Jesus In a Minivan (And Other Unlikely Places to find a King)

I ran to the window and peered through the lace curtains to watch Jesus drive away in his minivan, "TX" license plates fading from view.

Only moments before he had stood at the end of the neighbor's driveway as his wife sorted through piles of pink and lavender baby clothes.  In just a flash of time, a caramel-skinned child, ran past him, her arms flung back in the delight of her dash down the driveway towards the freedom of the street.  He turned to follow her.

Fright lodged in my throat as I noticed the speeding car coming down the road.  Parked along the curb, the man's minivan blocked his view of the on-coming vehicle, but at the last minute he spotted it, turned, sprinted, and snatched his daughter from the street.

His face beamed.

He scooped her up high, laughing, tossing her, delighting in his prize, and she returned his joy with her own giggles and a toss of her black hair, unaware of the failed snatch of death just beyond her next footstep.  Her daddy did not scold or shame, but carried her in his proud arms, eyes twinkling with triumph.  He buckled her into her car seat and they were gone, but my heart was full of gratitude for what God had allowed me to witness.  Just like the Daddy, Jesus snatched us from peril and rejoiced in having done so!  I can imagine how his eyes twinkle and dance in the triumph of moment.

Jesus shows up in the most unexpected places, such as as the neighbor's garage sale last summer.  And tonight as the clock nears midnight, I am awaiting the celebration of Christmas Day when we commemorate the birth of our Savior in an unlikely time and place.

Living here in Haiti I have a great imagination for what it could have been like for Jesus to have been born to poor, common, rural folks.  No fanfare, no royal clothes or decrees, perhaps just a simple stick shelter off the side of the house with a laboring woman and a common birth.  I can imagine the cows and goats had been walked home for the evening and were standing nearby lending warmth and scent to the scene.  And here the Savior of the world quietly enters into humanity; Emanuel - God With Us.  He identifies with folks who are nobody to the world, from an unimportant tribe, and who exist in the lower strata of society, in order to let us know what is most important to him and that his values are going to look different than what we might expect.

I am pierced with the realization that I am frequently looking in the wrong places for the Christ.  I am more comfortable thinking about the bright star and angel chorus than the feeding trough and strips of cloth.  I think I would have checked out the palace first, just as the wise men from the East did in their search for the one prophesied about.  I am more comfortable thanking God for the extensive "blessings" in my life rather than thinking about how I might change my list of "needs" to better appropriate resources to those who live "without".

It might be a week early for resolutions but during this next year, I want to be on the watch for Jesus.  Where will I see and experience his moving in and around my life?  Will Jesus show up in an outdated minivan?  On the back of a ragged horse or a road-weary moto?  And in which ways will I grow in being able to anticipate where he might be found?

If you'd be willing to pray for me, please pray that God would unsettle my clinging to what is comfortable and set me free to see him and follow him wherever he leads in this Haiti adventure.

Joyful Waiting

When I was little, we lived in southern Ontario, far from grandparents in MN.  Every other year my Grandpa and Grandma Breems would come to visit at Christmas.  There was so much excitement for their arrival.  We knew when they came there would hugs through thick, cold, winter coats, kisses and smiles, Christmas presents handed in to place under the tree and a big box of groceries to treat the family with exotic items like Bugles, orange jell-o, and Honeycomb cereal -- things out of budget for my parent's income at the time.

I would know ahead of time they were coming and as the weeks of advent passed and the Christmas tree was placed in it's stand and brightly strung, Christmas carols were sung in church and at programs, snow piled high, and the frost grew on the windows, I waited.  I waited in eager anticipation for their coming.  Every day I would ask how many more days before they arrived, and time seemed so slow.  I don't think I ever doubted they would come.  My parents said they were coming and I believed that, but the waiting felt like long-suffering in child time.

And then the day would arrive.  My mom would say, "they'll be here in the morning" and then, "in four hours, and then "2" and then "any time now", and then I would flop across the arm chair near the living room windows or sit by the heat register in front of the lower panes and press my nose into the frost, perhaps scrape a patch free to see through or clear it with my warm breath before watching the crystals re-form around the open circle.  "How much longer…."
"Any time now…."

A car would come to the corner and look as if they might proceed down our dead end block, and then turn, or proceed and turn too early in a neighbors driveway.  A sparrow would land in the bare bushes in front of the house hopping from branch to branch looking for berries and then dash away looking elsewhere.  A dog might lope across the yard leaving light tracks in the deepening snow and then a sudden lightness would ignite the top of my stomach, a thrill to shorten my breath and someone would yell out, "they're here! Grandpa and Grandma are here!!!"  And the rush to the entry to be the first to open the door, the first to yell out in pure joy, the first to hug tight and see Grandma's blue eyes glisten with happy tears and Grandpa's gentle smile.  All the waiting gone in a flash and only joy and delight in seeing one so longed for.  My stomach tightens with the remembrance of all of those feelings so long ago!

"Presentation of Jesus" by Ron DiCianni

In church this morning Pastor Dan preached about Simeon and Anna and how they waited to meet the promised Messiah.  In Luke Chapter 2 the Bible tells us that Simeon was a pretty great guy, and he had been told by the Holy Spirit that he would not die until he had seen the Christ.  We don't know how long he waited or how many times a day he dropped by the temple to check, but we do know he had been waiting a long time and could very well have been an old man.  So the chapter goes on to say that moved by the Spirit he goes into the temple courts and there he sees Jesus being presented by his parents.  He literally runs over there, takes the baby in his arms, shouts out a praise to God and prophesies blessing over his parents.  Jesus' parents "marveled"!

