain or shine, warm or cold, was a breath of life, with the heavy undertone of excitement.    

Now it is Tulip Time, but here we are, already in India.  I’ve been a bit out of sorts these last few days, and without trying to be overly dramatic about it, I think I’m rather homesick.  It was this time last year that I bid a bittersweet farewell to my beloved Hope College, and my ministry as a chaplain.  I was a little less than half way through my pregnancy, and JP and I were looking forward to an exciting, busy trip to India that included his brother’s marriage.  This was to be followed by my sister’s wedding shortly after we returned.  During this whole time period, I was also trying to grasp the details of a new profession as I joined JP as his partner in mission work.  Needless to say, this has been a year of major change for me.  I’m not sure I’ve given myself the time and space for proper reflection, but I am suddenly realizing that my heart has not forgotten to reflect.  My heart is tugging at me, reminding me of the things that have been my rhythm for so many years.  There is a quiet sorrow in me for that which is over, and I’ve found myself missing Tulip Time and all that it signaled for me in previous year.

 

my little tulip

However, to be most truthful, I must also admit that God is planting good seeds in my life right now.  In this year, God has gifted me with my precious little Leila.  She is my tulip this May.  And, God has been (and will continue) planting seeds related to my new professional life.  I trust that these seeds will grow into bright, daring blossoms, all in due time.  It will take some time for these seeds to grow, for the blossoms to emerge.  So, I say, I am grateful to be here.  Growing is good for me, and flowers are worth waiting for.

Leila: a photo update

Leila is as cute as ever.  All of her little milestones and daily changes bring us great, great joy. She is cutting her first tooth these days, and practicing a lot of cute sounds.  She especially likes to blow raspberry noises with her finger (or mine) in her mouth.  Here are some recent photos that you might enjoy.  Just the daily-ness of our life…

daily-ness is good…

Leila is still lap size

our little cowgirl gets a horsey ride from Tata

like many babies, Leila LOVES red

Adorable with a capital "A"

Leila plays some tunes with Daddy

afternoon sun

lovin' the feet these days!!

Things that I love… Part 1

I (JP) love to make people laugh.  It was, therefore, imperative that Leila laugh, and laugh a lot.   Unfortunately, you don’t get to tell newborns or even infants what to do.  They have a mind of their own.   After trying to teach the basics of cricket and simple things like setting up a encrypted wifi network, I gave up.   God is good though.   Babies do grow and show you things that are new every day!   I want to share with you what I came home to today after a workout at the local gym.  I hope you have as much fun as we all did!

P.S.  The deadline for your entry into the contest (see previous entry) is coming up so do not wait too long!

Leila Licks Things

Leila spends lots of time licking these days.

Also, I forgot to tell you about how we got stuck in Gary, Indiana on the way home from Iowa and South Dakota.  The visiblity was poor, the weather was getting worse, and Leila began screaming in the back seat.  We opted to get a hotel for the night, and Leila enjoyed playing princess with all the pillows on the bed…

Princess Leila