on death and ice cream

It was a Tuesday morning when the familiar sound came drifting through the crack between the top of our walls and the base of the roof. The inconsolable; the freshly mourning. Boaz has died, the neighbor told me. I knew that he had been injured in a soccer match. I knew that he had been referred to the hospital. I knew that he had been sent home. Died? Yep. We started piecing the puzzle together and concluded that he must have had some form of internal bleeding that was not attended to.

Since Boaz’s house was right across from the preschool, we canceled class for three days so as to not disturb the wailers with our painfully cheerful ABC’s, or maybe  so as to not frighten the wee ones with the fits of sheer grief, whichever happened to be louder.

It quickly occurred to me that Bronwyn might not be so ok with funerals any more. She had attended her fair share in her early years, but now, older, more emotionally aware and empathetic, I wasn’t sure how she would perceive the descending sadness. This is, after all, the child who could not cope when Frosty melted and when Cinderella lost her shoe. A little boy is gone and his mommy can’t even stand up under the weight of sorrow – I wasn’t sure how that would not shake my sensitive girl.

We sent her to play elsewhere as I sat with the wailers in the funeral house - as Jeremy prepared the Land Rover to serve as hearse - as songs and cries of grief waxed and waned. We slept closely that night, hugging our little girls with a fresh awareness that life is fleeting and precious.

The following day, the boy was to be buried. Jeremy was sent to the hospital to retrieve the coffin and the body and bring it to the church. We sat, along with a few hundred others, under the trees, waiting for that familiar sound of the diesel engine to draw near. As the vehicle pulled closer, the noise level amongst the people grew and Bronwyn looked at me with concern. Why is everyone crying? Because a little boy has died, and his mother misses him so very much. When is he coming back? He’s not, baby, he’s going to be with Jesus now. Oh... Can we have ice cream?

the overflow seating

It was the third of her questions that helped me relax again as I was clued in to the fact that this was indeed still beyond her, and we were not likely to have another Frosty or Cinderella-esque melt down. Of course I was still sad for Boaz and his family. This boy has been a part of our crew for years and the unnecessary nature of his death made me ill. But as with so many things, my preoccupation with my own children somehow had the ability to defer and deflect other reactions. And for that funeral, Bronwyn was ok, and therefore so was I.

I posted a picture on instagram of my girls on my lap and the coffin wedged up next to us as we carted it off to the cemetery. She never asked and I never told her what was in that crushed-velvet-covered box. I was surprised a bit by the outpouring of sympathetic reactions to that picture. Clearly the story was heartbreaking, and I did appreciate the solidarity, but the startled response gave me pause to remember, oh, our friends don’t know how normal this is.

It’s not always a boy bleeding out after taking a soccer ball in the stomach. But it seems to always be some one and some thing. The same night we buried Boaz, a Musonda grandchild passed away and the mourners kept mourning and only just shifted to another location. A few days after that, Bana Louisa’s mother died and no one came to my meeting at the clinic. A few days later, Bana Ngandwe’s brother died and Bible study got canceled. We have only attended one of the four funerals in the past two weeks largely because we lack material and emotional resources to cater to every single family, and therefore we pick and choose. But the reality remains that we could probably go to 50 + funerals a year in our community like everyone else does. 

funeral procession to the burial ground

Quite honestly, mourning is strangely normal. The domination of death in the village is seen in meeting minutes when three fourths of the absentees are reported to have gone to funerals. Organizations, including our own have not only “sick day” policies but “funeral day” policies a well. We receive more requests for monetary assistance for funerals than we do for business/micro finance. There has never been a team or a visiting volunteer whose work has not somehow been disturbed by an unexpected funeral.

towards the cemetery

That evening after we came home from the burial ground, I capitalized on the events of the day, taking the opportunity to explain to Bronwyn about Jesus’s death and what that implied for our own. Jeremy, worrying that I was breaking the cardinal rule of parenting by answering questions that my child was not asking, gave me the “stop talking” face and I had to remind him that he had not been there for Easter when we had to completely avoid the death preceding the resurrection because our three year old couldn’t understand and I was determined to use this opportunity to help her figure out the rest of the gospel.

