It is that time again. When nostalgia creeps up on us and I, for one, stand with mouth open and looking out many windows, trying to find where my year went. I’ve just gotten used to writing 2012, now I will have to change again? What are the lessons I have learned this year?
January:
- You can’t really leave until you have someone to say goodbye to. If nothing holds you, you are only going, not leaving. But I am overly blessed: I find myself continually coming home, always a goodbye and a hello.
- Rio: Sitting in a shop corner next to the Sugar Loaf mountains. Acai na Tigela is heaven in a bowl. The heat gathers that little pool of sweat in the small of my back. My feet ache in sandals. They’ve grown wimpy from constant socks and shoes in winter weather. I want to paint a picture of the little boy flying his kite from the roof of his favela. There is no sauce on my pizza. That is why Brazilians use ketchup. I am Brazilian today. What did I do to get life this good, and how can I make it last forever? The woman from Rio told me to pray “God give me patience because if you give me strength I will kill them.” Perfect motto for people who work with children.
February:
- I am a vegetarian without any morals–you can kill all the cute little animals. And I have eaten many of those little ants that fall into your food on accident. I know they are there.
- Valentine’s day: Mariana: do you have a boyfriend? Me: no. Mariana: oh! Is that why you are so rich?
- “The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost.” –G.K. Chesterton
March:
- Carnival: One spoon in the whole kitchen. We get up to cook breakfast for 80 people with one spoon and one working oven burner. We manage. Because this is Brazil. And somehow, the things that need to get done get done. With just one spoon. I am getting the “camp-y” feeling. A soft heart that wants God like the first time I got excited about it and knew it was the only way for me. No, I hadn’t tried other religions, but I knew it, like you know you love him, even though there are so many guys you have never met.
- Motorcycles: I love the sound of wind brushing past my ears with no apologies. Flying through nature: the green that only tropics have, the blue that belongs to Brazil. The 4:30pm sun that doesn’t burn, leaves a haze over the sugarcane fields. The stones make my teeth chatter, the view makes my heart hurt. “I’m the lucky one” I whisper to myself, and hope the feeling will never grow old. I look down at my foot with the black line of dirt where my sandal was, my nose burnt even with SPF 30, and I wish I could put it on paper–the way it really is—instead of random lines of words that I try to tie together into a sentence.
- Kony rant: Anytime you give to something that you are not currently at (in location and in heart), you will be, for the most part, “blundering blindly forward.” Giving to missions in general is a great step of faith–because no matter how many reports they give you–you still have to trust, and there is so much you don’t know and don’t understand. And yes, mistakes will happen even with the best intentions: think about trying to help your own family and how that gets tangled. But that doesn’t mean you stop–which is the only other option given in these criticisms. Don’t tell me what is wrong until you give me an option to make it right.
April:
- My problem: Once you know one child, and learn to love them, you begin to find them everywhere. The boy on the kombe, working a man’s job. He should be in school. 12, 13 years old. He looks like one of mine. He could be one of mine. Is he one of mine? Why do I feel responsible? It is such a heavy thing to be responsible. Isn’t it supposed to be fun? Oh it is, with Milena playing her fingers across my arm, wiggling every direction but up, asking me to hold her tighter.
- “The secret to Christianity is the life of Christ in you. Allowing his life to become your life. His revolution is not self-transformation, but his transformation of us, from the inside out, as we receive his life and allow him to live through us. Vine, branch. Anything else is madness. If you are not drawing your life from Jesus, it means you are trying to draw it from some other source. I’ll guarantee you that it’s not working. I have spent most of my adult years trying to find those keys that would enable people to become whole. The epiphany I have come to is this: Jesus had no intention of letting you become whole apart from his moment-to-moment presence and life within you.”—John Eldredge “Beautiful Outlaw”
- Easter: painted rocks for eggs, celebrated Passover, learned how to have Sabbath and sacred: “If one allows, Sacred will choreograph and lead a life into the arms of exquisite beauty, extraordinary joy, and blissful closeness with Jesus Christ. Sacred asks for our entire life. She asks us to trust that in God’s perfect timing she will remove the sweet smelling product of her labors from out of the heavenly oven, hand us a fork, and say, “Enjoy!” “ –Eric Ludy, “Meet Mr. Smith”
May:
- Can I look you in the face and say “I need you to be a better person in this situation?” I can hear all day that God has only the best for me, but when it comes down to it, I still don’t feel like I can ask for it. Because asking is putting my desire out there, vulnerable. And when you ask, you give the other person the power to respond. To deny or ignore. To look at you and say your fear: “No, you don’t deserve that—you are not enough.” And I know what that looks like: it looks very lonely.
