Attempts and Nothing More

What follows are three attempts to adequately show what it feels like to be home. These attempts fail; however, maybe you are able to get some picture of what I mean.

Attempt #1:

The concrete is gritty and warm beneath my bare feet. I’m standing a few yards away from the plum tree in our yard sipping a miniature 100 calorie Pepsi. I watch as my parents and my best friend Christine pick small greenish plums off the tree and gently set them in a large white bucket. I begrudgingly put down my half drank Pepsi and join them.
            “I just don’t understand which ones I’m supposed to be picking,” I complain, “They’re all green. Aren’t plums supposed to be purple?” I pull one of the plums off the tree and press it between my fingers. It is firm and unyielding.
            “Get the ones that have a little bit of red on the outside, but Dad says they are all red on the inside anyway,” my mom unloads her armful of plums into the bucket sitting on the sidewalk.
            I randomly pluck a few more plums from the tree and put them into the cradle of my shirt. I hold the hem of my shirt with my left hand as I slowly fill my impromptu bucket with the plums I decide look a little bit more pink than green. Christine is standing on the ladder handing plums down to my mom.
            “Look how good of a plum picker Christine is, Leah,” I know exactly what he is going to say next, “What a good daughter.”
            “Yes, Christine is too good. I’m sorry I couldn’t be the daughter you wished for,” I lazily add a few more plums to my shirt before emptying it into the bucket. I take a few steps in the opposite direction of the plum tree and pick up my little Pepsi and watch everyone else at work.
            “We should just wait until they are ripe,” I sigh.

But just last week, I had been annoyed when the team I was working with stopped shoveling sand into their buckets. When they began to sip at their water bottles and look around pleading with their eyes to be done passing buckets of sand up a rickety ladder to be dumped in a pile on an unfinished floor in an unfinished building. But I wasn’t ready to be done swinging buckets of sand in an assembly line. I liked the rhythm and gentle pull of my muscles each time I swung the bucket to the next person. I encouraged them to keep going. But now, as the bubbles of the Pepsi tickle my tongue, I wonder why the effort of pulling plums off a tree seems so daunting. And I wonder why I leave dirty dishes in the kitchen without thinking of cleaning them. Or why I feel if I am able to wedge my piece of trash into the full trash can, I don’t need to take it out.

All these things that I would so willingly do in the Dominican Republic seem to be too much trouble for me to be bothered with here in the United States. But why is that?

Attempt #2:

“I don’t know how to really put it into words, Christine,” I glance over at her. We are sitting on a grey metal glider that sits forgotten on my front porch. It looks out at the light post, the brown grass, and the smooth, empty street.
            My little sister Lydia creaks open the front door. “Dad said I could be out here.”
            I roll my eyes. We had just been bickering inside. “Lydia, I know the only reason you came out here is to annoy me. Go back inside. Christine and I are talking.”
            “Dad said I could be here,” she flits past me and stands annoyingly close.
            “Lydia, just go inside!”
            She struts on her tiptoes in front of me. I give her a hard shove with my foot which almost knocks her off the porch.
            “Hey!” she shouts as she smacks me, but she doesn’t back away fast enough.
            I hit her hard, “Lydia! Just go inside. I mean it.”
            She does so after glares and mutterings of idiot.
            “You see, Christine? This is just what I mean. I feel like a different person here. If I were in the Dominican, that interaction never would have happened. I would have been able to handle it with more patience, more grace.”
            Christine rocks the glider a bit with her toes, “Yeah, but she was asking for it.”
            “Still…” I say and look at the dead grass. “I guess there, I just felt like I was closer to the rest of my life. I was nearer to being on my own and doing what I was supposed to be doing. Then I come back here, and I just have empty days. I play board games with my sisters, but usually Lydia or Talitha will storm off half way through, and I’m left twiddling the pieces in-between my fingers wondering what’s missing. But I’m just as much of a contributor as the next person. I am just as lazy and selfish and demanding. And anyway, we both know that I wasn’t really a very good person in the Dominican either. Don’t give me that look, you know it’s true. But I guess there, I felt a bit closer to one.”  
            “But, Leah, you have to remember that everyone makes mistakes. Nobody’s perfect.”
            “Yeah,” I say unconvinced.