Jesus died so that we don’t have to, I told her, among other things. And she sorta nodded and said, ok while slurping her completely-melted-nothing-stays-cold-in-October ice cream. Jeremy pointed out that she still wasn't getting it, but I’m ok with that because at least she has the full vocabulary of redemption now. She’s seen the picture, heard the sounds and she now has the words to grasp that life here is not forever. She has the context for our work’s great precept: life is hard, God is merciful, heaven is for sure.

This will only get more real for her. With every funeral, every coffin and every burial, it gets all the more concrete that life implies a final hour. This interaction with death is a part of the third-culture-kid package of life lessons that are not at all desirable but somehow a blessing all the same.

I’m thankful that my children have never ending opportunities to come face to face with ultimate reality. It is the hardship of the now, juxtaposed with the mercy of God and the assurance of heaven for those who believe that keeps us here. And I want them to get that. I want them to live the same, where they consider all their years as a mere breath and endeavor to do something significant with them. I want them to know that death is NOT the worst thing that could happen to a person – death without knowing Christ is.

And so in plain view and along side our sticky-faced kids, we champion LIFE. We push and sweat and labor till we just can't anymore - all to the end that people would know LIFE and know it to the full. We mourn with those who mourn. Truly, deeply. There is nothing neat or sterile about it. We also teach/sing/show again and again that to live is CHRIST and to die is GAIN. Because so help me goodness our blondy MK’s might be totally weird and awkward for many of their experiences here, but if nothing else they will have a rock solid theology of life and death…

…and that is a gift greater than all the ice cream in the world.

why ex-pats are sometimes cranky

 The first day I got back to the village, my husband and I had words. The kind of words that you might be a little embarrassed to have your neighbors overhear. It’s just that I walked into our home and pretty quickly decided that it was, by my definition, filthy. Jeremy had come back to Zambia before the girls and I to do two things: run a conference and clean our house, so I felt completely justified in asking, “WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN DOING THESE PAST FIVE WEEKS?” (and, yes, I asked it in a tone worthy of the caps lock.) “I’ve been cleaning,” he replied, with much greater grace. “HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE?” I continued. “IT LOOKS LIKE A BARN IN HERE.” The husbands apt reply: “You only think it’s dirty because you just came back from America.”

A few days later we went into the immigration office to add Leonie to the work permit. We sat, for over an hour, watching three officers play on their phones and do nothing immigration related in general while one man slowly (understatement) made copies for us and looked at our passports and wrote our names on a cardstock folder with a sharpie and went from this office to that doing who knows what. After the first hour of waiting for ??? we were ushered into the accountants office which we considered good progress, except that the officer in that room was not in a hurry either and was stapling and fiddling and rearranging papers in a file marked Cheng, which I’m sure was very important except that Mr. Cheng was not in the building so far as I could tell. When both children were bored to actual tears, and we had been in the office for an additional hour and a half, Jeremy could see me shifting our innocent baby dramatically from one hip to another with a slight pursing of my lips and a few heavy sighs for dramatic effect. “Calm down,” my wiser half mouthed to me. “But its not right,” I mouthed back. “Let it go,” he said with a wink.

Her face : My emotions.

I had a few “wink wink” replies in my own arsenal but I kept them to myself and after losing only one more hour of our lives to that office, we finally left. “You’ve gotta leave America,” Jeremy urged on the car ride home.

I knew he was right. I worked on my processing and my attitude for the next few days. It’s just dirt. It’s just a line. It’s just a stare. It’s just a little slow. It’s just… It’s just… It’s not America, but that’s OK.

It only took three weeks before I felt like I had truly arrived. The test of achievement came after a 13 hour trip up from Lusaka with our new volunteers. In the course of said trip, we blew a radiator hose AND picked up a nail which blew our tire AND survived an attempted car jacking on Lusaka’s infamous Lamumba Road. (true story.) And you know what? Cool as a cucumber, I was. And then we walked into the door to our house and got smacked in the eyeballs with chaos. All of our cabinet doors were flung open and contents pulled out so that our cat could sniff out our rats – which she obviously had done, leaving a blood trail and a few heads on the rug as proof. A noticeable inch of dirt (dust is too wimpy a word for this cake-layer) had settled, coating all of the surfaces with muck. And the chicken given to Leonie as a ‘welcome to the world’ present had decided to use the cat door to get into our house and had been roosting on our dining room table coating it pretty heavily with crusty white poo.

