― Elisabeth Kübler-Ross
The longer I am here at In Step, the more that the days seem
to blend together. The more I get used
to the day-to-day routine, the harder it is to pick out what, in the past week,
stands out to me. The reality of my
awareness is that very little of it stands out, but not because it is mundane
or boring or ordinary. I felt myself
sit back in awe this week and, again, recognize how much beauty is living here
on this compound. It’s overwhelming when
I actually think about it, and it’s almost easier not to think about it at all
because of the emotional load it bears, however positive it is. It’s almost easier sometimes to just pretend
that these are all “regular kids” here for something like a summer camp. I know, it’s ridiculous, and it’s not
true. These kids are not regular
kids. Whatever that means.
This week I
went to Eldoret with Jeff (one of the directors) to take one of the tykes to
see a doctor there. One of our sweet
babies, seventeen months old, has been having a lot of tummy trouble – bloating
and distention, diapers that could very well clear the veranda, reluctance to
eat solid food, and severe failure to thrive.
She’s been with us for months and still hasn’t been putting on much
weight, and continues to fall behind in milestones of physical
development. She can sit up but doesn’t
roll over or crawl at all. I can only
imagine that she hasn’t rolled over onto that belly of hers because it’s
causing her pain. She has the biggest
brown eyes I’ve ever seen, with long black eyelashes that curve outward – women
all over the world would kill for what this little one has! She’s got tiny little arms and legs, with a
rotund abdomen. We have her nicknamed
“CTE”, or “Cutest Thing Ever”.
In Eldoret she was examined and a
high-quality (digital) x-ray was taken that showed an abnormal gas pattern and
retention of fecal matter high into the bowel.
She’ll was taken back for a barium enema this week to better visualize
whether or not there was a narrowing of the bowel that’s preventing stool from
passing. As if she didn’t have it hard
enough to begin with, right?
Before we
went to the hospital in Eldoret to see the pediatrician, we stopped at the
airport to drop off Rachele, the visitor from Pennsylvania who was with us for
most of July. I’ve hoped to write about
my experiences with this woman in this blog and I’ve really struggled to. She touched my heart in a gentle and deep way
and we got to know each other on a level I did not expect. I feel like she adopted me as her little
sister.
Rachele is
a mom – apparently an awesome one – of two boys, ages fourteen and
seventeen. She’s married to Mark, the
love of her life, of whom she speaks with great devotion and admiration. She’s a veteran, too, and served our country
with passion for as long as she was able.
This was her first time to Africa, and she came by herself! This lady has some serious guts.
As soon as
she got here, Rachele felt like part of the team. I was sick when she first arrived and I was
occupied with my own illness for the most part.
We also still had our team from Canada here, and so there were many
people among whom to divide the time.
Just after the Canada team left, Carla, Jeff and Beth Ann all left for a
missionary conference in Mombasa (in southeastern Kenya, past Nairobi, on the
coast of the Indian Ocean) and it was just the four of us – Rachele, Adam, Ray,
and me. There were tasks that needed
doing and issues that needed handling and she stepped right up from the word
“go” to be as much help as possible. The
woman brought willingness, courage, and love to all of her interactions with
the kids. She brought her heart with her
and formed strong relationships with each of us as we shared our life stories
and testimonies. She and I shared almost
as many laughs as we did tears. She left
a tremendously lasting impact on my heart.
What I
admire most about Rachele is her ability to see the best in people – especially
in children. Now, let me remind you –
this woman is not exactly the stereotypical all-American church girl. She hasn’t had life handed to her on a silver
platter by a long-shot. She’s a tough
cookie with a heart of gold who has seen and experienced some really challenging
life experiences; she has made lemonade out of some hard and bitter lemons. The lemonade she has made out of difficulties
life has handed her is sweet and attractive – it is her warmth, her friendship,
her compassion, and her faith. I’ve seen
many people who have experienced great challenges become hardened and closed
off, or on the opposite end, openly apathetic and lackadaisical about
life. On the contrary, Rachele seems to
live in an envious balance of sharing her heart and being reserved. Interacting with her, and watching her
interact with the kids, was a privilege I miss already.
One of the
special gifts Rachele shared with us when she was here was her talent with the
special needs kids. We have a handful of
children with needs that are different than the other children: six have some
degree of profound developmental delay.