Can you imagine being told by God that you are waiting for the Messiah to come.  Unlike my grandparents visits, Simeon didn't even know when that time would be, but he waited, eagerly, nonetheless.  Imagine the day when he feels that stirring inside, he rushes to the temple searching past robed men and animals and there he catches a glimpse of the baby.  His heart confirms what his eyes are seeing and in a great dash he bursts out into joy, thanking God right out loud, runs over to the new family like he has known them forever, and snatches up the prize he has so waited for.  (How great would that moment have been!  (How freaked out would Jesus' parents have been?  But there was going to be more "out-of-the-ordinary being Jesus' parents…)

"Saint Simeon Nunc Dimittis" by André Durand

I think all of us who have longed or waited for something good can also can imagine the sweetness of that instant joy.  And so each year we practice that ritual of waiting and joy, waiting to celebrate Jesus' birth all over again.  At least I hope we do.  I hope it does not get squashed out by all the extra frivolity we have attached to his simple arrival.  I hope there is some space left for the simple expression of the heart where there is excitement and marveling at his gentle coming, a place where it feels our heart might not be able to take one more moment of anticipation and then the overwhelming JOY of his having come can overwhelm us.

We get to experience this kind of wait and joy cycle in many areas of our life.  Sometimes, the waiting part seems so very long.  There are days in our work here in Haiti, I wonder if the joy will ever follow the waiting.  When will the ache of hunger be released?  When will the grind of poverty be lightened?  So I wait with anticipation with all of creation and the people around me; I wait for joy.  And then I catch just a glimpse, as if through the crowd I see joy in the hearts of those who long for justice, I see praise in those who are bent low… and I wait for the moment of fullness, for ALL the joy to be released.

  All this, in turn, is jut a small practice of the greater wait we have for Jesus' return to reclaim all of creation!  In the Bible we are told we don't know the exact time he will return, only that he will and that it will be "soon".  And as I strain for just a glimpse because I know he is just a few steps away…

 So I'm putting my tree up, going to programs, celebrating his return, and waiting very near the window.  I might even scratch in the frost and feel the deep excitement in my breath as a wait for his return during this season of advent waiting… Maranatha (Christ come quickly)!

Jesus in the Pharmacy

I saw Jesus today.  I was on my way over to the main campus to bring back some meds we didn't use.  I walked into the pharmacy and there, kneeling on the floor washing and bandaging a man’s fungal feet, was Rachel.  I tried to look away before seeing any nastiness, but realized quickly the washing and dirty work had already been done.  If Rachel held distaste for her task her face did not belie it.  Instead, she calmly wound gauze between toes filled with healing cream and went on with conversation as if being knee-bent on a gritty tile floor holding a stranger’s rotting toes was nothing out of the ordinary.

A few weeks ago it might have been different.  A few weeks ago during a conversation about nursing at COTP the same young woman had worried eyes as she admitted feeling inadequate and unsure about how to be useful with a limited skill set.  Rachel graduated from nursing school just months ago, and instead of settling into a predictable 3-11 shift in OB or serving up tidy med cups at the nursing home, she said yes to an adventure outside her comfort zone.  Before any nurse friends out there get too upset, I know there are more difficult aspects of nursing care than "predictable shifts" and "med cups", but those things fall within the expected course after graduation.  Starting a volunteer position in a 3rd world country with no real job description, and an expectation to work outside your skill set, is not.  Few nurses in the States ever have the expectation of having to diagnose and treat Typhoid, be the only help for a woman laboring to birth a baby in the back of a speeding pick-up, stitch up a motorcycle accident victim brought to the front gate, or tell a woman and her children she is likely dying of cancer and there is nothing we can do to help.  Our nurses do these kinds of things because they are there and are the only hope in those moments, but those are not moments they were trained for.

It was not really what she had come for -- this foot care thing.  She had come with more experienced nurses, with more experienced supervision, with hopes of structured med routines and baby care, and safety, but as often happens in life, plans did not go as expected and she found herself with more responsibility than she was up for.  She didn’t know if she could handle it.

And then Jesus stopped by.  He scooped up a big ‘ole ladle of grace with an extra pinch of peace and slopped it all over her soul – spirit food if ever there was any!  And she gobbled it up, because in this land of poverty -- of hungry eyes and too thin arms, where the rawness of the poor presses in so closely, she was hungry.  

I talked with her a few days ago when she was overseeing blood draws and setting up meds for our baby house kids and asked how she was doing.  The more experienced nurse she had come with had to leave unexpectedly to be bedside of someone she loved who was nearing death, and the supervisor she had hoped to work under was gone on a visit stateside.  Plan A had slipped away like a piece of paper, snatched by the wind and tossed just out of reach.  

She said she was surprisingly calm.  She thought it was grace.  And I think so, too.  The kind of grace that covers you when you don’t know much about babies and are not even sure you adore them, but have to care for a crying one all night.  Its the kind of grace that allows you to float over personal inadequacies when in reality you should be drowning.  The grace that carries a heavy special need boy all over Milot Hospital in search of x-rays and answers, long after your arms ache from fatigue and your back tightens with the strain.  Or the kind of grace that fills a heart with joy for service even with a stranger’s stinky feet.

Rachel Peterson - short- term volunteer nurse

Rachel is reminding me again about allowing God to work when we don’t have it all together.  Don’t get me wrong; she’s a competent nurse and her confidence adds to her beauty, but we don’t always feel like we have it all together and God doesn’t need us to.  I am trying to remember he chooses to use us in our brokenness because that is where his glory shines.  He doesn’t need me to be prepped and polished; he needs me to be teachable.  He might even use me if I’m not, by his grace.  

