New Wrinkles in Life

After two months on the job as a stay-at-home dad I have a newfound respect for parents that stay home and watch the kids. I had hopes of having time to work on my freelance work during Jo's downtimes, but that is few and far between. I didn't think I had any romantic notions of lots of personal time but my expectations have been adjusted.

I have truly cherished all the time I have been able to spend with Jo. However I am starting to get antsy. Antsy, wanting to find the time to look for more work be it full-time or freelance. Antsy to get to a place where I can contribute financially again to our family.

One aside, I have had time to work on my photography as anyone who frequents the site can atest. Now I hope that that creative energy will filter into my other creative interests.

I am also eager for Thanksgiving, the chance to get with family have embark on a new adventure either here in So Cal or elsewhere (we have settled on a location for Thanksgiving).

A Menagerie of Thoughts

Today marks two weeks of unemployment and so far it has been anything but boring. Here I was hoping I would have a lot of free time to do odds and ends of things I have needed to do around the house for months, and some time to decompress from the stress of my situation. Not so much. Granted I have been able to get a lot of things done, just whenever I finish a task a feel like three more pop up. It has been a mixed blessing being unemployed right now. On one end I know Heidi enjoys having me around to help her with Jo, but at the same time we wonder how long we can financially make living off of unemployment and disability checks. But I have had some good down time to help clear my head which has been nice. Here's some thoughts I have had over the past couple of weeks.

• It's amazing how quickly a day passes just watching a newborn baby. They really don't do much (eat, sleep, poop, repeat) and yet after a day at home looking after Jo the time just seems to fly.

• When an interviewer says "How attached are you to your salary figure?" it usually doesn't bode well.

• I have learned not to get my hopes up. Just because someone says they may have something for you I have learned to not count on it until they sign on the dotted line. I learned that long ago in the business world but it's constantly getting reinforced these days. Granted I have never been unemployed before and have only been fully unemployed for about two weeks. I can't even fathom what people who have been unemployed for nine month to a year are feeling.

• It's quite infuriating when you hear about all these government programs that are supposed to help out people like Heidi and I, and when I look into them we don't qualify because we either make too much or we don't make enough.

• They should call USA network the NCIS network they play that show all day everyday.

• It's quite a challenge to create a routine while at home all day and with a newborn it's almost impossible. First newborns have no schedule, second there are so many distractions at home it's a challenge to keep focused. After 10 years of going to work, I feel so displaced having nowhere to go in the morning.

• Though I have never been a big goal setter, but I am seeing how goals are very important out on your own. It helps give you hope, something to look forward to. I have a few so far this summer. Obviously one is get a new job. Another one is do the High Sierra Trail (Sequoia to Mt. Whitney). I am so eager to get out in the mountains again. it should be a good diversion, and thankfully relatively cheap since I have all the gear. Yet another goal is to start putting up pictures up on a daily basis starting next week. Just away to keep my creative juices flowing while I am idle.

That's just the beginning of my thoughts over the past two weeks. I am sure more will hit the blog in the near future. Now that I feel like I am getting a grasp of the things I need to do at home I should have more time to work on my own work, including the web site, my art, and other projects I have been meaning to get to.

Those on Facebook can check out my photos of Jo over the past couple of weeks. I am still trying to unify all my different web entities. More on that later.

Josie Part III

Here's some photos of our little girl and her homecoming. Enjoy.

More on Little Josie

Both mom and baby are doing well. Heidi had a C-section after about 12 hours of labor. The doctor felt Josie was under too much stress. So they quickly got Josie and out and cleaned her up. Now we're just enjoying our new baby. Below are some pictures of Josie with her grandparents.

Newest Weston

Josephine Lois 6lbs. 10 oz. 19 inches Born 2:00

Hope Springs Eternal

How can you say no to a face like this... Enjoying a slow Memorial Day and a nice long walk with Lucy the morning light was perfect for a couple of quick shots of "Queen Lucy"

Liberian Reflections Part II: Yekepa

Looking back at when I first seriously considered going on the trip to ABC I had a completely different perception of the locale than what Yekepa turned out to be. Hearing the town was in the middle of a rain forest and a seven-hour drive from Monrovia, the big city and capital of Liberia, I was expecting a bunch of thatched or mud huts under a canopy of 40-foot trees. That was not the case. Granted, the town buildings weren't much better than mud huts (we actually did see some), what we did see was a community trying to eke by amongst the remains of a once thriving mining community.



