The 30 year streak is over...

Today was not a normal day.

The start of it should have tipped me off.  I struggled getting out of bed, puttered around the apartment longer than usual doing nothing of consequence, and left my apartment later than I usually try to.  I grabbed the first Mobike that I saw when I got out of my complex, already running late and not wanting to be picky about which bike to ride for a change.

I wasn’t speeding along, but I was going to a brisk pace. I never worry about my surroundings when I’m biking to school (except for traffic, of course…don’t worry dad!). I try not to stop too much and keep a good pace. On a good day, it takes me about 6 minutes to get to school…yesterday it was 4. Today, not so much.

Anyways, I rode along and at one point thought “Hm, that scooter is awfully close to me.  I should yell at him to back off.” But then I thought “You sure do yell at people on scooters a lot. Give him a break…”

I should have yelled.

A minute or so later, a van comes honking up to me yelling out the window. I wanted to ignore him, but he cut me off.  My Chinese is not so good, but what I caught of what he was saying was “Back there…two men…your phone…two men…back there.”

Oh crap.

Sure enough, my phone wasn’t in my backpack pocket anymore.

And it wasn’t on the ground on the corner…

…or along the road…

…or where I got the mobike in the first place.

Turns out I should have yelled at that scooter.  The one time I had a right to be angry.  The one time I could let go and let them have it…and I didn’t even know.

(And right next to that anger that I could have let out, I’m honestly a bit impressed that they took it while I was moving along quickly without me realizing it.  That takes skill.  Skill used for evil, but still skill…)

My day may have started on a sour note, but it ended with dinner at a fish hotpot restaurant with two dear Chinese friends, talking about life and family and schooling and hope.

And so I’m ticked because I have no phone…and I just sold off the last of my electronics that the phone replaced…

And I’m a bit put off because this is my first experience of being pick-pocketed in 30 years of living and doing life in random corners of the world…

And I’m annoyed because I don’t have the money in reserves to replace the iPhone that I was so excited to finally own earlier this year…

But despite frustration and irritation at the circumstances of a day that had a rough start, there is hope. Tomorrow is a new day. The sky this morning was a perfect blue. I can afford to go out with friends for a meal, and I have friends to go out with.

I’m sure there are many lessons that the Father is going to be teaching me in the next few weeks of frustration with the world not quite at my fingertips, but I’m excited to use my eyes and ears to learn them.

Today was not normal day, but at least it ended well. J