- Six word memoires: Jesus loves me: I love Jesus. Cut my hair: It grew back. Said goodbye to say hello again. Divided in half to become more.
- Mothers day: “Believing in the miracle of metamorphosis is the sum total of a mother’s job. The theological term for that is faith. To have faith that the baby in arms will become the toddler toilet trained before 18, and that kid who can never find his shoes or matching socks or math homework will be able to find a girlfriend, job and Jesus. It’s always the mothers, preachers and prophets who doggedly believed that leopards can lose spots and grace and angels can make pigs fly. Mothers were made to have faith. I don’t want to imagine if you hadn’t. Mothers give up much and never give up.” –Ann Voskamp
- Dorothy Day: “I wanted, though I did not know it then, a synthesis. I wanted life and I wanted the abundant life, I wanted it for others too. I did not want just the few, the missionary-minded people like the Salvation Army, to be kind to the poor, as the poor. I wanted everyone to be kind. I wanted every home to be open to the lame, the halt, and the blind.”
- Airports: I have discovered another world between the worlds, and it is a cold place with gleaming floors and doors. Each door leads to a new place. Everything looks sanitized, even the people, staring up at informational screens with their mouths half-open.
June:
- Life divides: Brazil, Indiana, rich, poor…irreconcilable circles moving in opposite directions. I pull together, bringing in all the disagreements and making them mine–making them me. I shouldn’t expect this to be easy. It is good to be home.
July:
- Supercamp: I like the word YES. It oozes positivity. But I often forget that for every YES it means a NO for so many other things. Someone said “You can do anything you want to in life, but you can’t do everything you want to do.” You make choices and stick by them. Yes to Supercamp meant no to other things…like extra sleep. Like me time. It is a beautiful sacrifice, but it takes all of you.
August:
- I’ve learned enough to know I don’t need answers, I just need peace. Funny girl, you are almost 30. But your soul will never believe that.
September:
- We walk down the road to Paulo’s house. A trail of children follow, wherever I go there is a processional. With one kid on either side, and Flavio telling me we are late. I run into people everywhere. I’ve infiltrated this whole community, I realize. For better or worse—you are responsible for what you have tamed.
- Joelson on marriage: “Rachel, it is one thing to live life having your own goals and reaching them. But when you open your life to someone else, have a goal with them, and then manage to reach it and see how it affects not only you, but also them…well, that is joy exponential. And that is marriage.”
- Rice and Beans Experiment: One month of rice and beans (September 13-October 12, 2012). First week: Just rice and beans. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Like 1.4 billion people who live off of $1.25 or less a day. Three weeks: Rice and beans as the staple, but can add other things. Like the 3.5 billion people who live off of $2.50 or less a day.
- “See that I am God. See that I am in everything. See that I do everything. See that I have never stopped ordering my works, nor ever shall, eternally. See that I lead everything on to the conclusion I ordained for it before time began, by the same power, wisdom, and love with which I made it. How can anything be amiss?”—God to Julian of Norwich
October:
- My difficulty with the rice and beans experiment is not the lack of variety, or even getting tired of it: what makes it hard is time and motivation. When I put limits on myself (only food with rice and beans), it is harder to put together a tasty meal. Can it be done? Yes. Will I do it? About 40% of the time. Time + Resources + Motivation + Creativity = Tasty Meal. How often do those four things line up for someone in poverty?
- I danced with a girl wearing a torn, thrown-in-the-trash princess dress with a gaping hole in the side. But she was the princess and I sang and twirled her non-the-less. They giggled, because I sang all the Disney songs in English. But they knew the movies, so it didn’t matter. I picked up a little girl to make sure she was out of the way of the passing car, and she winced. She lifted up her dirty shirt to show me a belly full of infected bug bites. Everywhere I touched her hurt.
