In February, as we approached the blue gates that had sheltered this precious treasure, my heart raced. It couldn't be real. Those 9 days in Kigali were a complete rush of adrenaline and crazy hurt and hope for this beautiful baby I now finally held and began to call my own. We dashed about filling out papers and waiting in lines that might never end. We navigated courts and policies and legislation and held our baby. And we could not wait to go back home.
Not because we didn't love it there, but because we longed to begin our life as a family of 5, complete. We longed to introduce our sweet girl to normal. To love. To home. To being full and held and tickled and adored. We ran home as fast as we possibly could.
And since then, my heart has LONGED to return. Deep in my heart where it almost physically hurts, I've wanted to return to Rwanda. So many friends have connections to this sweet land and the trips seemed all too numerous. Watching Facebook posts of families meeting their sponsored children and knowing the beauty within this amazing country made me crazy. Envious of the way I knew their heart beat while they were there, I knew my heart needed what they were getting and I was jealous.
I would meet Africans here, almost feeling a magnetic surge to walk towards them and throw myself awkwardly into a friendship because I so longed to know Africa, Rwanda, my baby!!!
And here I stand, 2 days away from boarding a plane that will yet again take me to this land that holds so so much!
Strangely, if you've asked me in the last 5 months how I feel about it all, I would probably give you a pretty honest answer (that's the only way I know) and say that it feels strange. My heart felt numb. Uninspired. Unmoved. And ashamed of it!!
I know, now that I am closer to this reality, that it just holds too much. My heart knew that if it began to feel all that there is going on under the surface, that it truly might just burst. So in a wise effort to protect itself, an emotional pace maker seemed to put itself in place; pumping rhythmically in robotic fashion just to get by.
Worried about this robotic motion of my preferably passionate self, I turned to books and movies to shock my heart back into motion. And sure enough it is working. I am feeling again and to be honest, it terrifies me.
My purpose in returning to Rwanda this week is BEAUTIFUL!! Breathtaking!! I work as an Independent Ambassador for Noonday Collection which is a company that uses fashion and design to help pull those in vulnerable places out of poverty. It has been so fulfilling to advocate on behalf of these beautiful souls all over the planet. I can imagine myself in previous travels seeing one of those souls on a street begging and wishing that my handful of change could do more. And now, I get to be a part of amazing change and transformation by selling gorgeous jewelry and accessories that they make so that they can have a sustainable income, educate and feed their families restoring the dignity they deserve as God's creation! Pinch me! It's such a great job!! So I will meet our 12 Rwandan artisans in only days!!
For 8 days I get to soak up the sun and air of this wonderful land! I will visit the homes of our sweet sponsored kids and be able to see them as so much more than a smiling face and sweet words that they write in their notes. I will hug their necks and meet their families and bless them with my prayers and get to throw a little birthday party for my boy who just so happens to be turning 16 on the actual day I meet him. Many Rwandans or maybe I should say most, don't have the luxury of birthdays. I'm not sure just how to help him celebrate, but celebrate we will. His life is worth that to be sure!! Oh and he wants to become Mayor, so watch out!!
And this... In just 4 days from the moments that I write these words, I will again approach those infamous blue gates that once protected my daughter, my little 4 year old diva. She was contained in these walls when the world was against her and though those assigned to her care did what they could, she did not have a family, nor someone to hold her when she cried. I tell people often about the short mattresses in the cribs in the baby room that allowed a 8-12 inch gap that the babies surely fell through to the concrete floor below. I feel sure the big bump on my baby's forehead was testament to this. It was a good place, but it was an incomplete holding ground for her trauma when no one could hear her hurt amidst the deafening cries of the15-20 others crying for their mommas to hold them too.
I will walk in those gates and go behind those doors and look into those cribs...And can you see here why my heart might just prefer to be numb?
So, it feels like this. I am walking into this land that hold so much! I have 7-8 days to capture it into my camera, and memory and heart. I just don't think I can. It's just too much.
Having been starved for my return for 3 years now, I feel sure these days will not satiate my hunger. It feels like I will bite off a crumb of bread from my steak dinner and leave in want.
So will you go with me? Will you help me to capture through a lens, words in an old dusty blog, the memory, the value, the purpose the dignity of life and meaning of these souls I so deeply care for?
It will be an adventure and my heart may just feel ready to beat wildly again!
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