"Dry Season" isn't just a figure of speech

I ran onto the porch, dodging the pieces of ash floatingdown from the sky. “What is this?” I asked. “It happens in Dry Season.” repliedmy friend. Ash? From the sky? What is this, what is this place?

I’ve always heard of dry season, but it seemed like a friendlier concept from my temperate climate of North Georgia Mountains. Now I understood. It's not just a figure of speech. We were a month into the so called, ‘Dry Season’. And no one had to tell you for you to know. My lips were becoming consistently chapped, my fingers shriveled almost immediately upon entering the shower, like they were so thirsty they drank too much at once when they got the chance. The heat was heavy, and the dust in the air was thick with no rain to pin it to the ground. In the off chance there was a blessed gift of rain, it came swiftly and in the night. And it seemed as if when the sun woke up it retaliated with an even greater rage of swelter. The green on the trees fell, the colors on the flowers faded. Slowly the entire town took on a Sepia filter, and we were here, dry season.

Dry Season, in poetry, or literature, or other blogs posts,is accurately described as the hard time. The time where nothing can grow. Thetime you have to wait out.

But it’s 2019, and the beginning of it at that. I don’t wantto wait, I’m ready to go, to move quickly into the vision boards I made just amonth ago. I’m not ready to slow down.

And this is where I’m learning how to actually be committedto something.

I’m learning that the dry season, whatever that is for you, literal or not isn’t actually a place where nothing can grow. It’s just a place you have to be more strategic about it.

No longer can I just commit to the goals I set in place ofwriting this year. Now I have to get up earlier, and begin before the sun makesit too stuffy to sit still.

No longer can I just say, "I’m going to get fit!" But I have to know that after the workout I can’t stand in the shower and rest because we have to conserve water.

No longer can I say, I’m going to save money and eat outless. Now I have to strategize when to run to the market, because the heat ofthe day is sometimes just too much for me.

I know these are really specific to life in Uganda inJanuary-but I think the concept is the same for a lot of us.

As soon as a life circumstance or family situations or persistent sin declares a “dry season” over us, we are content to simply wait it out.

And while there is value found in the waiting, I thinkstrategic, discerning waiting is more obedient than waiting idly for the rainsto come.

Here, in dry season, the crops cannot grow. But the peopledon’t wait for wet season to begin the farming. Instead they burn the ground.It’s easier to burn because of how dry the air is, and it prepares the soil forwhat is to come. So the armaggadon sensation of watching ash fall from the sky,is really just a sign that someone is getting ready. It’s a preparatory stage.

That makes it the perfect place to begin the year. If it feels dry, even at the beginning of 2019, you’re not behind. Learn to move with the seasons, rise before the heat, and prepare for what’s coming. It’s going to be good.