Back in the 70s and 80s I guess Yekepa was a vacation destination. There was even a country club and olympic-sized swimming pool, all courtesy of the Lamco Mining Company. I guess it was a gorgeous place. Most of the housing, constructed by the company, was simple by our standards but luxurious there, mostly consisting of four concrete walls and a roof.

As the country spiraled into civil war Lamco and ABC pulled out, as did most western companies and organizations. Now, 15 years later all that's left of most of the structures are the concrete walls and whatever else looters couldn't run off with and weather couldn't wear away. Most of the locals who reside there now have made their own modifications to these existing structures, while the remaining abandoned structures are slowly reabsorbed by the jungle. It was rather surreal to see all the abandoned stuructures and equipment. I felt like I was in a Mad Max, or some other post-appocalyptic movie.



Three years ago Arcelor Mittal, a major steel company from Europe, moved into Yekepa with the intention of reopening the mine. With them came a new hope of a revived Yekepa, followed by more excitement when they chose to rebuild the school. However with the global recession and decline in demand of steel there is growing concern Arcelor Mittal might have to pull out, or at least scale back their operations in Yekepa. You could sense the uncertainty in the air. The Sunday we went into town to attend church the pastor even spoke about all the gossip of the company's potential exit.



The community as a whole was a lot bigger than I thought it would have been. I never heard any actual population numbers, but we saw a fair share of people when we went into town. Brad, James and I had the honor of watching a local soccer (football) match which was a big deal in the town. There had to be several hundred watching the game. As I mentioned before we also went to church in town, which was quite an experience. Coming from a rather reserved Baptist, and now Friends, background, the worship style in Liberia was completely out of my norm. Meeting all the locals was very easy. They were very friendly and eager to meet visitors. I never once felt unsafe wandering the area (except always keeping an eye open for snakes).

You can see more of my Yekepa photos on my Flickr page here.

Liberian Reflections Part I: The Library

Setting aside time to blog about my trip to Liberia has been a challenge of late. The sudden need to search for new employment and get ready for a baby seems to consume any free time I have. So I am setting aside the time now.

As I start these reflection posts I felt the best place to start was the whole reason we went in the first place, the Library. If you are just stumbling across this blog for the first time I'll quickly recap... My wife's grandma, Lois Lindley, passed away last summer. Her grandpa, Verl Lindley, along with the help of family, friends, and all the people Lois impacted throughout her lifetime of ministry, was able to raise the funds to rebuild the ABC University library in her honor. The University itself was destroyed 16 years ago by civil war in Liberia and is currently being rebuilt by close family friends of the Lindleys, Del and Becky Chinchen.



All that being said none of us were quite sure what state the Library was going to be in when we got there. And I was wondering how much a team of six could really do to get a library fully functional in less than two weeks. We were all pleasantly surprised to see the library building itself was very far along when we arrived. Most of the heavy construction was finished, the tile was mostly laid out, and electrical lines were run. We were able to focus more on setting up the furniture and computers, and deciding how the books were to be arranged. Of course that ended up no small task. We had a few unexpected setbacks, like losing 28 computers on campus due to a faulty voltage regulator on the university generator and discovering we didn't have all the necessary equipment to set up the library software. However, it was satisfying to be able to say we finished what we came to do in the 10 days we were on campus.



Beyond the library itself meeting all the people tied to the school was enriching as well. Meeting the students, faculty, and the workers was so great and humbling at the same time. Hearing the stories of what many of them went through during the war and just to get to ABC made me realize how much we, as Americans, take for granted. Many of the students didn't even own a book before they started classes at ABC. Listening to the countless heartbreaking stories was sobering. And yet seeing the gratitude and joy on their faces as the campus, and their country, is progressively being rebuilt was so energizing. Just walking through the campus during the day we would continually have passersby say "Thank You."



Getting past all the technical issues of my job at the school and meeting the locals and students helped put a face to a struggle I had only a passing knowledge of. I have seen countless photos and video of people suffering and in need, but nothing really captures your attention as much as truly seeing what these people go through on a daily basis. I know I had it easy as far as mission trips, I had a nice bed, four walls, and three somewhat substantial meals, but seeing the state of the rest of the country was an eye-opener.