            Attempt #3

There, my long brown hair with hidden streaks of blonde delighted the little girls. They would braid it and knot hair ties and rubber bands into it until the little tuggings made my head itch all over. They told me it was beautiful and would fight over who was to play with it. Sometimes there were six girls around me, each holding and styling their own piece of gringa hair. Pila de pelo.
            Here, Jason looks at me across the booth at a coffee shop. “You know, Leah, your hair is always the same. It was just like this the last time I saw you.”
            “I know, I know,” I say, “You tell me to cut it all the time, and maybe I will.”
            He ignores me, “It looks nice how it is, but it could be so much better. It could look really good with a change. It’s like you have something good, but you could have something great.”
            “Yeah and maybe I’ll cut it sometime, like I said, but I just like it this way,” I sip my coffee.
            “It could be better,” he says as he sits back in the booth.  

Here, dirty fingers don’t last long. There are signs in public bathrooms pleading with visitors to wash their hands. Bath and Body Works sells miniature hand sanitizers of all varieties and handy little rubber holders to fasten them on to backpacks and purses. Dirty hands don’t mean hard work; they mean a lower paying job.
            There, I hold a three-year-old outside the church. He is wearing the same clothes he has been for the past four days. A green striped shirt and blue shorts that look like swim trunks. The same dirt clod is glued and matted in his light curly hair. He wraps his arms around my neck and kisses me. When I tell the other kids around me that I’m leaving tomorrow, he shoves his hands over my mouth. His dirty fingers force their way in. I pull them away with the immediate thought of worm and disease, but then I think, to hell with it, and smother these kids in kisses in the hopes that they could know I didn’t just come down to the Dominican so I could have a new profile picture on facebook. That they could know, I want to come back as soon as I can just in case they need somebody to wash the dirt clod out of their hair.

There, I thought God wasn’t opening the door to me because there was something wrong with me or because He liked the others better.
            Here, I realize that maybe my fingers have only been grazing the door instead of pounding with a closed fist and strong knuckles. That maybe He is waiting to fling open the door in the huge romantic gesture that I have been waiting for all this time. But maybe instead, He will only faithfully crack open the door inch by inch, and I may never see the whirl of movement and the flash of light as the door is flung open to reveal the other side. Instead, the process may be long, and at times, I may feel as though the opening may never be wide enough for me to squeeze in. But God is faithful. So I’ll wait with my mustard seed on the other side of the door, confident that each day, He opens it a little bit wider.

Moving

           I look around the tiny room where I’d been staying for the past week in Hato del Yaque. Hato del Yaque is a suburb of Santiago where G.O. Ministries built a church and a dorm. Teams stay in the church and work construction on the future apartment building across the dirt road. Jen normally leads the teams in Hato del Yaque, but she hurt her back, so this week Kyle was leading the team which meant her little room was left available for me. There was a shower, and a real bed frame. Still no real mattress, but who needs that? I am perfectly happy with the cachones, also known as big pieces of foam.

            I’m trying to collect all my things and throw them into my back pack and plastic bags. Kyle, Doug, and I are heading back to Santiago just for tonight. Jen is feeling a little better, and she is going to take over the team for now to give us a night off. We will have tonight, and most of the day tomorrow while the team is at the beach. I plan on sleeping in, doing wash, hanging with the girls, and eating bread. Living the good life.

            I grab my dirty clothes bag and wrinkle my nose. Mixing concrete by hand for three days is not flattering; it is not beautiful. My purple towel is also suffering. It smells damp and moldy even though I just washed it the week before. I rip my Pooh Bear sheets off the top piece of foam, roll them up, and stuff them in my My Little Pony pillow case. I throw my shoes in a La Sirena bag, the Dominican version of Target, look around the room one last time, and call it good.

Doug, Kyle, and I throw our bags into one of the old vans and wish the team farewell.
            “Oh, but we’ll see you again?” they ask.
            “Don’t worry. You’ll see us after the beach. We’ll be back when you come back.”  
We would be going back just the next day. And the day after that, I would come back to Santiago. And the week after that, I would be going back to Hato del Yaque. And the week after that, I would be going back to the United States.

When I get back to Delores’ apartment in Santiago, I dump all my things in a side room since two nurses are also staying with Delores for this week. Delores is the sweetest woman. The female interns get to stay with her when they are in Santiago. We call her Grandma Dee-Dee, and her apartment is like home base.

