Trip Updates

We're in Kenya. Early morning, cool air from the open windows, rooster crowing. Our days have been very full and I haven't had much time to write about them, but I did write a few updates on Facebook, which I will add below. Meanwhile, Emily has done much better and you might enjoy her posts here and here and here.

Update 1.

So everything went fine getting to the airport.

And then we went through security, and at the same time Jenny was pulled aside for extra screening because of her splint and Steven was in very hot water with the bearded guy because he had for some oblivious reason packed big bottles of shampoo and other vanity items in his backpack.

Mercy me, I thought we had covered all this in detail the last two weeks.

So the precious ointments were sent to the trash.

And Jenny's hands tested positive for explosives.

So she and I were taken to a private screening room and gone over in great detail, us and all our belongings, and after that Paul was likewise inspected.

Thankfully they were nice about it and let me stay right with Jenny and weren't as intrusive as they could have been.

But Jenny was still terrified.

Now we are all waiting quietly for our plane to arrive.

They told Jenny it was probably some kind of soap on her hands that set off the alarms.

She is threatening to not wash her hands with soap until we are through security in Amsterdam, some 17 hours from now.

I got the distinct feeling the TSA ladies felt like they were caught helplessly in some bizarre scheme, having to pat down a skinny 11-year-old in the name of protecting the airlines.

Update 2

At last, at last, we are safely in Kenya, where the very air is heavy and slow, and the people friendly and the ladies sit in their booths and sell fresh fruit and the windows have screens but not glass and everyone roars along on the wrong side of the road.

Some things have changed so much. When we were here 7 years ago there were very few motorcycles because someone who didn't want the competition had arranged for a hefty duty on imported cycles. Now they're all over, and also lots of three wheeled things called tuk tuks, sort of golf cart size. And there are far fewer matatus.

We are staying in the guest house at the Mennonite compound and are blown away by the hospitality. I had all kinds of plans for making or buying our own meals, but suddenly we have invitations coming at us on every hand from people we don't even know.

It is wonderful.

And they brought sloppy joes for our lunch, and the fans are blowing, and the air is heavy and tropical and just right for a nap. Seeing as how we had a long, long journey to get here, and very little sleep.

Update 3

Yesterday was wonderful. Except for the beginning and end.

For breakfast I chopped up some local peppers, onions and tomatoes and fried them with eggs, all food that had appeared at the front door from these phenomenal Mennonites in this compound.

Then we borrowed a van and went downtown, where Paul had arranged to meet Sammy, whom we knew back in the day and who still serves as a "dad" for the remaining orphan boys Steven's age and a liaison between the Into Africa Foundation in the US and about a dozen orphans here.

Sammy sent a text that he's at the old Nakumatt store, so we headed there and walked into the central hallway and wow, it all came back, the crowds, noise, smells, action, and even the same hideous huge plastic Santa Claus that grinned in that tropical heat at Christmas seven years ago.

But we couldn't find Sammy. And Paul couldn't get his new phone to work to text him back. Some tense moments were had when we were trying to persuade the Man of the House to actually go into the Safaricom store and ask for help but perhaps those moments are best ignored. Finally he went and bought some more minutes for his phone, but the Safaricom folks were less than helpful. So we went back to the Mennonite compound and got someone there to help, and Paul arranged for Sammy to meet us here where we're staying.

And then things went wonderfully all day, but I will go into that later, since I need to go back to sleep, but I will just tell you about the end of the day. We had taken our old friend Vincent and his lovely wife Phyllis out for dinner and were driving back after dark when Paul didn't see a speed bump and hit it going way too fast.

The van, being Kenyan, had only a few seat belts, none of which were in the front bench seat where Phyllis and I were, and we both went flying and hit our heads, me on the ceiling and her on the side window. Both of us were in terrible pain but the really horrible thing was that Phyllis is pregnant. The kids got various odd bumps but Phyllis and I got the worst of it by far. We finally got back here and I sat with ice on my head and neck, trying to figure out if my head was actually going to stay on or not. Finally it stopped hurting quite so badly and I decided it would stay on after all and went to bed and 7 hours later I still have a stiff neck but my head is much much better.

