Changed...

I've been home longer than I was gone, but it's taken me that long to work through the culture shock, jet lag, and just...re-entry. Plus, my amazing family has claimed so much of my time since I've been home, that it's just now that I'm able to really process (during the school year, they are shamefully abandoned; and then I left the country not 48 hours after graduation...they get to claim as much of my time as they want.).

Am I changed? Yep. You can't journey to the fifth-poorest country on our planet, look into the faces of their neediest children, walk in the dirt to their homes, talk with the caregivers and NOT be changed. My heart is even more broken for their plight than ever before. And, a mighty huge chunk has been left in a feeding centre in the middle of the "bush" in Malawi. It's in the care of children with names such as Bridget Chomba, Mishak, Jonathan Saidi, Zione Flak, Yankho Guya, and Gabu...

Another thing that hit me like a two-by-four between the eyes was watching MY students rise to the occasion. In trips past, there was always something that fell through the cracks, some minor task that needed completing (if not, it would upset the whole applecart), some child that needed a friend that was overlooked, some person who needed a kind word. Not this year. This year's crop of students CLICKED. One person's weakness was covered by another person's strength. There were very few holes - in our team's strengths and in our program. To the point that I felt lost at times. Where was my job? I'm used to following the pack, picking up the dropped pieces, and filling in the cracks.

That loss of equilibrium is actually what we want. It means I feel a bit...off...as a leader, but it's a real dream come true. It means that we have enabled our students to the point that they don't necessarily NEED us to do what they were meant to do. The biggest dream of any person who's training leaders is to "train ourselves out of a job." Will we ever be out of our job? NO. There's always a new crop of students rising through the ranks for whom we need to be available. But, to actually see confidence, talents, and gifts woven together so beautifully as we leaders were able to...that happens very seldom in our lifetimes.

After a day or two of feeling a bit...not needed, I realized that this off-balance-ness was what I needed to learn. That maybe, just maybe, there was something for ME to do that didn't involve training or equipping my students (because, we already did that SO WELL.). That's when I got to look around and realize the incredible need for LOVE in the children at the centre. It was made abundantly clear to me when a seven-year-old boy climbed in my lap like a baby and sat there, letting me hold him, rock him, and sing to him for almost an hour. Seven-year-old boys in Malawi DON'T snuggle like that. But, this little boy had a deep-seated need, and he took the opportunity presented to him - one that, if I had been doing my usual "job" wouldn't have been available.

Memories are embedded in my heart, and since my camera broke down while on the trip, they're all I've got. Once I steal some photos from my team, I'll post them here. :)

Reminders in Dreams...

I woke up this morning, and I swear, I could smell it. That acrid, smokey smell that blows into our windows every morning when we're in Malawi. The locals burn their trash at daybreak, and that smell is more efficacious than an alarm clock. I felt the wisp of the mosquito net across my face and the humidity that is ever-present. I promise you, I was not on my comfy, pillow-topped mattress; instead, my hip was firmly planted on the board of my bed, since the mattress is so thin and there's a hole right where a person's hip should be. I couldn't have been happier.

Then, my alarm went off, and I realized I was still in the States. Don't get me wrong, I am GRATEFUL for my life here. I am blessed beyond measure. I have a job I love, an apartment that, while it's not much, is my home; I have friends and family who remind me daily of why I was put on this Earth, and I lack for nothing.

It's just...the countdown has begun. 69 days until I leave with an amazing team of high school students, and we travel almost 48 hours to the other side of this globe. To a place where everything is different, and yet...the important things are still the same. Smiles mean the same thing; heck, I think they mean more. They're definitely easier to share. Hugs are tighter. Language is only words; smiles, laughter, and hand-gestures communicate just as effectively. Children laugh. Songs are sung. And, gratitude abounds - for me, it's just the thankfulness to be able to go. To see and experience what so many here in the US have never seen, and never will because we're so wrapped up in our struggle to fulfill the "American Dream." I'm grateful to help feed the hungry, to love the "unlovable", and to let some orphans - kids who have been shunned by society because their parents died of AIDS - know that they have value. That they are not a mistake, and that they have a purpose in this life.

I've been looking at my students a little bit differently today. I see them not as little junior high kids, but as future world changers. Students I will someday, maybe, travel around the world with, sit in the dirt & hold little kids with, cook food at the center with, and hopefully, help instill into them a desire to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and heal the sick.

I can teach my students what the definition of "salient" is, how to effectively defend a thesis, and how to diagram a compound sentence with direct objects and indirect objects and compound verbs, not to mention nouns of direct address. But, if that's all I do, I have not, truly not, been a teacher. Because, being able to score well on a test means nothing if one cannot look with compassion on others.

That is my true calling. Teaching is just the vehicle I use.

69 days...