There are three bedrooms, and the interns take up two of them. Each bedroom has a bunk bed, so we have four bunks to split among the five female interns. It usually works out pretty well since we aren’t all “home” at the same time. My first week, I was in Hato del Yaque, and when I got back, Elsa was off at the beach. So I took her bunk underneath Kelly. When she came back, she slept on the floor for a few nights until Kathy left. I moved into the room next door to take Kathy’s bunk. But then Alissa wanted to switch, so we ripped the cachones off the bunks and threw my Pooh Bear cachone to the top. The next week, I repacked all my things and went out to Hato del Yaque with Doug and Kyle. I had Jen’s little room all to myself. She even has a shower with warm water. The shower made me think I was at a resort, other than the slightly stale purple towel, of course.

I stare at my pile of things on the floor of the storage room. I wish I could organize, but the nurses will be in my room one more night. Elsa had to move to share with Alissa and Kathy. This week, Kathy was the lucky one sleeping on the floor along with the cockroaches and dust bunnies.
            “How has your week been, Leah?” Kathy is sitting on one of the black couches in the living room.
            “It was really good! Hato del Yaque is my favorite place to be.”
            Kathy gives me a look.
            “I know that nobody else likes it that much, but I love being out there. Maybe it’s because that is where I was my first week so I feel more at home there. I don’t know. It’s good to be back here though too, except I am not looking forward to sleeping in the storage room.”
            “Everyone else is at the beach. It’s just you and me, girl!”

I take half of my pile of stuff and move it back into my first bedroom. The next night the nurses will be back, so I need to leave it so they never knew anyone was there. I take some cachones and throw them on the floor. I put my Pooh Bear sheets on and stand in the doorway to survey my work. I wrinkle my nose. Is that me? I never smell that bad. I sniff hard and look at the open closet with a grimace on my face. One sniff and I slam the door closed. These will be my closets in just one day. Fantastic.

The next day, I work on my blog, skype with my friends, and chat with Kathy. But when I throw my dirty clothes in the laundry machine, I realize my purple towel is still hanging on the hook in Hato del Yaque. I go over all the possible ways to get my purple towel to me as soon as possible, but since I can’t actually use the force, I have to admit I will just have to wash it with my next load of dirty clothes.

“It would be nice”, I think, “to have all my things in one place. To have a bed that’s definitely mine, to have drawers for my underwear, to have a hook where I can always find a clean towel.” Back and forth from Santiago to Hato del Yaque. Back and forth from Champaign, Illinois to Huntington, Indiana. And someday, maybe, just maybe, back and forth from the Dominican Republic to the United States.