I want to call and see how Phyllis is doing in a couple of hours.

And I don't think I've ever seen Paul this repentant. In his own way he felt worse than I did.

New Column

Today's Letter from Harrisburg involves such disparate elements as my set of china, Randy and Shelley's baby, and Grandma organizing the Smucker circle letter.

Available here.

Strings

One of the perks of growing up conservative is that there is a fairly small pool of style you can choose from. (Yes, I said perk, I know a lot of my friends would disagree) Even with the small pool there is a style to be had. There is a cool way to dress even if you’re Amish. There is a cool way to do your hair.

So says Andrea on WritersBlock02.

She is one of those snarky clever young bloggers that I have to read with caution because they make me feel like I am old and deliberate, kind of like Walter Cronkite.

But yes, between Andrea's post and another incident, which I will get to later, I was reliving this odd memory of how in my youth there was a right way and a wrong way to tie your covering strings, proving, I think, that fashion is an inborn thing that you can't legislate away with a 20-page Odning.

By "covering" I mean the white cap that Amish and Mennonite women and girls wear. We started young, like at six weeks old, the first time we showed up at church. The conservative end of the Anabaptist spectrum requires strings on coverings. In the old days I'm sure their purpose was to tie under the chin and keep the cap from flying away with a stiff breeze. But later, when coverings were anchored on with pins, strings took on a life of their own, and became something that the church fathers required as a way to keep the covering large, since no one was going to have a tiny little cap on the back of the head and strings dangling from that.

And believe me there was a protocol with covering strings.

If you were sloppy like me you left them flapping in the wind during the week.

If you were really insecure you chewed on them during school.

If you were any sort of cool you tucked them down the neck of your dress. This was The Only Cool way to treat strings. And it had to be down the back of your dress, not the front, even if you went to public high school and mystified classmates asked if they were holding up your undergarments.

You had to tie your strings for church. I don't think even the coolest, most rebellious girls at our church flouted this one.

When you were little, your mom got you ready for church and tied your strings tightly under your chin, or more often and far worse, off to the side, under your left jaw. Terrible.

By the time you tied your own covering you would rather wear your grandma's old gray Amish dress with pins to church than have your covering tied tight under your chin. No, you tied a little bow down lower that landed about two inches below the clavicle. The bow had to be small and neat and even. It could not tilt to one side. And the trailing ribbons had to be even.

I could not manage such a bow. I just couldn't. It was always uneven and cockeyed and sloppy. Of course my big sister Rebecca always had chic little bows but I simply didn't have it in me, no matter how much time I spent at it, going cross-eyed during Dad's Sunday morning prayers during family worship in the living room.

And I have this awful memory of being ready for church and my big brother looked at me with disgust in his eyes and his voice and exclaimed, "You're going to church with your covering tied like THAT? It looks like a shoo-bandel gnipp!"

Well, a shoo-bandel gnipp is a shoestring knot or bow. Sigh. He was right, much as it hurt.

Finally I learned how to make a square knot, and I started tying my strings in a neat little square knot, and it worked just right for me, and was easy but looked neat and tidy, and I may even have started a bit of a trend, probably the only time in my life that I did.

So yes, "even with the small pool there was a style to be had."

The other incident.

Yesterday Jenny came home from school holding her right arm to her chest. She and a friend had been racing for the door of the play shed when break was over. Jenny's shoelaces were untied, and her friend happened to step on one stray lace, and Jenny went flying into the gravel.

I took her to the doctor today and yes, there's a small break in her right radius. The doctor had mercy on our upcoming travel plans and didn't put on a full cast, just a lower molded cast thing like a small canoe with a sharp upward bend at the elbow, then it's held on with Ace bandages and supported in a sling.

This could make traveling overseas really interesting but it could be far worse.

But the reason this incident velcroed in my mind with the covering strings of the past was that I couldn't help but think that if Jenny had had a proper shoo-bandel gnipp like I've told her a hundred times, she wouldn't be in such pain and such a pickle now.