That's all for now. Later I plan to post more on my experiences in Yekepa, the orphanage, and Monrovia.

To see more photos of the Library and the complete trip visit my Flickr page. I have broken them into four sets: my favorite photos, photos of ABC and the library, photos of Yekepa (including the abandoned mine, trainyard), and the orphanage.

Rolling Out the Liberia Photos

Kids At Play At the Orphanage, originally uploaded by dubland.

Here's the first batch of Liberia photos. Several more to follow, as well as some more in-depth posts on my trip. I apologize that they have taken so long to get up but the past month has been so crazy. With losing my job (at least half of it), having to move dubland to a new server, revamping dubland to be more of a job search tool, and starting the whole job hunting process life has been a blur.

For now these will all be on Flickr until I decide where to house the complete set. Hope you enjoy the photos.

Finished Liberia Photos

I was able to finish some of the photos I took on my trip to Liberia, and they are now on Flickr. I'll slowly move them over to Dubland after I finish some maintenance issue with the site. In the meantime enjoy these photos. Tonight I am supposed to meet with the Liberia team to share our photos and video. More to come!

Back Home

Well I am back in the States after a very taxing trip back. We left the ABC campus Thursday morning and didn't reach home til Saturday night. We did spent most of Friday seeing the sights in Monrovia which was quite fascinating and sobering. Then we took off from Monrovia around 9:30 PM and landing in Brussels around 4AM. Then a seven hour layover there, followed by flight to DC, and finally our last connecting flight to LA which touched down just before 7PM.

In the midst of the mental haze I can say for sure it was a great and enriching trip. One, I am sure, I remember the rest of my life. It was so rewarding to see the library finished and seeing the beaming smile on Grandpa's (Verl's) face as the library was getting dedicated was great to see. I know it was a very satisfying and emotional trip for him. And to top it off he was made a chief of the county by the ABC professors (more on that in a later blog entry).


It was quite humbling and eye-opening to see what the Liberians have gone through and are still going through as a result of the 20 years of civil war. Seeing how excited the students, and professors were to have books to read and a place to read, you realize how much we as Americans take for granted. Most of the current students at ABC have had little to no access to books up to now. For the whole two weeks we had students and workers saying, "Thank you" as we passed.


I will post more later this week as get more time to work through my thoughts and reflections on the trip and a little more coherent. With more photos and hopefully video in the near future.

Finishing Touches

Well believe it or not we are almost done with the library. We are putting in the last shelves and books, and I am double-checking all the network lines to make sure they work. After that we clean up and make everything look good. So hard to believe we are almost done. And with time to spare. Not a whole lot,we leave Thursday morning, but it's nice not to have to hurry things through.

As for the lost computers, it looks like the school lost 31 computers. Thankfully we have 18 to help absorb some of that loss. Still working on recovering some of the data on a few of the key computers.

Tomorrow I should have photos to post of the finished library. Back to work.

Ummmm...

Well we have had our first technical difficulty. Yesterday afternoon right before dinner the voltage of the generator on campus went rapidly up and knocked all the power out. After restoring it we found that almost all of the computers that were plugged in, even those powered off, were gone (as far as we can tell right now). Talking to Bryan, our on call electritian (Thanks Bryan) we are trying to figure out what happened and how best to prevent it from happening again. Thankfully I had only plugged in two of the library computers at the time, and all the rest of the computers will be behind UPS backups which should help protect the computers from future incidents.

So today I am trying to assess the damage and figure out how many functioning computers we have on campus. We're praying for the best. I was able to take some good pictures, but not sure when I will get a chance to look at them. Hopefully tomorrow I will get a chance to post, since we won't be working tomorrow.

We Have Lights!

Well the lights are now working in the Library. Thanks to James and Brad they cranked though the remaining lights and even installed all the blinds. We were also able to set up the network in the library as well. Next step is to set up the computer room and finish up the network inputs in all the other rooms. Things are starting to take shape. Doug and Judi are still trying to get all the library software squared away. It's always fun trying to contact customer service from a remote place like this. And Grandpa furiously put on all the switch plate covers. So furious in fact he broke some glass doing so (you'll have to ask him about his phenomenal strength).