As I leave the pharmacy, I know Rachel has no idea how God has used her moment of service to teach me how to be used.  She just joyfully serving in the moment he has given her.  And as I walk back out into the bright Haitian sun I pray,

"God, thank you for bringing me to this place, with these people, to help teach my heart to trust yours!  Ready me to be used even when I don't think I have what it takes, keep my spirit soft, and let me see service in simple moments of caring for those you love."  Amen.

Are You My People?

One of my greatest joys here at COTP is watching adoptive parents arrive, join with their kiddos and take them home to become a part of their forever families.  I've witnessed nearly a dozen in the nine months we've been here, and each time I feel such gratitude and joy at seeing precious little ones being cherished as they should.  The good-bye fete the afternoon before the family flies out is especially poignant.

A long-term staff (usually Emily), makes a treat to share, and the Nannies, kids, staff, and the adoptive family gather (typically under the play pavilion) for a final good-bye.  There is parting prayer and blessing, singing, tears, a little anxiety for what's to come, and declarations by the Nannies of "Bondye konnen" (God knows).

Not everyone loves the good-byes in the same way.  I am not the first to wonder what it must feel like to the other kiddos to see the farewell scenario each time.  Once again there is talk of forever families coming soon, the parents come, the friend spends time with them, and then leaves, never to be seen again.  From the perspective of the other kids, it is an unsettling loss, filled with uncertainty, and more than a little sadness.

A few days ago I was walking Natalie home from school.  Her warm, paint-stained hand was in mine as we walked along the gravel path behind the school, on the way home to our house at Manna.  We had just come out of the shaded part of the path into the warming sun when she looked up at me and said, "I want to say good-bye to you and go with my people.  When are my people coming?"

While I cringed with rejection for just a moment, I knew instantly what she meant.  Everyone else has people who come and take them away.  We had come but somehow stayed.  It just didn't make sense to her, so in her mind, her "people" must still be coming!

"We are your people, sweetie!  I am your mommy and dad is your daddy!" I tried to explain.

"No, Mom."  (As if to say, don't be silly.)  "My people who need to take me to United States."

Oh my sweet little girl!  How much you have to think about through all this transition!  My heart welled up into my throat to imagine what she must think and worry about, why she gets moody and mad, and how hard it must be to wrap her mind around what we are supposed to be to her.  We have the right titles, but we aren't doing what the other adoptive parents do.  How is she to make sense of this all?

She was pretty much done with me at this point, as I clearly was not getting it, so she changed the subject to the "getting home from school" routine, saying, "I need to go potty and wash my hands for lunch?"  This, too, used to be a battle with near daily crying and angry removal of clothes, but she has gotten used to this routine as we eat lunch and prepare for our afternoon nap time, and she no longer fights it.  Now she checked to see if she could still expect this routine to hold in her moment of uncertainty.

The next day, she again casually asked, "do my people come today, Mom?"  Once again I explained that we were her people, that we would be taking her on the airplane to visit all the grandpas and grandmas and uncles and aunts and friends that are learning to love her from afar, and that we would be her people forever.

She still wasn't buying it.

This continued on for a few days.  Every so often she'd ask about her people, if we were her people, if other people were still coming to take her, if we were going to visit the United States, if we were going to come back.... all of us, her, and Rose Guerda, and Noah, and Elijah, and Daddy, and Mommy?

"Yes, honey.  All of us.  We are your people, forever."

This morning Kirk scooped her up and as she held his cheeks and pressed a wrinkled nose close to his, she asked, "Daddy, are you my people?".  He responded with the question, "can I be your people?"  She said yes.  I asked her, "can Mommy be your people?"  She said yes.  And we asked if we could take her to the United States some day and come back to Haiti and be her family forever?  And she said yes.

I'm pretty sure it was the real deal; the real moment we adopted her.  Sure we had committed to it and the paperwork will soon make it legal, but right there and then we covenanted to be family.  We will be her parents and she will be our child.  We will guard her and teach her and love her and she will grow in strength and beauty and love for us, too.  We will be her people and she will be ours.

There is precedence for such adoptive arrangements.  In the book of Ruth in the old testament of the Bible, Ruth and Naomi become family to one another despite all other ties of marriage and duty being severed, and it lead to blessing for both of them, including "adopted Ruth" being included in the lineage of Jesus Christ.

How deeply God has rooted our desire to belong and how wonderful that he models this covenantal and adoptive relationship with us!  Some day Natalie will learn, and Rose, and Noah and Elijah, too, that not only are they our people, but God's, too.  While we have much to offer her, God has more, and she will be held in a covenant of grace and promise that can fill her with security and belonging rooted in His boundless love!  

My peeps:

 

Ransom Money

The price was only $1, but with the transfer of cash, and a triumphant gleam, Noah bought the life of a bird.

With countless interruptions from school each day, I get weary with deciding what is worthy of a break from the books and what is not, but earlier this week, I came home from walking Natalie to preschool to find Noah and some school boys from next door, bartering on the back porch, over the price of a common fledgling pigeon.

Ah, great, just what we need!  I figured it must be wounded or ill or some such thing leading to death and further drama, and I really wanted to shut the transaction down, but Noah pleaded.  Oh I should be saying NO to this, but perhaps there could be some lesson?