A Small School You've Never Heard Of

             “I go to Huntington University in northern Indiana; most people have never heard of it. It’s really small, up by Ft. Wayne.”
            “Oh, OK, sure,” he says and throws the next expected question at me, “And what are you studying?”
            I give him my rehearsed, seldom varying, word for word answer, “I’m majoring in English, and then double minoring in Spanish and ESL. Do you know ESL?”
            He gives the usual answer, “I think I’ve heard of it, but remind me again what it is.”
            “It stands for English as a Second Language. So, basically, I plan to teach English to Spanish speakers.”
            “OK, cool,” he says and nods his head. Normally, the conversation would end at this point with more head nodding and smiling, but since I’ve been in the Dominican, I’ve tacked on one more sentence.
            “And maybe,” I say, “I could end up teaching here or in some other country. I don’t really know.”
            “OK, very cool,” he says. And now we end the conversation in earnest with head nodding and smiling. But there is nothing else going on, so he looks for something else to talk about. He begins to tell me about how he recently went to Ft. Wayne to get a special breed of rabbit for his daughter. I half listen, but I’m distracted by a group of women standing close by.
            “How old do you think she is?” They keep their voices low.
            “Well, she’s in college, so not too young.”
            “But still, to be here on her own for six weeks?”
            There is more whispering and a general disapproval that I am here alone at my age. My parents should have kept me safe in America where the streets are clean and the dogs well fed. Maybe when I’m older. Maybe after I finish my college degree, or after I’m married or after I’ve had my babies in America. And surely, only after I’ve been settled in a suburb. Maybe I can live in the Dominican Republic after my golden retriever has passed on, and my two and a half children have families of their own.

~~~

            “Oh, I go to Huntington University in northern Indiana; most people have never heard of it. It’s really small, up by Ft. Wayne.”
            “Oh, OK, sure,” he says and throws the next expected question at me, “And what are you studying?”
            I give him my rehearsed, seldom varying, word for word answer, “I’m majoring in English, and then double minoring in Spanish and ESL. Do you know ESL?” He doesn’t, and so I tell him. I’ve had this same conversation hundreds of times. In the States, this conversation drove me crazy.
            “I don’t want to have to go to this thing because people will just ask me how college is.”
            My mom rolls her eyes at me, “They are just showing that they’re interested.”
            “But they are not interested! It’s only a formality; they have to ask me how college is, and I have to tell them, but neither of us really want to.”
            “You are just too cynical,” my mom tells me, but of course she knows I’m right.  

            On Tuesday, a new team from the United States flies in. Their plane is usually supposed to arrive at 8 or 9, and it is always late. I wait in the church where they stay; I’ve made sure the water is cold and the tables wiped off. When the team finally does role in, it is 10:30 or 11, and they sit in their plastic chairs looking blinkingly around them as they listen to a member of the G.O. staff go over rules. “Don’t drink the water. Put the toilet paper in the trash can next to the toilet. Don’t give out things to the kids. The food we have prepared for you is safe. Please help us wash the dishes after each meal. Let me introduce you to some people. These are some interns who will be helping out this week: Anthony, Reece, and Leah.” Everyone looks my way, and I view the next set of people who will ask where Huntington University is.

            But I want to get to the end of the week. I want to sit in those plastic chairs next to those same people who looked at me blinkingly wondering what my major is who now know that I like to put about an inch of mayonnaise on my sandwiches. These people who know I’m pretty good at the card game Egyptian Rat Screw. Who know I have relatively large feet.

            But what I really want to do is sit next to the people from home, at least for a little while. The people who know that I hit a car while parking the first day driving with my license. The people who know how I got the scar on the shin of my right leg. The people who know that all it takes to make me furious is to pinch my nose. The people who had to tell me I had a birthmark on the back of my leg because I had never noticed it before. The people who know that I’m not ticklish. And the people who know I have two hairs on each of my big toes.

            Those are the people I hope will be around to hear the story behind my next scar. And those are the people whose numbers I hope are added to by a few of the people who looked at me blinkingly as I was introduced to them as an intern.

Cane Sugar

          “You need to have prepared a one minute or five minute response to the question ‘How was your trip?’” Lydia Gard told the team from Windsor Road Christian Church the first week I was there; we were sitting on the beach in the dark, and I dug my fingers into the sand. And she asked again as the interns sat on plastic chairs on her patio, and I twisted a hair tie into knots in my fingers. “Because you don’t just want to respond with ‘It was so hot,’ or ‘Check out my mosquito bites.’ The reason people come on the trip is because someone told them about it. I’m not exactly telling you to plan out a sales pitch, but essentially I am. You know what I mean? Does that make sense?”

