rest stop

People stop and ask me questions when we stop for bathroom breaks as we travel all the time. Most of the time it catches me off guard - how do you know I'm traveling with 22 African children? Oh yes, I remember- I am clearly labeled with a massive ACC logo covering my chest and, the logo on my jacket (yes a jacket- it is getting cooler...but I also fear that no Canadian winters and a winter in Texas has left me a wimp!) Anyways, today as Ang and I brought up the must try Wisconsin cheese curds to the cashier the lady at the till asks:
"Where are you performing?"
us: " Well, we just did a performance in Fish Creek, and now we're headed to Washburn to do a concert Sunday evening."
"So where are you from then- Fish Creek or Wisconsin?"
to this we smiled "Neither- the children are from Uganda" (to which she stared at as blankly- so we clarify "Uganda, Africa. They travel as part of this choir to get the financial support they need to get an education back home"
At this point she gets very excited "Africa!" and turns to the cashier beside her "Did you get that? They're from Africa!" To which the lady just nods politely.
"But don't they miss their families?" she asks. We explained that most of them are partially orphaned or come from very vulnerable situations. "What? That happens? Oh my goodness, that is so sad, that is just so sad isn't it?"
As we're collecting our cheese to go, Angela adds "It is but these kids have the greatest joy, love, and happiness for a hope in the future."
At that point all the lady said was "Oh wow."
She was completely taken back by it all- the fact that the children are from Africa, that they live in poverty and come from needy situations, but that they are joyous. That amidst their sufferings there is a hope for poverty that is hard to imagine and shockingly sad.

As we walked out of the store my first thoughts were that the cashier was quite naive. But immediately following was my second thought- that how great that couple minute by chance counter was with her. That lady was both so genuinely concerned and excited by what little information she'd discovered through our conversation together. It just got me thinking how much more I want to influence people here in North America to broaden their perspectives and get them involved, connected, educated, hurting, and caring for those in poverty in this world. This one cashier made me imagine just how many more people there are out there- ignorant to the realities of how most of our world lives. It made me imagine just where we could be with more people aware and ready to help bridge the gap between rich and poor- ust imagine, with people on board- excited, educated, ready to give, where we would be?

I was just thinking about it after I hit the "publish post" button on my last entry....simplest things really are the greatest source of joy after all. I just managed to write a couple paragraphs worth of stories from tonight- to anyone else a simple swim for a couple hours and drink before bed. Wonderful isn't it how it can be so much more?

wet and worth it

I had to double check my schedule to tell you where I'm writing from tonight- we've come a long ways this week, and so many travel days later in a hotel room in Hurley Wisconsin it feels nice to curl up and relax in the easy silence of a room alone tonight.

Today was a great day. I gradually watched the scenery around me turn into what reminded me of a more Canadian landscape as we drove on the U.S side of Lake Michigan. Even the small fishing village of Fish Creek Wisconsin reminded me of the Port Stanley- a fishing port and beach that our family has celebrated every Canada Day at together. I love the long bus rides. I love having the day ahead of me to leisurely spend it between reading a stack of books for the kids around me, reading myself, listening to music, and then allowing it to let me drift in and out of resting. After setting out today just after breakfast we got to the hotel around 4:00. At first I wasn't going to, but I decided to get in the pool and swim with all the kids at the hotel. I had so much fun! It was one of those moments of just genuinely enjoying the children and making the most of months left with them. As I get tired more often I have to remind myself to really take these times and cherish them. I ended up having a blast piggy back swimming the boys through the deep end, playing tag with Lino, and what initially began as helping Lydia learn how to kick properly turned into almost all the children at the side of the pool playing red lights green light with me...took me right back to my swim teaching days! Funny story:
I spent some time with Geoffry helping him learn how to float- coaching him along to keep his head up and tummy up. At this point Nelson walks over, announcing that he is my personal assistant in teaching, and upon seeing Geoffry's large stomach ballooning out of the water says to his stomach "Wow there- down boy! Sit!"

After swimming, I asked the girls if they wanted to make some chai tea together for bed- which was met by Gladys screaming and jumping around the room, and Peace running at me- flinging herself on me like a monkey saying "Auntie- you're the best!" And so we went to the lobby and made chai- or should I say had sugar with a bit of chai? Then me and the 5 girls piled onto my bed- drinking tea, listening to devotional songs, singing together, and then praying for the person that was beside us. I tucked them in a couple hours ago and couldn't be feeling happier.

