Just in Case

Pushing my bike up the hill just now, I ran through my to do list in my mind.  What is most urgent?  What have I been neglecting?  First I will do this….  then I will attack that…

I rolled down into my garden and greeted the builders.

"How is the house looking?!"

"Ahhh, well… it is fine… only now you cannot enter."

"Oh.  Umm… How long will it be before I can enter?"

"Um…  maybe 5 or 6 o clock?"

Oh noooo…..  My laptop!  My course readings!  My tumbuka revision! FOOD! TOILET!

"Oh…  that's ok…. I'll just go sit in the garden," I casually replied, while inside I shook at the prospect of two whole hours wasted swinging in the hammock, watching the colours of the landscape deepen as afternoon faded into evening.

Then I opened my bag, and voila - a small miracle.

First I spotted the newspaper I had slipped in earlier, just in case there were delays during my cycle ride.  

Next I spotted this notebook, and another 'just in case' item - this pen.

"Ah…  but none of that will do me any good if I starve before I get inside the house," I thought, not quite willing to believe my good fortune.

That's when I noticed, tucked away under piles of tumbuka story books (yes, I was also able to study tumbuka after all!), the freshly opened packet of raisins I had also tossed into my bag at the last minute.

Just in case.

So for all you who used to regularly laugh at the shape, size and weight of my over packed purse, you now have insight as to its contents, and the reasons I insist on packing such a thing around with me every where I go.  

You never know what the day will bring, but I feel confidant that I can almost always make it through, as long as I have my trusty notebook, a working pen, decent reading material, and an extra large packet of raisins.