            I’ve been here for three weeks. Half way through. What is my answer to the question ‘How has your trip been so far?’ I have to say I don’t know. I can tell you that I came wanting to find God but being prepared not to. When being an intern was still only a thought in my mind, I sent a message to Lydia over facebook.
            This is exactly what I wrote: “I need some advice. I have been praying and thinking about the DR for this summer, but I don't know what to do. To be completely honest, my faith has been pretty rocky the past few years. I haven't quit believing, and I don't doubt that God is a good God, but I am lost anyway. I feel that no matter what I do, I cannot feel Him. I know that if you're sick, you can't get better without changing your lifestyle to a more healthy one. So that's what I have been doing for the last year. It's been my philosophy for this last year. I feel so out of touch with God, but I don't want to be. So I've been trying to always do what is right even if I don't have the feelings to accompany it. I've been in Sunday school all my life, so I know "Jesus loves you." I know it's true. But when I am honest with myself, I think that is the root of my loneliness. I feel that God doesn't actually love me or want me. I know it's completely wrong. I think he loves others, and I am overjoyed in getting to share His love for others with Him. I love everybody and I feel hurt when any of God's people are put down, but for some reason, I can't translate that love to myself. It logically doesn't make sense; I know that, but I can't translate the knowledge that He loves me to my heart. So my question is whether or not I should apply. I don't know if I would be the greatest intern if I am having these irrational doubts myself. Thank you for taking the time to read all of this. I'm glad you made it back safely from the Dominican Republic!”

            Lydia wrote back quickly and encouraged me to still apply for the internship. But that wasn’t all. She also asked if I wanted to get coffee. So she drove the 45 minutes to have coffee with a sloppy individual at Coffee D’Vine on Vine street (a very clever name). And she made the drive again and again. I told her about boys and family and my job. She told me about her kids and Pinterest and how she and her husband met.

            “I guess I’m just scared that I will go, and I’ll be there for six weeks, and that I’ll get nothing out of it,” I take a sip of my Levi Chai. It is orange and vanilla and frothy. “Sure, maybe I’ll help some people or do something, but I know the point of a missions trip is to get something out of it. I know I can’t tie rebar better than a paid professional. If it were just about helping the people down there, I would sign over a check for $2,500 dollars and stay home. But I’m not doing that; I’m hoping something will change for me. That I will understand something about God that I’m obviously not getting.”
            Lydia listens carefully and lets me talk.
            “It’s just I keep putting myself in places where I hope God will meet with me, but He doesn’t. The reason I’m at Huntington at all is because I was hoping to finally be able to feel God or connect with Him or whatever the Christiany term for that would be. And don’t get me wrong, I’m glad I’m here and everything, but I’ve still got nothing. I am still just trying to do what’s right in the hopes that someday I will have some assurance that it was.” I sit back in my chair and run my fingernail on the styrofoam of my cup. I make little indents and lines as my eyes tear up.

            “Leah, I think that’s great that you continue to seek God even when you don’t feel him. I think that shows a level of maturity. But I want to encourage you not to give up seeking Him. Because we are given the assurance that if we knock, the door will be opened to us---”
            “But it hasn’t been opened,” I interrupt, “I am still waiting on the other side, and I don’t know what I’m doing wrong. I just keep watching other people file in front of me and go through like it’s nothing, but I’m still on the outside, and I don’t know what I’m doing wrong.” I brush a tear off my cheek in frustration. I do not want to cry.
            Lydia is silent thinking of how she can answer a question with no answer.
            I give a shuddery sigh as the conclusion of this almost cry, “But I guess I will just have to keep trying. I’m going to go to the Dominican Republic in hopes that He will meet with me, but if He doesn’t, I guess that’s ok, too. I mean, there’s a reason for everything right?”
            Lydia gives me a sad smile and tells me she loves me and that she prays for me.  

            But the conversation left me with hope. I wrote in my journal (not diary because that is for jr. high girls) that night. It is dated 9/13/11. “That’s just how I feel, that everyone around me can feel God, but not me. And I so desperately want it. So it’s that fear of not getting Him that’s holding me back. But what I discovered in the course of the conversation, that the reason I came to Huntington is the same reason I should go to the DR. Yes, it is difficult for me to meet with God, and that is the very reason I need to seek Him all the more desperately. So what if others can meet Him anywhere? That shouldn’t stop me from trying. And if I have the opportunity to place myself where God might show up, I should take it. That’s why I came to Huntington. There was a better chance to meet God here than at SIUE. The DR is an opportunity to meet God. I cannot let my fears keep me from missing the appointment.”