Tomorrow we are headed to Washburn to perform in an outdoor theater part of a summer music series- check it out! http://www.bigtop.org

Be still?

Think back for a minute...when was the last time that you were completely still, felt wholly at peace? There was a song I used to sing in Sunday school called "Be still and know that I am God"...infact that one line was the song- slowly we would sit and sing that line again and again until our teacher believed that we'd found a point of focus and a sense of calmness and swept over the classroom. It is so hard for me to quiet my heart. It is so hard to try and live, even just a day, without it shaped by a schedule or commitments, outings, or dependent on things to do.

As a child my most relaxing memories are those that I can fondly look back upon at our cottage by the Lower Beverly Lakes- separated from the ringing of the phone, the computers, t.v, and days cluttered with activities and school that always kept us too busy. The cottage was such a serene haven of escape from all of it.

Yesterday, my day off with Angela took me back to those last 2 weeks of the summer- where everything was so peaceful, the days were free, and all my family had around us was the lake and each other. I couldn't think of a more perfect day off. We've shared so many days off together, and with other friends from the team and were recounting some of our favourites the other day...exploring the French Quarter of New Orleans, 6th Street in Austin, listening to live music, great restaurants, but more often now as I am beginning to feel more tired I find myself needing these kinds of peaceful days to really relax. Ang and I swam across the lake that a host home overlooked near Indianapolis- it reminded me of swimming black Jack Lake at the cottage. As we swam across we stopped halfway to just lie on our backs and let the warmth of the mid day sun wash over us. With my ears covered by the water I could hear nothing, and only see a seemingly endless vast expanse of blue sky overhead. For just a couple minutes the worries, stresses, tension, and exhaustion seemed to float away from me...It is easy to become discouraged sometimes, know how to show love to people, push aside your selfish thoughts, be genuine, be a true servant, or even in everyday details loose sight of the big picture of why I am here. I always find myself wishing that I could capture a feeling better through my words but I can't. Maybe that is why I have never much enjoyed journaling. I always feel like what I write has to be perfect and articulate...but the truth is I don't think you can capture that kind of peace in words.

Marci (our choir manager) was down visiting us for this past week- she is a good source of encouragement and I hope that her visit can help to bind us together more as a team. She lead out staff devotions for us on the weekend and spoke of having a heart of worship. She asked us where we felt most worshipful in our actions, and at the time I couldn't exactly answer. I love worshiping through music, but often I get distracted. I believe that yesterday though was my answer to her question- in absolute quietness and stillness. Where I can be floating right in the middle of everything around me and have no question that this is our God.

Stories

The more we travel the more I believe that the story of one life is really made up many other people's stories and how they intertwine, come together, and cross paths with the own roads we're on. Lately I have stayed with so many wonderful hosts with such unique stories to share. Last week I stayed up late every evening visiting with my hosts- a couple whose husband was from Whales, and his wife from Indiana. On the second night they wanted to take a picture of us to put on their "International wall"- a wall in their home in which to hang memories of many visitors from all around the world. They welcomed in a young man from Brazil to be part of their family and home for a year when he needed a place to stay after being stranded in an airport and brought home by their son with no advance notice! At one point they were telling me that there was one Christmas day in which Eileen, the wife was the only American around the table full of company! Luckily, with a British background, we made pot after pot of tea together as I listened to their stories. They told me that if they couldn't travel to every country- live in every culture- then the best way to come to learn and know a different culture was to make your home open to people from different places. I thought that was a neat way of looking at it. We'll never get to see the world- let alone all the places we'd like to in this lifetime- but what a wonderful way of learning about them...really, I guess that's what our hosts do upon meeting us right? I should also add that my host proposed to his wife within 24 hours of meeting her and they have been happily married and totally in love for almost 30 years now since then. Isn't that incredible? A love so instant but yet so strong?