Quote of the Day:

"YOU'RE NOT GOOD ENOUGH"

--A big sign that ought to be hung around the neck of a certain sweet young Oregon maiden who is off at EBI for six weeks, according to her protective family

A Conversation

So I posted on Facebook that I was packing for Kenya, first things first--TP, Kaopectate, and Pepto Bismol.

"No no, take activated charcoal," said two friends, Frieda and Jennifer, who ought to know, especially Jennifer.

So I stopped at Walgreen's today and looked for activated charcoal among all the other tummy remedies. I wasn't sure what I expected, maybe a rattly paper bag with black chunks in it, but all they had was a bottle of capsules, and the label said it's for gas and flatus.

Hmmm.

I went to talk to the pharmacist. He was a friendly young man.

"I'm traveling to Africa," I said, "and someone recommended activated charcoal in case we get sick from the food. Is this what I want?"

"No no," he said, "that will just bind the bacteria and keep them inside. You want to get rid of them. And really, if you get a foodborne illness, you'll want to see a doctor and get on antibiotics."

I thought but did not say, "Yes. See a doctor. In Kisumu, Kenya. On short notice. Indeed."

"But," I said, not really comfortable discussing such a delicate subject with a young man, "there are times you really need to, you know, deal with the symptoms."

"Yes," he said condescendingly, "but like I said, you'll need to see a doctor and take antibiotics."

"But," I persisted, "if you're, like, on the plane, you really need something immediately."

He repeated his spiel and I should have looked to see if someone was behind him pulling a string out of his back and then letting it go.

I looked at him. "Have you ever traveled overseas?" I said.

He smiled, a bit humbly but not as humbly as I thought he should. "No, I haven't," he said.

How did I guess? I turned and left, leaving the activated charcoal for another day and time when I've talked with someone who is experienced in its use.

Travel Plans

A few months ago we decided The Time Has Come to take Steven back to visit his birth country of Kenya, and to take the rest of the family back for a visit.

As you probably know, our family spent 3 1/2 months in Kenya in 2003-04 helping at a home for street kids. Paul helped get the school going, and we all got involved as we were able. Then we all fell in love with the youngest boy, Steven. Well, we fell in love with all of them in their own way, but Steven was special, and when it turned out that he was the only one of the 25 for whom no family could be located, at all, it seemed like a sign.

So we came back to the U.S. and between a social worker and lawyer over there and lots of paperwork here, we did an independent adoption. Paul was ready to go and get him and an hour before he was to leave, his dad died. Two weeks later he left, and jumped through all the hoops in three weeks without bribing anyone, which, we have been told, simply does not happen, [others have spent many months and dollars] and he and Steven came home on Christmas Eve.

Three years ago we were all set to go to Kenya for a visit, our family plus two high school seniors, and an hour before we were to leave, election-related violence broke out in Kisumu and we had to cancel our trip.

So with a track record like that we realize that "Many are the plans in a man's heart, but it is the Lord's purpose that prevails."

But yes, we plan to leave in mid-January--all of us except Matt who is just weeks away from graduating--and spend a week in Kenya and then go to Poland and have a few days with Paul's brother John and his family.

We hope to look up Steven's old friends and teachers, visit the Mennonite missionaries, spend the night in a game reserve with rhinos sniffing around our cabin, and find places from Steven's past, as far back as we can track them.

Your prayers would be appreciated--for safety, and good health, and family unity, and especially for Steven, as he revisits what could be some very painful memories.

I realize it's a bit risky to announce our travel plans to the world, so let me just say that we hope to have someone stay here while we're gone, and if you decide to break in anyway, you won't find much of value, this being a Mennonite house and all, so no jewelry or drugs, maybe a few dimes down the couch cushions, and if you want to steal the computer I should tell you ahead of time that it's old and the sound doesn't work and even with headphones you can't understand anything on YouTube.

Coming Home

Amy was at SMBI for twelve weeks, and then she came home, and I feel sorry for her. She hasn't complained a bit, I hasten to say, but I still feel sorry for her.