- Poverty does not look like rice and beans: it looks like rice and/or maize. Beans (the nutritious part of rice and beans) are too expensive for the world’s poor.
- “In the past thirty years, extreme poverty has been cut in half. In 1981, 52% of the world’s population lived in extreme poverty (defined by the U.N. as living on less than $1.25 per day). But by 2006, that number was 26%.” http://www.live58.org/about/what-is-58
- “Sometimes you have to watch someone love something before you can love it yourself. It is as if they are showing you the way.” –Blue Like Jazz (Movie) Perhaps…that is one of the most powerful things I can do in Brazil. Love these kids to show others how they are lovely.
- Doing this experiment was just a little layer of experiencing and understanding poverty. It is easier not knowing. It is much easier to just go into a community, “put a band-aid” on it, and then go away with the afterglow of doing good, rather than actually be in relationship with them. Relationship changes everything. Everything that used to be black and white turns grey and things get a lot more confusing. It was never about rice and beans: it was about sacrifice, limitations, small frustrations, and the patience and creativity to overcome.
November:
- I have been in Brazil for four and a half years, beginning in 2004, but I am still only doing “band-aid” help in so many areas. It is hard to take the steps to invest your life. It is also hard to know what that looks like: there is no manual—it is simply living life with God.
- I am a seller of dreams. Of ideas, of myself. Being a missionary—or in ministry—you are presenting yourself to people. Your sacred dreams of changing the world. And saying “Please—please trust me—believe in me—and support me financially.” The truth is, I’ve been working with children in poverty for 15 years and still don’t understand it. As I sat and watched the kids at the dump, I asked myself: what they do when they poop. Leaves, I guess? Are their certain kinds of leaves to use? What about for babies? What do girls do when they are on their period? Do they really never floss? And so on. I want more than just “band-aids.” I am learning. And it is an incredible responsibility to KNOW.
- It takes extra grace to go back and forth between the world of HAVE and HAVE NOT. Staying at one or the other requires less of me. All the moving around just makes me feel like I am trying to please everyone and failing miserably.
- I feel like I am losing grace and getting mad more easily at overly expensive cars, as I wait for the bus on the side of the road. Extremes are so blatant in Brazil. And to see them zooming by in what they don’t need, purposefully not caring about those around them…I cannot excuse them. There is no excuse.
- I feel the bitterness growing inside of me…cars too fancy for their own good. People too rich for their own good. The “It’s not fair” echoes in my head. And I have a car; I have chosen this life. Imagine someone who didn’t. Seeing the “Haves” all day. Pass by without even knowing. I think it is the not knowing that irritates the most. How can they continue to be so ignorant to the needs around them?
- Where is grace? Where have I let it go? And this is being a responsible adult: having 50 things on your plate to do and learning to do every single one of them with grace.
- Bottom line: the hard part about being poor is, everything takes extra grace. But the amazing thing about it is that the grace you need is always there—the exact amount you need. I guess that is what makes us all equal in all of the inequalities: the grace we need is always there.
- Behind every locked door is some kind of broken trust, and every time I turn to lock it, I am reminded of that. And honestly, I’d rather lose another cell phone than have to remember that. Trust is such a beautiful thing. Why then, when you are stolen from, does it make trust look so naïve and stupid?
December:
- After living in community with the people I am serving, I realize I need to reevaluate my definition of success. In ten years, when I see these children, what do I want to see? That they know and love God. That they can read and write, and do basic math and are able to provide for their family. That they know how to be faithful and love as a spouse and a parent. I have to let the rest go.
- In her book “One Thousand Gifts,” Ann Voskamp writes three things she is grateful for every day, discovered many things along the way, including two simple sentences that marked me profoundly: “Thanksgiving creates abundance” and “Thanks is what builds trust.” Could it be that the abundance the children I work with need—that I need—in all areas is found through thanksgiving? Through being and teaching gratitude? Thanking God for everything, even the pain, the lack, the ugly, is what builds trust. In all of my relationships, they can only be transformed to beauty through gratitude. And it starts with simple “Thank yous” in the little things you begin to see when you practice.
- “To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never, to forget.” –Arundhati Roy
Why yes, that is a huge homemade twister board:).