I also stayed with a family when I came back from vacation who were wonderful to get to know. Sometimes it surprises me just how much people open up and share with you when just a few hours ago you were complete strangers. I'm glad they do though and I believe it's teaching me and encouraging me to be more open as well. The husband as he drove me home started talking about how the children had changed him and moved him- and how when he looked at me doing what I'm doing at my age he started to look back to the place he was at in his twenties. He started to share about how many years he'd wasted away back then, and how selfish he'd been, and how it was too late to change that. Yes, it is too late to change the past. I was reading a book the other day that said if we continually let our minds wander back to the negatives of the past then we will always be living in a negative place, reliving those emotions and never coming out of them to face today. I told him that yes the past is gone- the chance at changing it gone. But the future? The today? It's not too late for that. He went on to say that he hoped he wouldn't loose the change in him brought about by the children once we'd moved on. And then he couldn't talk anymore- getting frustrated with himself for being so emotional and choked up infront of me he turned away and drove until he broke the silence by saying "Laura you're a cool girl. That's I can say."

I hope if you're reading this, and you know who you are, I've thought a lot about that stay- and you're pretty cool yourself."

"Never let the story die" were the words of the missions pastor from my home church when I met up with him for coffee on my vacation. May that be true for all of us.

The pics I promised!!

back!!

It doesn't seem to matter how tiring or discouraging of a day it can be- somehow these children- "the laugh of a child" as Goethe once said "can make it holier still". I write tonight- for the first time in awhile since being home on a vacation and I am tired from a long day and a concert this evening. After crossing from Kentucky to Indiana I now sit under a net of butterflies in the bedroom of a little girl who has given me her room for our night in Indianapolis. The night air is warm on my back, and I can hear fireworks outside my window for the second night in a row. (Downstairs there even waits a fourth of july coffee cake for breakfast!)

It is late but I can't seem to still my mind enough to sleep although my eyes are telling me that I should go to bed. I do want to share with you though since I've been back. It always seems that there is so much that happens in just one day spent here traveling this life on the road. It hardly seems like just 2 weeks ago that I stepped off a plane in Lexington Kentucky. Seeing the children again and my dear friends from this team was probably one of the warmest feelings one can ever experience. I had missed them so much when I was home- my mind just did not want to take a vacation from wondering about how they were doing- how their exams went, their concerts, their hosts, the news things they'd done...how they were doing.... I flew into Lexington just in time to sneak into one of the closets in a classroom the children had for the day. Steve was lining up the kids at the end of the day and told them since they had behaved so well that they deserved a surprise- and that the surprise was in the closet. He then opened the closet door to where I stepped out. That is the only instance where I can say that being nearly knocked over by the screams and hugs of 22 children is one of the greatest feelings you could ever experience. For the past week I have still been catching up with them- hearing their stories and reassuring them that I drank enough chai tea on my vacation for all of us!

I never took the time I had at home with my family and friends for granted, and I certainly am trying to live in the moments I have left to be with these children now and this team in person since being back.

The children have been counting down days until a surprise- and yesterday we took them to 6 flags in the Kentucky Kingdom! I heard many guesses of what the surprise could be- everything from swimming and the zoo to flying a giant goose together! None of them could have ever imagined to guess this though! I had a great time- Angela and I put our two groups of girls together and tried every roller coaster and ferris wheel we could manage to ride in a day! Oh I wish you could've sat beside these girls- eventually I was laughing so hard at their screams and "Auntie Auntie Auntie! God will help us! Oh my my my ca ca ca ca ca help me!" that my stomach hurt and tears streamed down my face. I was laughing so hard that it didn't even matter that a rollercoaster was making me go upside down, get whiplashed, or feel like I would fall off its tracks- the reaction from the girls was just too hysterical. I don't know who was louder- Peace and Scovia's screaming or my laughing- although Rachel can tell you she could hear Peace screaming from outside the entrance of the ride!

I will try and most pictures later- and I'll end with a couple quotes that I want to remember from the day:

Mo: "I can't wait, I can't wait I can't wait for the surprise today!"
Lillian: "yes you can"
Mo "No, I can't wait!"
Lillian: "Yes, you can wait"
Mo "No I can't wait! I am too excited!"
Lillian: "Please Mo- the bible tells us to be patient."

Immaculate: "I thought that ride was going to take me to heaven!"

Peace: "MAMMA!! MAMMAAAAA!!! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!"