Scaly-naped Pigeon fledgling

 One of the boys with red checkered shirt and navy uniform pants had shot it out of a tree with a slingshot, stunning it, before tying a grimy thread to its ankle.  He had hoped to bring it home to eat, but Noah was bartering for it's life.  A dollar is not bad for a few bites of bird, so Noah ran in the house to get the money from his savings.  Next there was the issue that the dollar bill itself was not good enough because of a small tear where it had been creased.  Finally the boy agreed to take the damaged dollar, likely laughing all the way to the bank, or at least to the school yard snack stand.

In situations like this, I am frequently faced with the thought of how hard we should advocate for the life of a simple bird when children die around us with far less care or attention?  Despite my desire for my kids to know and care about the pain of image-bearers around them, this is a burden I dare not lay too heavily on the hearts of my children.  They know others with hunger but do not always make the connection when their hearts become full with tenderness towards the hurt of a creature.  Or perhaps the weight presses so near, creature care becomes the concrete "something" they can do to alleviate the dissonance that follows them into play and sleep.

Whatever it may be, the bird became Noah's new focus of care.  He quickly finished his school work, went over to ask a friend's advice, and she eagerly researched online and helped come up with answers  as to what it was and how to best care for it.  He began a feeding schedule with berries and eye droppers of pureed veggies, made a comfy "nest" in a box, and even setting his alarm to wake him with the sun's rising, so as to care for his new dependent to the best of his ability.

That night when I tucked him in bed, we talked about how Noah's compassion for the bird could teach us of God's love for us.  How when our lives were destined for destruction He ransomed us at far greater cost, and choose to treasure and delight in us, despite our broken, helpless state.  I asked him to think about how the love he was feeling for this small bird gives us just glimpse of how immense God's love for us is.  Just like there is not a single thing the bird can do to earn back the gift, there is nothing we can do to pay for our redeemed lives.  We just get to live in fellowship and gratitude with our amazing Creator!  And as I asked him to think about this truth I realized the whole bird hassle could be God's way of reminding me of my own adoption into his care, how he wants compassion to blaze in me, and how he longs to see his nature of grace flow out of my life...

Ransom money -- God knows all about it and plants just a glint of that grace in our hearts, so boys and their moms can reflect His love to those around them.


As with most life illustrations, they only go so far before falling short of truth or usefullness.  In our case, muddy paw prints on the porch the next morning told the story of the hungry mongrel.  He made a midnight snack of the bird, leaving the carnage of feathers and bloodied bone for the aggrieved caregiver to find and bury the next day!!!

Is the next teaching about God's tender care of the sparrow... and hungry dogs, too?

Come As You Are

This week a child came to our house asking for pants for church.  I know this boy well.  I see him almost every day and my boys like to play with him.  He often asks for things I do not give him but this week he wanted pants for church because Sunday was a "party for Mom" day, and he wanted to go with her and make her proud of him.

It just so happened that in my excitement about possibly visiting the States in a couple of months I had gone through the boys clothing totes (yes, even here we have totes to hold our extra clothing) and had set aside a pair of khakis Noah has not worn since arriving.  They had had a small stain on the back of the leg since I received them as a hand-me-down and I had not made work of removing it, so even though they still smelled of Tide and were neatly folded between dryer sheets, I figured I could just get a different pair when we were home, and we easily parted with them.  I threw in a couple of imperfect t-shirts, a button up Noah hated to wear to church, and some stretched-out shorts.  It's not too hard to make a kid happy here, and the boy was pretty excited about the new clothes as he left.

To be honest, this kind of charity is very easy and gratifying in Haiti.  Maybe it is everywhere.  The boy gets new pants and is grateful; I get a shiny new ego bump for my act of benevolence.  It's almost as easy as writing a big check at a fund-raiser or clicking "like" for a compelling cause.  He gets what he needs and I go back to checking facebook.  Win-win, right?

He came back this morning.  Kirk was still lying in bed, I was sitting on the bed in my nightgown and the boy came up to the bedroom window and called out my name.  Incidentally, in a place with few windows on buildings, it is not uncommon for someone to greet you in this way.  You don't go up to house and knock on the door, rather, you walk up and holler for who you want, so that's what he did.  I really wanted to ignore him and pretend not to be there, I really did, but I got up and peeked around the door at him.  He was very proud of how handsome he looked with his new shirt and pants, all clean and ready, and wanted me to approve of how nice he looked.  But he wanted something else.  He wanted money for the offering at church and didn't have any.  He was worried about what others would think of him if he didn't put anything in the offering plate.

Even if our Creole was great, how do we explain to this child that God doesn't need him to bring him money to be welcome at church.  Kirk told him, "God has a lot of money.  It's ok for you to go without giving an offering."  He looked ashamed at having to go without, so I gave him 25 gourdes (60 cents) and we agreed that we would talk more about it later.

He left happy to have the correct presentation for church to honor his mother on Mother's Day, and Kirk and I sat there feeling very sad for this boy.  At age 12 he already knows what is needed for him to be acceptable to even go to church.  A child who lives in such poverty that he sleeps on the ground of his family's stick home each night and literally eats the table scraps of others, has to suffer the further indignity of begging for the correct attire and presentation to enter his community's church.  I would like to believe it is the fear and not the reality of the judgement of others, but unfortunately it is true.  In Haiti it is not considered respectable to go to church if you are not dressed properly, so if you are too poor for "correctly", you do not go.  So at 12, this boy already believes he does not belong among believers of Jesus on a Sunday morning.  I could about cry, thinking about this reality.