One of the six is relatively high-functioning, two function moderately,
and two are wheelchair-bound. Rachele
played and worked with each of the kids in such a dedicated and focused way
that she could tell us (or at least tell me) things I didn’t even know about
any of them (but what do I know? I’ve been here for two minutes). One of the children, who only “walks” on her
knees, Rachele had standing and taking a few steps; she worked with the child
regularly while she was here, and now it’s easier to continue the walking
practice almost daily. Another one, who
occasionally has outbursts as he struggles to express himself, was kept calm by
new games Rachele implemented involving therapeutic touch and sound – games we
are still using today. So many other
little gifts she left – from playing “Little Bunny Foo Foo” and “Where’s
Thumpkin?” to letting the kids use her scented antibacterial hand sanitizer
(they call it sabuni, meaning “soap”;
they’d try to eat it and she’s deter them saying, “don’t eat it or you’ll poop
bubbles!”) to playing songs from the radio with their names in it (like Benny
and the Jets)… Rachele’s attentiveness and wholehearted presence with our kids
makes her name one they won’t quickly forget.
Rachele and
I had the type of intense conversations that I can’t even have with some of my
close friends: one of those gut-churning, heart-wrenching, tear-jerking,
rib-aching-from-hyperventilating-from-crying-and-laughing-at-the-same-time
conversations. How could I have become
so close to a woman who was only here for three and a half weeks?! I guess she was just one of those people in my life. You know what I mean by “one of those people”, too: someone who comes
into your life unexpectedly, sees you for exactly who you are, knows that you
have walked in each others’ shoes from time to time, and tells you exactly what you need to hear exactly when you need to hear it. It’s likely that I won’t see her again for
almost a year, in person… but I’ll see her here everyday each time a kid asks
for some of the sabuni she left me, or sings “Little bunny foo-foo, hopping through the shamba…” or makes a joke
about shaking their “booty” (okay, in her defense, it is better than the
Swahili word for the rear-end, tako,
pronounced like the Mexican food). I’ll
see her everytime I hear the word mrembo,
a word she flung around at every little girl and boy, for practically any and
every reason, describing how she viewed them.
“Joshua mrembo!” and “Marrion mrembo!” and “Brenda mrembo!”
Mrembo is the Swahili word for “beautiful.”
I won’t
just see Rachele around here in those seemingly small or silly things,
though. If I can hope and pray for one
way to continue seeing her here I hope that I see as she saw. I hope that I
continue to see what Rachele left here by looking at this place with her
eyes. No doubt: I love this place, I
love the kids, and I love the mission… but there’s an particular vantage point
that Rachele took as she gazed over what we do here that added a color and a
depth to it that, perhaps, a few bouts of malaria had dulled for me. She saw – and undoubtedly sees – the beauty
in even the most challenged of our children, the positive opportunities for
change in even the most difficult situations.
I’ll see Rachele when I know that I
can ask some of our older boys, who have been struggling to obey Ray and Adam,
whether or not they are bad boys. She
gave a few of them some “talking-to’s” (as they were called when I received
them twenty years ago), that turned into motivational speeches that would put
Tony Robbins to shame. I know I can ask
them, “What did Miss Rachele remind you
of?” I know I will the response, “I’m a good boy,” and I’ll ask, “Why’s that? Because what’s in your heart?” I bet they’ll say what they said to her,
about which she reminded them.
“God.”
Maybe
that’s why it is so easy for her to see the beauty in the struggle, in the
traumatized or handicapped child, in the tough situation. She looks for the beauty in people and she
finds it. She sees God in the faces and
stories of our kids here, and that’s where she sees the beauty. I’ve heard it said that we often see in
others what we ourselves project; if we project negativity we will see it
everywhere, but if we project positivity we will see the glass always
half-full. I also wonder if the reason
Rachele sees beauty in the world so easily is because she herself embodies so
much of this same beauty she seeks to discover and accentuate in others.
When we
were driving to Eldoret, the sweet baby had a serious diaper-related wardrobe
malfunction all over Rachele, who was about to travel for a day and a
half. Obviously this happens often with
kids, and especially with kids with tummy issues. Rachele took it in stride, laughing about it
all the way – good thing she didn’t leave all her scented sabuni with me, wink wink. I
got a voice message from her a day or so ago and she talked about how adorable
and sweet the little tyke is to her. I’m
not surprised, but it made me laugh thinking about the situation, and how it’s
just another little example of my new friend’s loving outlook.
There’s an
interesting tradition here. When new
babies arrive without names, they are typically named after visitors, interns,
or special people who support or love In Step.
While Rachele was here we got two new baby boys, one who needed a
name. He was named Noel, as I mentioned
last week. Some of the Aunties told
Rachele that when a girl baby comes that she should be named after her. They said,
“She should be named Rachele Mrembo.”
Amen, sister. Amen.
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