~~~

            Alissa and Kathy hold my hands as tears drip down my nose. They pray that I will be able to feel God’s presence. They show me Mark 9:24 which says, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” I excuse myself and hurry downstairs to the bathroom. I shut the door and weep on the floor in the dark. Is that possible? Can one believe but still have unbelief? I hope it’s true because that is where I stand every day. I stand outside the door still knocking.

            How has your trip been so far? The only thing I can tell you with confidence is that Coca-Cola tastes a hell of a lot better with cane sugar.

6/28/12 Te Amo Marisol

            Kerlyn had to come to lunch late because a kid had pooped on him. People were already putting their dirty plates in the tray and filtering out. Alissa, another intern, was busy putting the food away and wiping down the tables. I should really have been helping, but I figured it could wait. It was wonderful to sit in the breeze next to Carlos, Kendrix, Dianna, and Romano. They are all Dominicans or Haitians about my age, give or take a few years. We had been coaching basketball all morning, and the cold water in front of me couldn’t taste better. Kerlyn sat down across from me with his plate of rice and beans.

            They spoke in Spanish with one another about the basketball clinic, and I listened and watched the people still remaining in the room. There were a few team members washing the dishes. I really appreciate that because it means I don’t have to. One of them came and took Kerlyn’s empty plate and the empty glasses still sitting on the white plastic table. Another team member wiped down the tables that Alissa already had. Maybe I could have told him that she already did, but instead I let him have the satisfaction of doing good. Eventually, the team filtered out leaving only the Dominican cooks in the kitchen, the Dominican youth at the table, and the American me.

            Kendrix started to hum, but it must have been a song they all knew. In no time at all, Carlos, Kerlyn, Kendrix, and Romano were belting out a song about love and passion. The song ended, and I applauded. But Kendrix wasn’t finished yet.
            “Be right back,” he said.
            “I think he went to get that guitar,” Kerlyn said as he rolled his eyes at his exuberant brother.
Just as predicted, Kendrix came back with the guitar and took a seat at the table. He started to play another song everyone knew. The women in the kitchen began to roll their eyes and sneak smiles at each other.
            “Marisol!” Kerlyn shoved back from the table, “This one’s for you, baby!” He pointed to Marisol, the head cook. She is a plump, short lady probably in her 50’s.
            “Te quiero,” he mouthed to her and sang with Carlos and Kendrix.
Marisol came out of the kitchen, hands on her hips. She shook her head with a half smile on her face. Her look was scolding but the twitching of her lips gave her away. Kerlyn took her hand and got down on one knee. The song carried on full of love and promise. Romano was laughing so hard, I thought he might fall off his chair. The song slowed and Carlos and Kerlyn wrapped Marisol in their arms. She started to smack them. But she didn’t make a move to leave, and now her smile was harder to hide. Finally, they had had enough of her smacking so they relinquished their grasp. Kerlyn danced back and grabbed an unopened pack of plastic cups and used it as a microphone.

            Kendrix started to play a new song, and Marisol waved the boys away. She went back to the kitchen and proceeded to roll her eyes at the new love song given in her honor. Romano and I exchanged happy looks.
            “How come you don’t go take a nap like the other Americans?” he asked me.
            “Because then I would miss this.”

6/22/12 How do you spell a name that sounds like Zayuh?

          The feeding center was hot and full of people. I had gone in at the back and leaned against one of the walls, but there just wasn’t enough space. I thought the team should be in there rather than me, so I slipped back outside. I leaned against a post and listened to the chaos of children yelling for a different sized plate, metal forks thudding against plastic plates and cups of juice being set hurriedly on the tables. I could see the old basketball court next to the church, with its hoop leaning dangerously forward. The netting was torn up from kids grabbing and holding on just to prove that they could. Our two ministry vans were parked on the gravel road in front of this little church. This little church that was feeding at least fifty kids one hot meal six days a week.

            An old woman was passing along the road when she stopped and tried to talk with me. She said something was bad and showed me two bundles of straw in her potato sack. She pointed to the road and gave me a sad and knowing look. She figured I had to know what was bad about her straw and the road. I didn’t. But I did know that she was missing her front teeth and that her hair was white with grey streaks. I knew she was much smaller than me, and her eyes were a bit muddy. Amy, a member of the team that I was working with, attempted an hola. The old woman began to share her woes with Amy who knew about two words of Spanish, hola and gracias. The woman asked for money so that she could eat. I translated for Amy who told her she didn’t have anything. I translated for the woman. She gave me the same sad look with her muddy eyes as she did before. It was a look that said, oh well, what can you do? She moved around to the window of the building next to the church where the women were preparing the food for the children. I didn’t see her again.

            I never know what to do in those situations. I feel bad with whatever I do. Should I just give all that I have? Or is it better to rely on the church in the area to take care of her? Would it be better to give to a church that would hopefully be able to invest more in her life? Or would the 100 pesos I could give mean anything at all? At least it could mean some beans and rice.

          The children started to thin out of the small one room building. I slipped into the back to see if I could be any help. In the very last row of the faded green benches sat two older girls. They were in the very corner near the slotted windows. They looked out of place. I lean over and say hello. They shyly smile at me.
            “How are you?” I ask in Spanish.
            “I’m nervous,” said the bigger girl. She was sitting the closest to where I was standing. She had dark skin and big eyes.
            “Why are you nervous?”
            “There are a lot of people.”
            “And a lot of them are men,” I say and wink at them. They laugh which is an invitation for me to come closer. I move around the back of the bench and stand near the window. Now, I am facing them instead of talking over their shoulders. I only leaned against the window for a few seconds before the girls scooted over to make room for me. I sat down, and we smiled at each other not quite knowing what to say next.
            “What’s your name?” the older girl asked me.
            “Leah. And what’s yours?” the older girl told me her name was Zayuh (at least that’s how it sounded to me. It was just like my name except with a z). The girl who sat next to her, who I was told was her 14 year old sister, said her name was Jennifer. Zayuh was 16.
            “Are you a Christian?” Zayuh asked me.
            “I am. Are you?”
            She nodded.
            I was surprised that she asked me, but I carried on the conversation, “Jesus is my best friend, and I can talk to him.”
            “For me too! When I’m sad or need a friend.” We grinned at each other because we had found common ground.