Leonie's chicken. After her last stunt I expect she'll soon be dinner.

I sorta glanced at our shell shocked volunteers who we were inviting to sleep in our barn-of-a-house with us and I noticed the familiar face – the one I had worn not long ago as I too tried to readjust to the totally different set of expectations that is village life.

Freshies be like, "whaaa???"

This is the occupational hazard of the ex-pat life; in the traveling back and forth between two worlds, just as soon as you get used to one "home," you get uprooted and have to go through a painstaking process of reorientation before you can be comfortable in the next. That which calls for litigation in one world is merely par for the course in the next and until you decode the new normal, chances are good your responses will be less than temperate. The near constant self-talk involved in deciding what to get worked up about is a brain drain so much so that it makes mature adults lash out like three year olds. Overreaction usually is prompted by something innocuous like the guy who cuts in front of you in the grocery store because he only has a loaf of bread and you have a full cart. He’s all innocent and like, why the face, lady? But your pre frontal cortex is quite literally a hot mess and you therefore come across to the world as straight up cranky.

It just takes time. It takes time to love the nighttime drumming that keeps you awake, but eventually you’ll incorporate the beat into your dreams. It takes time to  appreciate being kept waiting in offices, but eventually you’ll keep a journal and pen on hand for those found minutes of rest. It takes time stop craving high speed internet, but eventually the detox will kick in and you’ll embrace the art of being present.  

Learning to follow the leader, even when it's hard, is critical to success.

I’m getting there. America made me soft in some ways and hard in others and I’m firming up and letting go in different ways once again. I no longer care whether my chaco tan is a result of sun or dirt. I only wash the girls’ faces twice a day instead of sixteen. I invite the guy with the single loaf of bread cut in front of me. I saunter, not speed walk. I embrace the awkward silence instead of spewing twaddle.

Eccentric, as per her calling

All ex-pats tend to be a little eccentric. It’s what brought us over here and its what keeps us here for more than a weekend. But we’re not all cranky. I swear. We’re merely human and as creatures of habit, it takes us time to get in the groove. But once we’re there – turn up the 80’s pop music and get ready. We shall dance. Un-crankily and Together.

un-cranky, together

a thousand reasons to worry and one trump reason not to

We left our passport country a week ago now, and I still don’t think our stomachs, or our hearts have come down out of the clouds. Everything you imagined to be true abut flying with two littles on three back to back international flights totaling 21 hours in the sky and 33 hours of total travel time – you were probably right. It was… something. 

we were a spectacle going through the airports. the baby at the back got a few double takes

Leonie did great because everything she needs for peace and happiness is attached to my body. The rest of us had to dig deep and seriously woman-up lest we fall apart. Poor Bronwyn, empty from exhaustion and full of sorrow for having parted with Grandma, she wavered back and forth between excitement over escalator rides and extreme mourning over that which she had left behind. Every hour or so, she would break into a drawn out wail, exclaiming loudly enough for the whole plane to hear, “I miss Grandma! I want to go back to Grandma’s house!” We kept shoving gummies and other forms of distraction in front of her to try to keep the peace for everyone. As we waited in the heinous security line in London, she found herself trapped in yet another episode of misery and just cried out over and over, “I can’t handle it, mom! I can’t handle it!” I know baby, I’m not really handling it either, I’m just concealing it better than you are.

I recruited a little Italian girl in Heathrow for some play therapy

I kept telling myself that it would all be over soon, and sure enough, we did make it to Zambia. Jeremy worked some of his magic and got himself in the back door to be able to meet us on the immigration side and help us collect our bags. I offloaded the eldest onto daddy and focused on the still happy babe who was the only one who had properly eaten and slept for the last two days.

We commenced the 10 hour drive to “home.” Are we nearly there yet? Bronwyn asked for the 927^th time since leaving NY. Catching her staring intently out the window, I asked Bronwyn what she was looking at, to which she answered, “I’m looking for my friends, mom.” I was so excited to get her home and back in the playful arms of those who had cared for her so well throughout her first two years.

