**NOTE that Scott put photos on Flicker--click on the sidebar to see the changing landscape of the road work in Uganda, as well as some reunions with familiar faces**
We're back in Kenya after a full and strenuous and wonderful week in Uganda. The first thing I noticed, in the taxi from the airport, was the sky. The sky in Kenya is endless, distant, blue, clear. Perhaps because the landscape has less to distract one. After the jungle green profusion of Uganda, Kenya seems muted. But the sky is amazing. And it's good to be home. Or sort of home.
Because this life is continuously a journey of the paradox of belonging and alienation. We embrace Kijabe and are embraced by this life, these students, this hospital, this work, these friends. But I also feel the rub of being outsiders in a way that I didn't in Uganda. Not easy to explain or put one's finger on. A matter of time (we've invested less than 3 years here now, out of 20 in Africa), or of sheer complexity (so many more families here, more activity, that one is inevitably out of sync). Of an ordinal matter, does it become progressively more difficult to bond with each new home? Or is it just the melancholy of graduation hitting, the fact that alumnae are back and seniors are leaving and life just feels transient in this season? Only one more year until our next child leaves us, and my heart crumples a little more.
We pulled in Thursday evening and went to work. A week away felt like a month. A missionary friend had moved in to be near the hospital while recovering from severe Dengue Fever. Luke's friends pop in and out, alumnae here for visits, sometimes there are a dozen kids around the table or draped over couches making popcorn and watching sports. The weekend has been filled with non-stop events, Rugby finals and alumae friendlies, Junior Store food and art shows, concerts and church services. The entire MUN group is about to come over for pizza. Goodbyes loom.
So we turn from the malarious majesty of Uganda, from the teens we have nurtured as best we could for two decades, from the school we helped found, from the hospital and nutrition programs we helped build . . to the dry highlands of Kenya to more teens and a long-established school and hospital where we know God has called us for this season. And we keep trying to hold both places together in our hearts.
We're back in Kenya after a full and strenuous and wonderful week in Uganda. The first thing I noticed, in the taxi from the airport, was the sky. The sky in Kenya is endless, distant, blue, clear. Perhaps because the landscape has less to distract one. After the jungle green profusion of Uganda, Kenya seems muted. But the sky is amazing. And it's good to be home. Or sort of home.
Because this life is continuously a journey of the paradox of belonging and alienation. We embrace Kijabe and are embraced by this life, these students, this hospital, this work, these friends. But I also feel the rub of being outsiders in a way that I didn't in Uganda. Not easy to explain or put one's finger on. A matter of time (we've invested less than 3 years here now, out of 20 in Africa), or of sheer complexity (so many more families here, more activity, that one is inevitably out of sync). Of an ordinal matter, does it become progressively more difficult to bond with each new home? Or is it just the melancholy of graduation hitting, the fact that alumnae are back and seniors are leaving and life just feels transient in this season? Only one more year until our next child leaves us, and my heart crumples a little more.
We pulled in Thursday evening and went to work. A week away felt like a month. A missionary friend had moved in to be near the hospital while recovering from severe Dengue Fever. Luke's friends pop in and out, alumnae here for visits, sometimes there are a dozen kids around the table or draped over couches making popcorn and watching sports. The weekend has been filled with non-stop events, Rugby finals and alumae friendlies, Junior Store food and art shows, concerts and church services. The entire MUN group is about to come over for pizza. Goodbyes loom.
So we turn from the malarious majesty of Uganda, from the teens we have nurtured as best we could for two decades, from the school we helped found, from the hospital and nutrition programs we helped build . . to the dry highlands of Kenya to more teens and a long-established school and hospital where we know God has called us for this season. And we keep trying to hold both places together in our hearts.
1 comment:
Thank you for this beautiful, raw picture of the transience that surrounds your African life. It makes me so thankful to be able to read these intimate blog-thoughts and not just the polished, calculated, summary of the quarterly events and highlights. These are the things we need as supporters and senders, to be able to hear your heart and the way it is being pulled in countless messy directions. Know that you are being prayed for regarding all these things today.
--from Hannah Willis, friend and supporter of the Faders and the McCropder team, African missionary wannabe
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