            The feeding center began to slowly empty, and when Zayuh and Jennifer were done eating, we went to stand outside the church exactly where I had first talked with the old woman. Jennifer disappeared, maybe to her home or a friend’s, and Zayuh and I were left alone.
            “Do you have a lot of friends?” she asked me.
            “I do.  A lot of my friends are in the United States, but I have friend here too. Do you?”
            She cast her eyes down and answered me in her smooth voice, “No, no the other girls don’t want to be my friend because my skin is too dark.”
            I was at a loss. Skin color is an issue that in the States we sometimes like to pretend doesn’t exist anymore. But here it was, again, in the Dominican Republic. Here it was, again, tearing this girl up and leaving her empty.
            I put my hand on her, “I think you’re beautiful,” and I meant it. My throat tightened up as I said, “And Jesus does too.”

            She told me I was nice, and the tone lightened. We talked about boys. We agreed that we want our man to be honest, and he needs to love Jesus. I said it would be nice if he were guapisimo. She laughed.
            She looked out at the group from Revolution church playing with the kids of her neighborhood. The high school boys were running with kids on their shoulders, and a few were being chased by a pack of niños.
            “I like American boys,” she admitted shyly.
            I laughed, “That’s perfect! I don’t like American boys, so we can switch.”

            “OK! Time to go!” Kerlyn shouted to the group. Team members began to hug their new kids goodbye, and load into the vans. Zayuh and I looked at each other.
            “Do you have a cellphone?” she asked me. But it was more than that. What she was really asking was, Is it possible for us to stay friends? Can you prove to me that I am loveable regardless of my skin color? Can you show me that there is tangible hope rather than only relying on my whispered prayers?
            “I do, but it’s for the United States. I can’t use it here.”
            And Zayuh gave me the same smile that the old woman had.

6/12/12 Departure

           4:30 AM and the alarm’s set for 6:25. I wake up with the remnant of a nightmare stuck in my head. In the dream, it was 7:02, and we were supposed to be at the church at 7:00 AM sharp. “Don’t be late,” they had said, “You’ll see our tail lights.” What had I forgotten? I rushed around the house frantically trying to remember.
“Lydia, put the book down and pack!” my mom shouted as she went in the garage to load the van. Talitha, my 15-year-old sister was preparing to drive us to the Dominican Republic. Terror gripped me. I fed my cat bacon strips out of a bag.
“How will they survive without us?” my dad sobbed.

But I rub the dream out of my eyes and think, What am I forgetting? I guess, I’ll worry about it when my alarm goes off. I peek at Lydia who’s asleep on my floor. She’s been there practically every night since I’ve come home from Huntington. This will be her last night for  a while because we really are supposed to be at the church at 7:00 AM sharp, and my dad, Talitha, and I really are going to the Dominican Republic. However, Talitha isn’t going to drive us there.

4:40. I still haven’t been able to fall back asleep. I’ve woken myself up thinking about what I’m forgetting and what the next six weeks have in store. I snap a photo of Lydia on the floor with this blog in mind. Then I take another. And another.

                                                                               4:41

                                                                    5:10

                                                                 5:54

                                                                  6:05

        

                                                               6:06  

 
             

