a rough start...

there's an occasional day, maybe about once a month or so (much less often than it used to be), where things just get to me. whether its the culture, the traffic or this "new life" in cairo, it just all seems to fall down onto my emotions like a new waterfall pounding down on the untouched earth below.

today was one of those days/mornings.

having a full-time "secular" job in cairo means a lot of things, but the one thing it meant today was being frustrated, tired, and broken in horrible traffic this morning. sometimes the traffic is just waiting in terribly long lines on exit ramps and such. other days, like today, it means dealing with crazy drivers and not-so-nice people. that's the kind that gets to me most of the time. i can deal with waiting in lines for 1.5 hours, but i can only deal with unkind horribly inconsiderate driving for about 10 mins! then the breakdown comes.

it usually comes back to the following thoughts in my mind:

-why is it always a fight?
-how can people live like this?
-this is not a life to fight in traffic every morning?
-what kind of city is this where this is the normal?
-what kind of people are these people to act like this in driving?
-why am i here with these people living in this same city and driving on these same crazy streets every morning in rush hour traffic to this job?

and that's the base question that my thoughts always seem to hit. kind of the bottom pit of it all. it seems to always come back to the big "why"--why am i here???? that's the big one that hits so hard and with such strong desperation that you feel as if your life should just end at that moment.

of course, i'm being dramatic. (after all, i've been in egypt and its an emotional and dramatic culture!)

i don't want my life to end. and i really don't want to keep asking this "why i am here" question. but its just one of those days. and i have to remember that those days come less often than before and they only come on occasion.

so, i'll try to hang in there today, like i try to do on these kind of days, and just try to relax and trust in what i know to be true. i am here and i am supposed to be here...that's the plan..the Big Plan...and that's the reality. blessing and curse, good and bad, sickness and health, up and down, clear and confusing.

that's life i think no matter where i live. we get it all.