But as I consider this sadness, I wonder how different is that than in our home churches in North America?  I will admit to having snotty thoughts about a visitor's skirt being too short, or a shirt too shabby, tattoos too prominent, make-up too garish, diamonds too big or too small, hair too wet or too unkempt, sitting to close to the front or too far to the back, kids too loud etc, etc, etc.    Oh Lord, have mercy on me if I have been the cause of anyone not feeling FULLY welcomed into the house of the Lord, especially if it has been a child!

Are the poor welcome in our churches?  Do they dare approach the front door?  Is there anything about our buildings, attitudes, practices, or behaviors that discourage them from sharing in Christian fellowship.  If so, we have a lot to think about as far is what it means to be the body of Christ.  If the poor can't fit in with us, then we likely don't fit in with God since Jesus made it clear in his ministry that among the poor was where he was at and who he most identified with.  With the poor he loved lavishly, forgave generously, fed heartily, advocated vociferously, lived simply, and died selflessly.

Just this week I had been reflecting a bit on how my life can be fairly distant from the extreme poverty all around us because of the compound walls.  I have to intentionally leave the safety of the enclosure to encounter much overt poverty, and even then, I have begun getting used to the sight of poor and their constant plight.  I would like to believe part of that is because I am learning to see past outward appearances of Haitians and beginning to see hearts, but I know another part is my attempts to insulate against the constant press of need.  But this week I began to pray that God would allow me to feel the reality once again and be moved by what moves Him; to once again experience compassion even when it is uncomfortable.

His discomfort cost Him his son's life, mine only disrupts moments of my time...

So friends, I am going to pray for you.  What insulates you from those Jesus calls his followers to minister to?  Is your distance a physical barrier of some sort, or something in your heart?  I am praying that you and I will be shaken to not only know but be moved by God's heart for those in need.  Oh yes, I am praying for your discontent, that you may unsettled in your life enough to move closer to Christ and his Kingdom.  I need that, too.  And maybe, just maybe, God will give us opportunities to reflect his perfect love in such a way that even a "least of these" kind of kid, will know he belongs in the family of God.

Urgent Care (Rose's Broken Leg)

Thursday, April 18th, 2013

Yesterday, we were in Port au Prince for an appointment for both girls.  Before leaving our hotel, Rose was playing on a couple of low stairs.  I had taken her down once and when she climbed back up I chided her to get back down and began walking toward her.  Before I could get there, she giggled with the pleasure of her own disobedience and hurriedly turned to go down the two stairs.  As she turned she lost her balance and fell.  At first I did not get why she was crying so  much for an injury she usually recovers from so quickly, and felt a little angry that she was carrying on so, but when I tried to set her down she would not put weight on her left leg.  She acted "shock-y" the rest of the afternoon, sleeping a lot and not wanting to eat.  She whimpered when her leg was moved.  At that point I was pretty sure she had some kind of break or serious injury.  At the advice of a friend we splinted it once we were home and Rose slept for most of the night.

I have written about going to the Dr. once before, but the experience of accessing medical care here in Haiti is so unlike home, I thought I'd share another encounter with healthcare, Haiti style.  

Let me start by saying that there are truly some lovely people to meet along the way.  Despite the hardship Haitians face both in their work and in getting care, in general, I encounter patience, warmth, and friendliness along the way.  This is one of the marks of goodness I so enjoy about this culture.

The morning begins just before 7.  My cell phone sounds the "rise and shine", I get myself dressed and ready and then wake Rose.  

I leave our place at Manna and walk over to COTP.  Noah has decided to come along to help out and join in the adventure. After tracking down John, we get into the red pick-up and bump and jostle down the dirt road, until we get to the tar road that leads to Milot.  I have been to Milot often enough to know my way around a bit, so I leave John at the vehicle and enter the front gate.  He agrees to find me in about an hour to check in.  The security guards ask nothing of me as I enter.  

I am not entirely sure where to go for emergency care, so first I check out the pediatric clinic.  The nurse tells me there is no doctor there and points across the courtyard.  Not knowing exactly what she says I walk back across the yard and up the stairs to the second level to an entrance for hospital admissions.  There I ask a guard where I can see a doctor for my daughter's leg.  He shrugs and indicates I need to go back downstairs, so I do.  

I walk to the peds unit.  There the nurse points me to Urgent Care, which I have not before noticed, tucked in a corner of the wide courtyard.  

The door has a padlock which hangs open and a nondescript door with a curtained window and a sign that reads Urgent/ Emergency.  I knock lightly and then enter, squeezing in next to the others in the cramped entry.  The area immediately within the door is a combined med room/ administration desk/ nurse's station/ waiting area all within approximately 10 x 10 space.   I tell the young man behind the desk that I my daughter has had an accident and I believe she has a broken leg.  He attends to a couple of other tasks while I share a single chair with Noah and Rose on my lap.  

While I wait, I take notice of the room  The rest of the space is sectioned off with curtains which fall too short to cover the areas they seek to divide.  There are 5 spaces with beds, 4 of which are occupied with people in varying degrees of injury and/or pain.  Two appear to be moto accidents with painfully abraded skin peeking through gaps in the curtains.  Family members crowd beside beds to help attend to the injured.  One large-breasted woman lays in her bed, topless, and while Noah is at the age to feel both curious and embarrassed by such nudity, in this setting he seems largely unfazed.

Back at the desk the young man writes out an order for radiology.  Having been here before I know I must go and have the price of the procedure written on the form and then pay for it prior to accessing the service.  

