Our house will be a wonderful place of hospitality when it is finished. We are so grateful for this gift and all the work being done on it but.... When the house is being reconstructed, how do we work around the noise and dust?
When the plumber is drilling holes through
sandstone walls and he can wear earplugs
but we have to work just above that commotion with the walls shaking, what would you do?
When another builder is popping tiles off another wall, also wearing earplugs and mask but we have to organize travel plans or teaching schedules, what would you do?
How do we concentrate when they saw boards just outside the window at our desks?
When can we have time for quiet reflection?
cleaning and a new layer arrives. The plaster dust from the reconstruction on this floor is still between the floor boards in our lounge.
Attempted solutions while they work on the lower level of our house:
1. Try to ignore it all and stop for a cuppa when it gets to be too much
2. Take a walk, a bike ride, or go for a swim while they work and do our work after they leave at 3:30 pm
3. Close all the doors we can between them and our workspace
4. Use headphones and listen to our favourite, soothing music
5. Go for a trip somewhere else, work while there and hope that the builders do the noisiest, dirtiest work while we are gone
6. Get up and work before the workers arrive at 7 am
7. Teach all day at another location
Since we returned to our home at the beginning of June, we have tried all these solutions.
The reconstruction really hasn't stopped us being hospitable for we have had guests for meals and overnight guests throughout. (The builders don't work on the weekend.)
We purchased a twenty visit pass to an indoor pool and Mark uses his wet-suit vest to swim in the ocean every now and then.
The week 14-18 July we taught a one week intensive post-graduate course on church conflict a Baptist Theological College.
Our daughter, Moriah arrived in Australia on 30 July and that weekend we drove 3.5 hours to deliver her to Canberra where she started work with Canberra Baptist Church.
The following Sunday we drove to Canberra again for meetings on restorative justice on Monday and Tuesday at St. Mark's Theological Centre. Tuesday night we drove towards Melbourne (seven and a half hours drive) for a Wednesday noon meeting with a variety of denominational representatives dealing with the common concern of conflict in the church.
That Thursday we met a young Chinese-Australian man who works with a group offering accommodation for international students. A pastoral worker lives on each floor as a living witness to the love of God. It was quite exciting hearing of his work and that we might have a chance to do some teaching with those pastoral workers and students.
Then for the third Sunday in a row we visited Canberra on our way north from Melbourne just in time to be present for Moriah's induction as Associate Pastor at Canberra Baptist. We are now the proud parents of a REV. That makes three Reverend Hursts in our family, though we seldom use that before our names. To most folks here, we are just Mark and Mary. (We can't keep up visiting Moriah this often even though it is nice to have her on the same continent.)
The reconstruction hasn't really slowed us down or interfered with our work, in fact talking to the builders gives us a reason to take a break, get away from the computer and walk around. When 4 September arrives so will the moving van for the grandma who will live on the lower level and we can only pray that the reconstruction on her part of the house is finished.