If you've ever experienced a Mennonite short-term Bible school, you know how it is. Intense, first and foremost, in friendships, classes, crushes, theology, discussions, just the whole spiritual atmosphere. Lots of people around, lots of personal reflection on who you are and who you're going to be, lots of growth.

And there's a consistent routine and cooks who make meals on schedule and deans who keep everything running smoothly and maintenance men who fix things. And people drop everything to pray with you and listen and have intense conversations. And give you backrubs.

And you spend 3/6/12 weeks getting to know a lot of totally new people as well as possible, which always makes you feel like you're on the edge of an amazing discovery. WHAT?? A Lancaster-PA guy who builds gazebos for a living can quote Winnie-the-Pooh as well as I can?? Awesome.

Or that's what it was like when I went to Bible school, and I gather the essentials haven't changed that much.

And then if you're like my gifted daughter, you spend a week on choir tour before you come home, and that ramps up the intensity even more, if that can be imagined.

And then you come home.

Home. Where all the guys are either brothers or dads instead of potential crush material, and they scatter the newspaper all over the living room, and hog the shower, and while your dad might enjoy an intense spiritual discussion if he hadn't been hauling cracked corn all afternoon and didn't have a sermon to study for, your brothers would rather talk about Get Fuzzy comics and the Ducks' spread offense. And your dad still hasn't fixed the porch swing that was broken when you left, and your brothers' bedroom is still just as messy.

Home. Where your mom is all frazzled because she seriously overcommitted herself all through the month of December, and when you get up late the next morning all happy with the rain on the roof and in the mood for a cup of coffee and a long spiritual discussion, your mom has already left for play practice at school and the dishes aren't done, and you know she's hoping you'll do them, and the kitchen is dark and has an odd smell, and you wish you could be in the kitchen at Bible school, where the lights are always on, and the cooks are always cheerful and glad to see you, and the coffee is always hot.

Home. Where sisters are young and annoying, and you have to live with them, like, forever, unlike the (few) people at Bible school who were also annoying. And they talk your ear off in the evenings about things like which insects are harmful and which are not, and about what they dreamed last night, and the night before, and they listen to your Bible school stories to a certain point, but they really don't Get It, because everything you say reminds them of more bugs or dreams or something equally mundane.

And it doesn't occur to anyone to offer you a backrub.

Home. Where both your parents mean well, and it's not that they're not saved or anything like that, but really have they had any spiritual growth in the last year? Have they read anything that stretched their minds? Have they really thought about what they're doing, and why, and about their impact on the world? And you know if you would broach the subject they would sigh and try to come up with answers to humor you, and then in the middle of the conversation your dad's phone would ring again and he would talk in his loud voice about Uncle James's ryegrass purities, and your mom would holler at your brothers to gather the upstairs laundry, and then she would shriek because she forgot to get the chicken out of the freezer for supper, and you would wonder why you even bother.

So that is why I feel sorry for Amy coming home from Bible school. She has been sweetness itself, let me hasten to say, and hasn't complained a bit about the level of chaos and clutter that greeted her, but I listen to her Bible school stories and look at her pictures on Facebook and see her smiling at texts from her friends in the East, and remember what it was like for me many years ago, and so I feel sorry for her and anyone else who has to finish at Bible school and then come home.

Quote of the Day:
"But it's no fun if everybody just agrees!"
--Stephie Smucker, at the Wilton Smucker clan dinner today, when we were talking about how the Smuckers love to argue for the sake of arguing

An Invitation, A Meeting, and A Clever Idea

So I wrote all that stuff about our Christmas play and didn't think to invite you. Yes, you're all welcome to come. Wednesday the 22nd. 7pm. Brownsville Mennonite. Take exit 216 off of I-5 and go east about 3 or 4 miles, and we're on the left right before you get into town.

And you know going into it that this is a kids' production with a frazzled director, so arrive with plenty of grace in your pocket. I should add that Arlen K. is taking care of the singing part for the older kids, and Stephie S. for the younger, and the music will be lovely.

And I should add that yesterday I was home all day except for going to a Christmas pageant in the evening, Fairview Mennonite's famous You Are There, and there is something healing about being home all day and getting the bed made and the laundry caught up and the vacuuming done and then going away with your husband in the evening.