Noah and I leave the room, with me carrying Rose, back across the courtyard, down a narrow two-way sidewalk to the front entrance.  I go to the information booth.  No one is there.  In the past when this has happened, pharmacy seems to fill in for the job, so I walk over to the pharmacy, which is in the same general area near the front gate.  I wait in line behind 4 others until it is my turn at the plexiglass window.  I pass my paper under the small arched opening.  Cool, air conditioned air seeps out into the muggy hallway.  The person inside informs me that the information attendant is now on duty.  

I return to the information booth, wait my turn behind 2 others and then present my paper there.  For some reason unknown to me, radiology fees need to be assessed in Archives (Records/ HIMS).  I walk to the doorway next to the pharmacy and walk in.  After waiting for one other to be served I present my paper.  The man writes 500 and I leave.  Next go to the Cashier to pay for the service.  There are 5 people in line.  I wait.  Again.  Rose's weight is wearing on my right shoulder muscles but she remains in a relatively good mood, and Noah is holding up remarkably well with all the waiting and searching, so I am thankful for that.  I make it to the window, pass the attendant my 1000 Gould bill, ignore the flirtation, and return to the courtyard to find radiology.

Radiology is marked with a sign above the door, painted in green letters, like all the other offices.  It sits on the far right end of a plaza of sorts, along with special services to the left, and OBGYN beyond that.  There is a large outdoor waiting area with wooden benches witch are all occupied beyond capacity.  I quickly scan the hands of those seated to see how many others hold papers like mine.  Seeing none I am assuming and hoping that most of these people are here for "special services" or OBGYN.  I mentally check off all of those with pregnant bellies and add a few extra to the tally as their friends and family, and am pleasantly surprised to see only a handful of others.  We might get through this whole deal quickly! 

It is difficult for me to tell what the proper procedure is for knowing when to enter an office or room, but sitting around doesn't answer it for me, so I go up to the door, squeezing around a man in a wheelchair with open skin.  He was in urgent care with us a little while ago, and his attendant stands behind him with a paper like mine.  I knock on the door and open it.  An official looking man with properly trimmed hair and dress clothes, looks at my paper and tells me, "just a moment".  I leave the room and prepare to wait as "moments" vary a great deal based on interpretation!  

Waiting is a big part of accessing care, and of many other aspects of life here, and since I am now waiting, while still holding my chunky toddler in my weakening arms I decide to people watch.  Though I have not yet specifically mentioned it, I should say that all the while I am at Milot I am being watched -- and talked to, and talked about, but mostly watched, so I feel less shame in openly staring as well.

There are improvements being made to landscaping in the grounds outside our seated area, and men are working on the landscaping.  I find it somewhat amusing that one of the guys is dressed entirely normally in shorts, t-shirt, and baseball cap, but has somehow found it appropriate to wear over the knee toe socks.  They have a red back-ground with a pink heart pattern for the majority of the socks with teal back-ground and white hearts from the ankle down, and flip flops between his conveniently separated toes.  He works seriously and is not at all hindered in his diligence by being dressed ever so slightly like a circus clown.  Noah does not even double take.  His new normal has set in.

After 15 minutes or so, the gentleman I saw inside the radiology room pokes his head out searching the crowd.  I lock my eyes on his, hoping he will notice and summon me with my white paper in hand, and he does.

Once inside I place Rose on the 1950's style x-ray apparatus, after the x-ray tech cleans the fresh blood off the table left by the previous patient.  The gentleman gives me a lead gown, positions Rose as one might expect, goes behind a plywood wall and takes the x-rays.  He then goes into a room labeled "dark room", processes the film, places the x-rays in a large envelope labeled "spine" and motions for us to exit the room.  We leave and return to Urgent Care.

Once back inside the Urgent Care room, the young man behind the desk takes the x-rays looks at them without registering any concern.  He gives them to a Dr.  who tells me in English, "the bone is broken. We need to cast."  I can see from the Dr.'s indicating that there are breaks in both the tibia and fibula.  

At this point another piece of paper is written with a request for Rose's medical record. I need to return to Archives to get it.  Back across the courtyard, down the narrow sidewalk, around the corner to Archives with Rose on my hip and Noah following behind. 

Again we wait our turn for being served.   I pass along the chart request along with her hospital card number. One problem.  We don't seem to have the right number.  Sigh.  We are being helped by a most  wonderful man, slight in stature, with Gandhi- like kind eyes.  I happen to have a copy of Rose's birth certificate along, so after some precursory searching for the chart, Gandhi sends me away to an office with a computer to see if her birth day shows up. 

ONCE again, back around the corner, down the narrow sidewalk single file, across the courtyards to accounting.  There they look in the computer, but are unable to help.  I follow my route back to the Archives office to tell them we have no luck.  Gandhi tells me without the chart I cannot return to  Urgent Care.  I tell him I will go to the waiting area outside to sit until our driver returns.  My cell phone died a few days ago and Kirk had texted the chart number to John when we could not find Rose's ID card that morning.  So we wait.  Noah goes outside the gate to buy some street food from the daily vendors.  Rose and I entertain the other hospital patrons simply with our "white mama, haitian baby" routine.  A man asks if her mother is dead.  Not wanting to get into a long discussion, I tell him "yes".  He asks me if I am her mother.  I tell him I am.  He then proceeds to explain to those around us, that the baby's mother is dead and I am now her mother.  There are nods and murmurs.  They watch me feed the baby.  They watch me get her sippy cup out the backpack and hand it to her.  They comment that the baby drinks.  They comment that I give her a doll.  They comment that she throws the doll on the dirty ground and that I give it back to her.  Just when I am becoming quite weary of the fishbowl, Gandhi returns with wonderful news -- there had been a misspelling of her last name, but he has found the missing chart!  I want to kiss him on his shiny forehead, but resist, and instead thank him profusely.  

