life here can feel a lot like making guacamole

Life used to be like this: Walk through the produce section in the grocery story , see avocados on sale, buy avocados, wait a day or so until they are slightly soft, make guacamole. Simple. Delicious. We love guacamole.

So, when we were sent a package of guacamole mix we were pretty excited. Until we read the label: just add avocados. Um, ya, no avocados here. Well, we did have an avocado last year that someone brought from a neighboring country.  So, a couple of weeks ago when our friend C brought back four avocados from the capital, we were quite excited.

After a week in the refrigerator, their skins were still very hard. We couldn't tell if they were ripe, so we cut one open. Nope. Bitter, hard, definitely not ripe.

Then there were three.  We put them out on the counter to ripen more. Two days later, they had white moldy fuzz growing on them. We cut another one open. The outer 1/4 inch was ripe...the rest was still rock hard and bitter. Luke was a bit upset that we had opened the avocado and told us be patient and wait longer. So we did.

Two days later, two avocados left.

We cut through hard skin to find this:

appetizing? i think not.

Half of the avocado was rotten and the other half was rock-hard. None of it was ripe.  WHAT?!

End result: No avocados. No guacamole.
Just add avocados...why can't anything be that simple here?

Today, our friend J brought us a gift from the capital:

doesn't seem ripe yet, but maybe tomorrow there will be guacamole. we hope.

And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. Galatians 6:9