Something cool happened at the pageant. I saw a young man walk in and something about the way he walked looked terribly familiar. He looked just like...yes! Marty from our wild Greyhound trip last summer!

If you've traveled much you know how it is when you're stranded overnight in Minneapolis or Spokane or wherever--you form these instant friendships with fellow travelers and talk for hours on end and feel like you've survived something together. And then you exchange email addresses when you finally go your separate ways, but you never see them or hear from them again.

That's how it was with the infamous "Carol" and a couple of older women we met, and with Marty. He was a clean and Christ-like young man about Matt's age who was a rock of safety and sanity to Jenny and me in some very unnerving circumstances. I hadn't expected to ever see him again, but there he was at the Fairview Christmas pageant, of all places. So that was a very unexpected blessing, and it turns out he knows my young friend Heidi Miller and her family, I'm guessing through cattle-dealing connections.

You'd think the Smuckers are competing to be the most clever, and I'll let you decide who won. I have this bad habit of buying and wrapping Christmas presents early and then forgetting what's inside. So this year I wrapped some and wrote the receiver and the contents on a sticky note in German or Pa. Dutch in the most obscure way possible. For example, something I got for Paul says, "Ebbis fa da Mann sei Schrift" and if you don't know Dutch, sorry, I'm not going to translate because he reads this.

I also have gifts for the youngest three that all say, "Schneider." There's a more common word I could have used but they're too familiar with it.

Well, they got their heads together and came up with what they thought was a very clever idea, and secretly got on Google Translator. But their big plans came to naught because apparently Google Translator doesn't work with Pennsylvania Dutch.

We will all just keep quiet about the fact that "Schneider" is way more High German than Pa. Dutch.

Quote of the Day:
"Amish nonfiction novels."
--a Google search that brought someone to my blog

An Edited Blog Post

A few days ago I sat down and wrote a blog post (finally!) that started like this:

I feel like I should write a nice cheerful blog post but I am not very
cheerful. Sorry. Lots of things are wrong in my life and somehow they
all coalesce in my mind into One Huge Major Thing and that is The
Christmas Play at school. I signed up for this at my husband's request
and he was so smooth and convincing and made it sound so eminently
workable but right afterwards everything else started disintegrating,
like the tree, and the dog, and then Emily who was in Virginia going to
college and struggling with depression had a scary breakdown and limped
through finals and flew home, and some other stuff as well like the ants
being so bad in our kitchen you'd think we lived in Kenya again and they
can survive 45 seconds in the microwave, I am serious, and I assure you
it was an accident but the timer dinged and I opened the door and there
they were, scampering around, and there is something about that that
makes you feel powerless.

So as you can see it started out on a pathetic note and went downhill from there, and Paul thought it was a blatant beg for sympathy, but still it maybe helps to explain why I've been a bit absent lately in all areas of life, and I'm not as averse to begging for sympathy as Paul is. I'll paste in a few more explanatory paragraphs that of course were exaggerated in the heat of the moment:

So I had to do stuff like drive the dying dog to the vet and hold him
while he was put down and an hour later show up at school with a smile
on my face and direct a bunch of boys who were never
intended by God to be in a drama of any sort, ever, world without end,
amen, and I went completely against God's will for their lives and stuck
them in difficult dramatic roles involving walking out of that door and
into this one without talking, stuff like that, and have been paying
dearly for my audacity ever since.

And I had to, a few times, sit in the car talking to Emily in Virginia,
my stomach an icy acidic pit, and try to convince both of us that she
was going to be ok, while calculating in my head how soon and quickly I
could fly to Virginia to be with her, and then collect my wits and go
inside with a smile and direct boys again, and help a bunch of
chattering girls figure out who should wear which shawl and carry which
basket, and act like it all mattered, and this wasn't so easy either.

Then there was the paragraph about trying to make my husband feel guilty for talking me into it, but we'll skip that.