He walks me back to Urgent Care with our chart, where we are now able to receive services.  We have now been at Milot hospital for 2 hours.  Though others stand in the crowded room, we are ushered to a back corner. The Dr. asks a nurse to get a clean sheet which she places over the sheet on the exam table.  I set Rose down.  My bicep  murmurs a weak thank you with a twitch.  

The Dr.'s name tag indicates that he is the medical director.  He demonstrates casting Rose's leg to 3 nursing students and two other young men in the room.  The other patients and their visitors watch as well.  Rose cries as sad wet tears roll off her cheeks into her ears and then it is over.  She is casted from toe to thigh and we can go.  

Almost.

John has not returned but Papito arrives.  The nurse is happy to talk to him instead of me assuming he will translate, which he does.  I have not yet been given a bill for the Dr. or casting so I ask if I owe something.  The nurse leaves and returns with a piece of paper.  250 is written on it.  I need to go back to the Cashier to pay and then return to Urgent Care with the stamped paper indicating I have paid. 

Noah and Rose and I wait in line once again.  There are 6, then 5, then 4, then 3, then 2 people ahead of us, when someone from Urgent Care comes out to the line to find us.  He says, "the nurse says you can return".  "Can?"  So it's optional.  I would rather stay and pay and then check what is needed, but he clarifies that we need to leave the line now, so I do, reluctantly saying good-bye to my almost- to- the-window spot in the cue, and follow the man back to urgent care.  

The nurse in urgent care tells me they have given me the wrong price.  It is too high.  Too high I do not care about if I means we can leave, but then she looks at something else and says it is too low.  She hands me a new paper with 600 on it.  

We return to the line.  We are once again waiting when a nurse from Urgent Care appears.  I think this cannot possibly be a good sign, but she simply gives us Rose's x-ray.  I smile say thank you, pay my bill and we can leave!  Whew.

I find Papito in the front waiting area and ask where the vehicle is.  He tells me he is on a moto.  At this point I do not care how we get how home and Noah is practically giddy that we get to ride home on a moto so Papito gets on the moto, Noah snugs up behind him with the x-ray tucked between then, I throw a skirted leg over over the back and squeeze Rose in between Noah's back and me, and with back-pack on back we leave.

Urgent care at Milot is not the same as at home, but for $25 American, Rose has been seen and cared for and we are headed home.  I think I need a nap!!!

Rose with her new cast - day 1.

The Most Peaceful Place. Ever.

For literature, Noah and I have been studying Robert Frost poetry, and trying to put ourselves in the place of the poet, with his eye for nature and nuance.  Last week on the way back over to our place from COTP, Noah got "lost" for 15 minutes.  Not the kind of lost that worries, me, but the kind where I wonder with great annoyance gentle bemusement, "huh, I wonder where he's staying?"

He came walking into the house with emotion filled voice, and said, "I was walking home and noticed a beautiful orange tree not far off and had to get closer to see it".  He had cantaloupe-colored, blooms in his hand, and his eyes were shining as he pressed one into my palm.

I did smile at that.  In our years of raising kids in the states, I often felt sad, or wistful maybe, for the things our kids were not getting that I treasure from my childhood, one of them being, a sense of wonder and curiosity about nature.

As a kid I lived in a place where rolling hills, woods, and streams were my play places.  Building forts with hay-lined floors, laying near the pond on my stomach watching tadpoles, jumping off the bluffs into snow chest-deep, enjoying the crunch of leaves on the forest floor or the crackle of ice on the pond, standing in a clearing in the woods and noticing the slant of sun, the musty ground, the sound of birds.... these were the treasures I valued from my youth that my kids did not know.  I had gotten lazy in my parenting and "visits" to the woods or fields were not fun for the kids - they're eyes and ears were not trained to love or notice the richness there.  They found those places boring.

But here in Haiti, in the countryside near Cap Haitian, with all the pain and hardship in lives around us, I have watched them re-awaken boyhood and discover joy in creation.  I have seen them begin to delight in the part of God who creates with such care and detail as to dress a distant tree in nothing but orange flowers for a brief season, a God who delights in designing the dizzying array of grasses that fill the fields and ditches with variety and texture, the God who broods over the deep shades of purple that tint the mountains around us in the afternoon light, the God who chuckles along with the comical vocalizations of the giant black crows, and He who patiently formed the tiny, perfect, fingernails of a fragile baby.  I love that my kids are in a place that peaks their affection and curiosity for such things, so when the boys asked if they could take me for a walk to "the most peaceful place ever" I said "yes!".

For the first part of the walk they held my hands like younger versions of themselves and were chatted excitedly while showing me the way.

We walked out the front gate and then to the left, behind the Manna compound, always with our eye on the tall orange tree...

... until we found ourselves standing right under it.

  The boys collected the blossoms that rained down from the tree and carpeted the ground, holding them to their noses, expressing appreciation for their beauty.

After a bit we continued on, past the bounds of the property, beyond the sugarcane, to a place where the plain opened.  There was a small farm plot to the right.  Tidy, hand-tooled, mounded rows were planted with sweet potato and squash vines, and a dry stream bed lay cracking on the left.  Lazy palms were scattered across the plain, standing tall among scrubby brush, and the gentle mountains rose hazily in the distance on all sides.





Noah put his palm to Elijah's chest stopping him mid-step.  "This is the place".