As we turned off the pavement onto our dirt road, we all prepped her, “We’re almost there, girl! Just half a kilometer left!” We pulled into our yard and switched off the engine, video camera in hand and ready to capture whatever cuteness that was about to ensue. I don’t know what Bronwyn’s expectations were for our homecoming, but the adults had clearly set the bar too high. I expected Bronwyn to run back to her friends with hugs and laughter, pick up her shovel and dig things, grab a ball and have a grand ole time. I expected to sigh with relief that finally we were getting back to normal, that my girl would find her place in the world again. Instead, my sweet three year old clutched my leg with a death grip and for the first time in over a year asked to be picked up. The fear in her eyes was unmistakable and it was clear that she didn’t know what was going on. “Is this my house?” she asked. We escaped the crowd to go look at her bed and her toys, to say hi to her kitties and to get reacquainted with the environment. I had to lure her outside. Everyone wanted to shake her hand, in the way she once knew so well, and yet now she just pulled back, unwilling to extend a hand to anyone. “Mommy, why do they all know my name?” she asked. Because they know and love you baby, and somewhere inside of you, I know you know them. I put a ball in her hand and gave her a gentle shove. She tossed it at no one in particular and ran back to my leg. We tried again, and this time she threw it back and forth a few times before retreating once more. “I don’t know what any of them are saying, mom” she stated. I know baby, they are speaking Bemba, and soon you will too.

all the friends on one side, and winnie by herself on the other. it was painfully awkward.

I had foolishly thought it would all come back to her, that she would remember immediately and pick up where she left off. That night I watched her crash from exhaustion in the new-to-her house, in the new-to-her village and I just sobbed. With our best intentions we were bringing her back to what we considered the greatest place on earth. Now it felt more like we had an amnesia patient on her hands, and I had no idea how to help her cope. The next few days proved similarly difficult. “Mommy, there’s a lady out there who keeps trying to pick me up.” Yes baby, that’s Bana Chiti, and you used to love her more than you loved me. She carried you everywhere and I know she has missed you.

this girl. her happiness in all situations is healing

Despite all of our explanations, the blank stares and revealing questions are a constant. It’s all gone – like it never happened, and I find myself in a near panic wondering whether she’ll ever get it back. Everything that made this place perfect for a child her age – all of those things are now sources of anxiety for her. She doesn’t know what to do with herself. She keeps face planting on uneven bush paths. She asks for macaroni and cheese for every meal. She keeps wiping the dirt off her pants. Too scared to interact with the kids from whom she was once inseparable, she now asks only to go to the farm to play with her dog.

daddy is a shelter in more ways than one

I have found myself this past week trembling with worry – what have we done? Will she pick up this language again? Will she make friends again? Will she regain her confidence? Will she be ok? Will I? I’ve fallen asleep atop a tear-soaked pillow each night this week, and that only after silently preaching at myself for a long while.

It will be ok.

He sees.

He cares.

He is able.

It will be ok.

This is my refrain and I repeat it over and over until I release my fears and my babies into His hands until the next wave of worry washes over me.

It will be ok.

He sees.

He cares.

He is able.

None of the current scenario looks particularly hopeful. Nothing I imagined to be good for my girl is coming to pass and my deep love for her is therefore matched by the depths of my concern for her and her happiness.

My logical side tells me that this is only a season, though I have no reassurances as to how long this season will last. I am drawn to hold her hand all the moments of all the days, though I am fighting that urge and challenging her to try and engage. She has learned a whopping two words of the local language and has made one friend. I’m choosing to call these baby steps victories even though I’ve melted into tears each time an insensitive child has barked at her to stop speaking English.

It will be ok.

He sees.

He cares.

He is able.

I know my fears are legitimate. I have observed how many third culture kids devolve into anxious, isolated, awkward, resentful beings. I know that my reasons to worry will continue to beat me up and I’ll have to continue to preach them down. But the trump reason for not worrying remains: Him. The One who took us back to the sates, who knew when we would get pregnant, who knew how long we would be away from Zambia, who called us back here, He knew how it would all play out, and planned it that way: He sees, He cares, He is able.

all manner of things will be well

It's three reasons in One, a holy trinity of security and confidence.

When all around my soul gives way, He then is all my hope and stay...