And then the overly dramatic paragraph about the program next year:

But I am thinking desperate things like, If I even mention directing the
play next year, take me out and shoot me, but that is too violent, after
all, so you have my permission to dump ice water over my head instead,
or better yet take me out for coffee and plead earnestly with me while
the white-coated men slip in from behind and take me off to someplace quiet.

And some more depressing details:

The play, by the way, is Why the Chimes Rang, which I used to think was
a charming story but now I think it has too much dialogue
and everyone will wonder what the point is, plus the grandmas won't be
able to hear, and I am going to have to prompt TR the night of, I just
know it, and the choir mikes won't help with the sound, I just know that
too.

And more pathetic stuff about how this affects my life. I was really on a roll:

Meanwhile I have been leaving the bed unmade and the basket of laundry
sitting there for four days because I have been sewing a red cape for
the king and a hat for the baker. And making phone calls to track down
a crown, and hauling furniture to church for props. And working way too
hard to find benches for the church scene and finally settling on, for
one, the old coffee table that was stored in the shed and that dropped a
chicken feather on the new church-platform carpet.

And I will skip the paragraph about parents who had [justifiable] opinions about the play except to say:

I am thinking they should all
sign up to direct the play next year, that is surely God's will for
them, and His will for me is to stay home and wear a big apron and bake
Christmas cookies.

And things concluded on a higher note, including the QOTD:

So that is why I'm not very cheerful but the play is a week from tonight
and after that I will be in a much more cheerful frame of mind, I
promise, because no matter how badly it goes, it will be over.

Quote of the Day:
Me: How shall I celebrate when this (adjective) play is over? Maybe
I'll sit down and watch a movie. The whole way through. I haven't done
that in ages.
Emily: I know a good movie you could watch. It's a Christmas movie.
Me: Not The Christmas Shoes I hope. I don't need to be bawling my eyes
out again.
Emily: [wicked grin] No, it's called Why the Chimes Rang.
Me: AAAAAAUUUUUUGGGGGHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

Dear me. See what I mean. You don't need to feel obligated to feel sorry for me, really. I signed up for this job, after all, and for this life, but I admit I didn't read the manual too thoroughly beforehand, especially that part about all the unexpected things that would slam me in the face. Ya, vell. Yesterday I called one of the moms involved to clear up a misunderstanding about the play and ended up talking for an hour about other things, such as her life, which is even more complicated than mine at the moment, and I found that extending sympathy did wonders for my own frame of mind. Plus some fine church people gave us some cinnamon rolls, coffee cake, and two jars of granola. That helped a lot too.

December column

Today's column is about losing the oak tree and the dog.

Read it here.

Come to the Concerts!

Jenny and Ben are singing with the Joyful Noise choir this fall and will be giving a Christmas concert on Friday, December 10th. If you're in the area, feel free to come. No charge.
Calvin Presbyterian Church
1736 NW Dixon
Corvallis, Oregon
7:30 pm. Prelude music at 7:15.

Directions: Take Hwy 34 over the bridge into Corvallis. Turn right on 9th St. Turn left on Garfield. Turn right on NW Dixon. The church is on the left just past the elementary school.

Then, far far away, Amy will be on a concert tour with the SMBI choir and visiting all kinds of places in the Midwest teeming with my relatives and friends and acquaintances. Here's her schedule:

Riverview Mennonite Church, White Pigeon, Michigan
Friday, Dec. 10, 7:00 pm

Sunnyside Conservative Mennonite Church, Kalona Iowa
Sunday, Dec. 12, 9:30 a.m.

Salem Mennonite Church, Leon, Iowa
Dec. 12, 7:00 pm

Cedar Crest Amish Mennonite Church, Hutchinson, Kansas
Monday, Dec. 13, 7:30 pm

Spring Hill Mennonite Church, Latham, Missouri
Tuesday, Dec. 14, 7:30 pm

Hillside Mennonite Church, Shoals, Indiana
Weds. Dec. 15, 7:00 pm

United Bethel Mennonite Church, Plain City, Ohio
Thursday, Dec. 16, 7:30 pm

Everyone is welcome at any of these. Make sure you introduce yourself to that short alto with freckles and tell her how you're related to me.