There is something nice about the low rumbling sounds of a generator. My relationship with a generator started January 1972 when Sue and I took our two baby daughter's to the Gilbert Islands now called Kiribati. For you that may have never heard of the islands, they are South Pacific islands located some 1,500 miles from Fiji. The islands sit right on the equator. Or the equator sits on top of the islands. I don't know which.
Its location gave to the Gilberts very unique days. They were exactly 12 hours long. The sun would show up exactly at 6:00 AM and would set at 6:00 PM. For the 365 days of the year, it was the same everyday. The sun rode the equator. The islanders taught us how to tell the time of day very accurately by the location of the sun. Still today, Sue and I will often point to the sun when ask the time.
We lived on a compound. In our little compound world we had a church and thatch huts for boarding students of a school we ran. Class rooms for the school were there. A clinic was there for Sue to practice her nursing. She never knew what was going to appear at her door. There was a large clinic/hospital in the main town but the real hospital was 1,500 miles away in Fiji and we only got one plane a week from there. You had to time serious illnesses with the arrival of the plane if you needed a hospital.
Every evening at six I would head over to my little hut that housed a very old diesel generator and start it up. The compound would come alive as the darkness had to flee for the next three hours. At exactly nine I would shut it down and darkness would return and the humming of the old generator would stop. As long as it hummed we had light.
I came to like the sound. I liked the light it brought. Everyone did. For 21 hours of each day we had no electricity. But at the setting of the sun we would enjoy the humming and what it gave to us.
On one of our furloughs from there we stopped in Los Angeles and spend the night in a hotel. Our youngest daughter Linnea ask her mom why they ran their generator all the time. She had come from a different world.
Those days are long gone and we are in the Philippine Islands now. But the memory of the old humming generator is still fresh. Still today, when I hear that certain humming sound, it is pleasant. It remains me of the light it provided just at the hour we needed it. That's the way Light is. It shows up at just the right time and eases away as we become calm. As it leaves it always leaves with the promise I will be back. Call when you need me. When your world becomes dark. Just call. I will come.
Its location gave to the Gilberts very unique days. They were exactly 12 hours long. The sun would show up exactly at 6:00 AM and would set at 6:00 PM. For the 365 days of the year, it was the same everyday. The sun rode the equator. The islanders taught us how to tell the time of day very accurately by the location of the sun. Still today, Sue and I will often point to the sun when ask the time.
We lived on a compound. In our little compound world we had a church and thatch huts for boarding students of a school we ran. Class rooms for the school were there. A clinic was there for Sue to practice her nursing. She never knew what was going to appear at her door. There was a large clinic/hospital in the main town but the real hospital was 1,500 miles away in Fiji and we only got one plane a week from there. You had to time serious illnesses with the arrival of the plane if you needed a hospital.
Every evening at six I would head over to my little hut that housed a very old diesel generator and start it up. The compound would come alive as the darkness had to flee for the next three hours. At exactly nine I would shut it down and darkness would return and the humming of the old generator would stop. As long as it hummed we had light.
I came to like the sound. I liked the light it brought. Everyone did. For 21 hours of each day we had no electricity. But at the setting of the sun we would enjoy the humming and what it gave to us.
On one of our furloughs from there we stopped in Los Angeles and spend the night in a hotel. Our youngest daughter Linnea ask her mom why they ran their generator all the time. She had come from a different world.
Those days are long gone and we are in the Philippine Islands now. But the memory of the old humming generator is still fresh. Still today, when I hear that certain humming sound, it is pleasant. It remains me of the light it provided just at the hour we needed it. That's the way Light is. It shows up at just the right time and eases away as we become calm. As it leaves it always leaves with the promise I will be back. Call when you need me. When your world becomes dark. Just call. I will come.