Interestingly, we didn't have the local workers today because it was a national holiday, Decoration Day. It's a day to go the grave sites of you family members who had died in the wars over the past 20 years. It is quite interesting working with the locals. I could spend a whole post on that.


As we were wrapping up this afternoon we got bombarded by a major rain storm. In fact as I write this I have lost my internet connection so I am going to have to wait to post this. Quite dramatic rain here. We now have some little ponds around the campus, not sure how long they will stay. As the rain started to come down, James took on one of the students in a game of 21 (basketball) at the gym. They wagered James' T-shirt, which he lost. The student was so happy to win a T-Shirt and James had to retreat back to the house shirtless. Now he doesn't need a shower tonight.

That's all for now. Hopefully we can post photos of some completed rooms soon.

First Day at ABC

Well we made it. After 3 days of travel we made it to the campus. Quite a grueling trip though. Seven hours in Brussels seemed to be an eternity. And the 3 hour technical stop in Ivory Coast en route to Monrovia was a bit tiring but we made it. And were greeted by muggy muggy weather. The city is right on the beach, in fact our night in the guest house in Monrovia was about 30 yards from the beach. We fell asleep to breakers which was nice (the A/C was even nicer). Yesterday was a 7 hour drive up to Yekepa, which wasn't bad, but man it felt good to be finished with the travel for awhile.

Today we start off running. Quite a bit of the library was already done which was nice. The drop ceiling, most of the tile work, and all the walls were already done. I was busy working on the network lines for the computers. James spent the day putting in all the lights, Doug and Judi spent the day conversing with customer service for the software company that made the library system. Brad went in between both James and I helping whoever needed the help at the time. And Grandpa (Verl) had the most important job of the day, supervising all of us to make sure we did it all right.

That's all for now as it is starting to rain. Hopefully it will remove all this muggy weather. Next time I am aiming to include a picture if time permits.

First Leg Down

Well we made it to Washington DC. Now we have a 5 hour layover before heading out to Brussells. The above picture is light-mural-thingee (that's the technical name) that is just across from our terminal. My next chance to post will probably be Monday night or Tuesday when we get to the school.

Now we have to find something to fill the 5 hours.

Ramping Up

In little over a week I will be boarding a plane for the long trip to Liberia, and all of a sudden I have a sudden rush of concern, "Am I ready?" Have I thought through everything I need for this trip? Heck no! Course being how this is my first real experience doing a trip like this I am not sure there is a way to truly prepare for an adventure like this, no matter how much you talk through it with others.

Am I excited? Definitely. But part of me wonders what am I doing going on a trip like this. Traveling thousands of miles to a very remote jungle to rebuild a library in a country I know nothing about (other than it was founded by freed American slaves.) Wondering how am I going to solve the IT issues for this building, since I am not an IT guy.

But then I realize how this whole process has been an incredible blessing. How six months ago Heidi's grandpa first brought up the idea of raising the money for rebuilding a library for the college in honor of Heidi's grandma. How all the funds came in, and then some, in the midst of a worldwide economic collapse. How originally I wasn't going to be able to go because of timing, and now I am. It has helped reinforce in me that God is truly sovereign, and He allows us to be part of the process for our own transformation. I just pray I can be open to being the vessel of change God wants me to be, as well as be sensitive to the change he is doing in me.

I also pray I don't forget something important when I pack this week.

Returning from Lynden

This past weekend Heidi and I embarked on our final trip without the worry of kids. We went up to Lynden, WA to visit Heidi's brother and sister-in-law who just moved up there. For those of you not familiar Lynden is about a 30 minute drive from Canada.

It was quite stunning up there, and we had wonderful weather. While everyone down in Southern California was waterlogged we had sunny skies. We got to enjoy a nice trip to the San Juan Islands, where the above picture was taken. We also soaked in the sights near Bellingham and Lynden. These are the first batch of photos before I have really cleaned them up. There are many more to come.

We ran across about six bald eagles on San Juan Island, this is a close up of one of them. Such beautiful animals.

Looking down David and Rachel's street.

This is the view just outside David and Rachel's apartment.

Wasn't sure if this was the work of a huge comic book fan in Bellingham, a gorilla marketing campaign by Warner Brothers, or a political statement, but I got a chuckle out of this.

Timber, David and Rachel's dog styling in an Angels Beanie.