            Dad has coffee ready downstairs, but I make a soy caramel latte, and plan to take the coffee anyway in a to-go mug. We leave the house at 7:02, but it only takes about thirty seconds to drive to my church.
            “You have deodorant?” Talitha asks.
            “Yes.”
            “You have soap?”
            “Yes.”
            “You have underwear? Swim suit? Sun screen? Bug spray? Socks?”
            “Yes, yes, yes, yes.”
            “Well, maybe you aren’t forgetting anything, Leah.” Talitha rolls her eyes at me. “Stop worrying about it.”
I run through my mental check list another ten times before I admit I won’t be able to remember what I’ve forgotten.

~~~

“Isn’t that an oxymoron? Because you can’t remember something you’ve forgotten,”  my Dad laughs at me in the O’Hare airport.
            “Well, I guess it’s too late anyway.” I take another bite of my cheeseburger from McDonalds. Surprisingly, it was only $1.35. I would expect an airport cheeseburger to cost me (well, my dad) much more. Kathy, another intern arrives, and I introduce her to the team from my church. They are flying down for a one week mission trip, but I will be staying as an intern for another five weeks after they leave. I will be spending six weeks filling water buckets, playing with kids, being whistled at by teenage boys, and having an ample amount of time to realize what I’ve forgotten.

The Miami airport feels just the same as O’Hare did. This time I choose Chinese noodles for my last go at bad, greasy American food. It’s not real Chinese food, so it counts. It sits thick in my stomach as the plane takes off. Talitha is sitting across the aisle from me, and two boys a bit younger than me are to my right. I look to the window to catch a glimpse of the ocean, but the boy’s tan arm is blocking my view. I try chatting with Talitha, but the plane roars in my ears. We land and turn in papers and pay our ten dollar entry fee to customs. We meet with the Gards. Derek and Lydia used to go to our church, but now they work with G.O. Ministries full time. Derek gives a booming I-L-L, and the 16 members of my church shout I-N-I. Go Illini.

We load our luggage and squeeze into two 12-passenger vans. I sit directly behind the driver of the smaller white van, and my dad and sister are somewhere in the rows behind me. It’s already dark outside, and I gaze out the window at life in the city surrounding me.

              Behind me, someone is explaining to the new comers about Dominican driving, “It’s not like in America. Stop signs and speed limits are just a suggestion. It’s crazy!”
            “Are you scared?” someone asks the first timers.
            “A little,” they say because it wouldn’t be right to just say no.
In front of me, a different conversation is taking place. A Spanish teacher has come along on the trip and she is chatting away with the young driver asking him all sorts of questions in Spanish. I understand most of their conversation, but the words still dance together like some kind of music.
            “Did you just see that motorcycle?” someone shouts behind me, “There was a dad, a mom, and two kids!”
            “Wow! Look at that pile of trash! It’s just so sad.”
            “Did you see how close we passed that guy?”
I roll my eyes and resume eavesdropping. The Spanish sounds beautiful to me; a life different from mine.

            We are waiting behind a truck to make a left turn. He goes and Kerlyn, our driver whose name I learned by eavesdropping, follows him. The truck eases into the next lane but stamps on the brake as a motorcycle whips down the road. Kerlyn slams on the brake as well so that we jolt forward in our seats.
            “Ooops,” a booming voice echoes from the back. He is maybe fifty years old and is used to America’s drivers.
            “Well now I’m a little bit scared,” says a forty-something-year-old woman. The Spanish coming from the front, full of bright words and orange sounds, ceases. Now, it is only American voices I hear commenting on the crazy driving.

            There are signs for Hato del Yaque. We are close to what will be home for the next week. The houses are close together, and the houses are small. The roads are bad, and the bumps are noteworthy. The adults sit outside their houses, and the children laugh with each other. We pass a boy of about thirteen who hails a friend still further up the road. He runs to him, and his flying feet keep him even with the van. His eyes are dark and sparkle with the crude joke he plans to whisper to his friend. I smile as I watch him in his excitement.
            “Oh! Is he trying to wash our windows?” a girl behind me asks. I want to scream, No, you idiot, he’s just having a good time with his friend. But I figure that’s not the best way to start my time as an intern. I shouldn’t have been frustrated. These people sitting behind me aren’t bad. In fact, the driving in the Dominican Republic is terrible. It’s dangerous. And people take risks on a daily basis that would get you ticketed in a heartbeat in America. Why was I angry with them? Did I think I was so much more culturally sensitive? Did I think I knew more than they did? Because I didn’t. I don’t.

            But I felt they were forgetting that this way of life was a valid one. That they were forgetting that just because the roads weren’t as clean, these people were somehow of less  worth than Americans. That they were forgetting the reason they are here is to show the love of Jesus Christ. And that they are forgetting that that love is the same whether you believe it’s ok to hold a baby on the back of a motorcycle or not.

But what am I forgetting?