Sing it with me, will you? My girl is struggling and therefore so am I, and I share this without reserve because there is something about living abroad that calls for above average vulnerability and the rallying of the troops. We’re battling on – with love and patience, and legos and gummies. Thanks, bush baby community, for standing with us.

transitioning, ugly-crying and carrying on

 8 days, I tell people. I have 8 more days until I get to go home. This is the conversation that has been happening a lot lately. My husband is across the ocean and I have two little girls who are heavy and poopy and we’re all hot and cranky and tired of waiting and ready to get back to real life. Jeremy made Bronwyn a cardboard calendar with quarters on each of the days with a message underneath each coin. The messages say sweet things like, “I love you” and “give mommy a hug”; I think I look forward to pulling each quarter off more than she does.

We were in the States to have a baby and now that Leonie is here and truly healthy and happy and all loaded up on immunizations and mommy milk, I feel confident that we are indeed READY. It has been long haul, and I’ve been honest about my discontentment in a few different posts here. It’s hard being in not your home, driving not your car, eating not your food and generally being at the mercy of all the people around you for basic sustenance. The lack of self determination has worn me a bit thin, and I’m planning on bellowing a William Wallace-esque FREEEEEDOOOOM the moment I step off that plane. (Because I'm dainty like that.)

But for all of my excited anticipation, I’m simultaneously sifting through the curious grief that I’ve learned accompanies all transition.

I’m well aware of the fact that I don’t transition “pretty”. After college graduation, I shut myself in my room and wept heavily for a good hour. I had an Ivy League diploma and great things ahead of me. Was I really mourning the end of finals? No more all-nighters? No more walking to class in blizzards? Hardly. And yet, I couldn’t escape that pressing sense of loss.

Here’s another goody: thirty seconds after Jeremy and I had left our wedding reception, we were driving down the road on our way to get our honeymoon started and I burst into full body sobs. Poor Jeremy, he silently patted my hand and let me cry but was probably like, Um, I’m really happy to be married now too, babe! Was I not thrilled to have married my best friend? Did I really want to go back to being lonely and single? Of course not.

I cried when I left for the Peace Corps even though I was excited beyond words. I cried when I finished the Peace Corps even though I was not even moving out of the village. I cried for days after Bronwyn was born even though I'd never imagined loving a floppy baby so much. 

sometimes I feel like the one on the right, sometimes the left

Transition brings into acute focus the good of what once was. And sometimes, seeing that good catches us by surprise, particularly if it previously seemed commonplace, or maybe even overshadowed by a whole lot of not good. You don’t know what you’ve got till its gone, go the words. Thanks, Joni Mitchell, for setting my angst to tune.

Now again it’s hitting me. I at least recognize the symptoms this time. I was completing a simple task, writing a thank you note to a lady. My girl loved so much the VBS so had just attended and I wanted the team to know how much it meant to me for her to have that kind of experience. I rambled a bit, explaining that we were missionaries and we were going back to Zambia soon and I knew my girls wouldn’t have access to that kind of programming for quite some time because we live in the bush and a VBS will only happen if I run it… and my eyes started leaking all over the thank you card. I started thinking abut the Sunday school teachers she’s had these past 8 months and the friends who have loved her and the resources for growth and learning she’s had available to her. I started thinking about the lack of malaria here, and the clean beds and the grandma hugs... and the waves of emotion just kept rolling.

this. good.

so good

In the days since, my mind has continued to add to that “this was a good thing” list – and not only with regards to the kids, but for myself as well. I’m happy for the safe place to deliver my baby and the nutritious food that was always available. I’m thankful for the small group that took me in and showed me such kindness. I’m thankful that I got to witness the beauty of all four seasons and that I had appropriate clothing for all the weather. I’m thankful for the internet access that let me stock up on planning materials and needed supplies. I’m thankful for the hugs that I received in person and not just over e-mail. It was hard in so many ways. And yet, SO VERY GOOD.

more than good

lovin' all the good

So if you ask me how I feel about leaving, I’ll still likely over-emphasize that I am totally ready and I can't wait! But I might also start to tear up too, because I know both the good I’m going back to, and the good I’m leaving behind. Part of me hates the constant flip flop of emotion, but strangely, I take comfort in knowing that this too is grace. All transition is loss, largely because God works everything for good, which means we’re always leaving something good behind.

all kinds of good

and more good still

If you’re in Dulles airport next week and see a bunch of sorry looking white girls who are schlepping luggage and ugly crying, know that its ok. Just flash me a sign of solidarity and say carry on, sister. And that we will.