"Shhh.  Don't say anything, Mom."  Elijah demanded.  After some silence, he whispered, "it's so peaceful here."  And without a doubt it was.  So quiet, except for an occasional cow bawling somewhere far off, the sounds of birds in nearby trees, and the hushed voice of the breeze through sugarcane and coconut palm fronds.

Noah agreed saying, "we should come here every day to enjoy the peace.  Isn't it perfect?".

Not long ago this moment would have been impossible.  In my rushed world with schedules and appointments and practices and programs and meetings and... well, you know all too well what I mean.  No one in our family had time for a quieted soul or a place to soak in the loveliness God had created.  Our lives were filled with the white noise of media, busyness, consumerism-- you name it, and I was allowing it to numb and bore my children.

God invites us to come and rest in him but often we are anesthetized to the beauty he has created around us; beauty meant to restore and renew like Psalm 23 talks about, beauty meant to balm hurts and discontent, beauty not just meant for vacations, but for our lives.  Might David, the Psalmist have known something about coming near the Lord in such moments?

I am in a land deemed the poorest in the entire world where starvation and unemployment and worst of all, hopelessness are real.  Garbage often fills ditches and pollution chokes water and air in many places.  Yet even here, there is so much beauty to be found.

Is your life too full for solitude and beauty?  Is there too much static noise to stand in a still, silent place and enjoy all that God has created for his and our pleasure?

I invite you to consider what gets in the way of experiencing the creation God blessed us to care for -- it may be the same thing that gets in the way of deeper relationship with God period.

A Day Trip to Paradise

This might just be down right mean to be sharing a tale with my northern friends of a beach day in Paradise but there have to be a few perks with living and working in the poorest country on earth, don't you think?

So here's my spoiler alert: if it's just going to make you cranky to see tropical blue waters and happy sand-filled faces, then turn back now!  If not, share in our day of rest, away from the usual pressure of day to day, and catch just a glimpse of God's glory right here in Haiti - we did!  Oh.  And there's a picture of raw meat, too.  You've been warned.


Our trip to paradise begins with a less than glamourous ride in COTP's tap-tap.  It is the only working vehicle available and I am willing to travel by nearly any means necessary to get to the beach.  Kirk and two of the kids are up front, and the rest of us sit in the back, jostling, bumping, and creaking, through diesel smoke, and road dust.  The ride is rough, but with the open back of the tap-tap, I am able to get some great pics of the trip.

Not long into our trip, a woman walking down the road with a large load on her head motions for a ride.  Kirk stops, I help her take her load down, and she climbs in.  She asks if we can give her some money.  I say "no" but we that we can give her a ride and conversation.  She thanks us for the ride and wishes us a good day.

As we get into Cap Haitian traffic begins to thicken.  Often I am grateful our vehicle is not as heavily loaded as other vehicles are!  The one above was full of people in addition to bags of rice and goods.  A few observant folks might also note the sign for the local Haitian beer above the tap-tap.

A filthy tidal river runs through Cap Haitian.  In this picture you can see the houses built right on the riverfront.  The ocean is just beyond the bend in the river.

On the bridge heading into Cap Haitian, someone has temporarily abandoned their freshly cut beef.  It will continue it's journey for about another mile before it makes it to the open air market... hopefully sooner rather than later!

A view through the front window of the tap-tap of bustling Cap Haitian.  Saturday morning doesn't look too much different than any time - busy, chaotic, and always interesting!  I "let" Kirk drive.

Once through Cap the traffic starts to thin a bit, and we start the climb up and over the mountain.  The first part is quite smooth as there are improved roads thanks to the recent Carnival (Marti Gras) celebration in Cap a couple of weeks ago.  The later part is nothing short of painful.  Kirk said later there were parts of the road he wasn't sure the tap-tap would make.  He could have told me this when we got home instead of at the beach, but obviously we did make it!




























Labadee is the spot where the cruise ships come into port and enjoy the beauty of the island.  It is an exclusive fenced off area with zip lines, piles of water crafts, beaches and more!  But just to the side of it runs a little road down to the ocean where small, roofed boats await local traffic.  Kirk negotiats very briefly with "Titoto" and then for $50 round trip we pile into the little boat for a small open ocean excursion of our own!  We are paying too much but it is worth it not to have to haggle.

Rose isn't wild about the trip and seems to think that she can't sit independently with a life jacket on, but everyone else loves the ride.  The ocean sparkles with all the aquamarine favorites of blue and green while the sun glistens on the gentle waves and swells.  It starts to feel a bit more like an actual trip to paradise.

We pass local fisherman and divers.  Many have homemade lobster traps with pop bottle floats.  This man spearfishes with googles and flippers.  Later I see him carrying a prepared conch to sell.

After sailing around a couple of points the boat heads into a quiet bay.  There is a yacht parked in the shallows aways from shore, along with a few other boats like ours who have carried other "getaway" folks, but the beach is still quite remotely populated.

The bay has a gentle sloping sandy beach with areas of coral farther out.  An enthusiastic freshwater spring runs close to the shore creating a fast, cold river that leads into the ocean.  Crabs dart between the river and ocean water and small schools of fish swim skittishly in the shallows of the beach.

It is paradise!

The girls take a snack break on the beach.

My view from the beach.  The "kids" have a fun time diverting the stream and creating new canals to the bay.

Our peaceful bay for the day.

By 3:00 PM the sun is already beginning to sink behind the steep mountain range, and shadows are falling on the bay.  The mosquitoes show up for their evening rampage and it is time to go.  We all agree this is a spot we certainly wish to return to soon!

Yes friends, it has been a beautiful day in paradise!