Back in the day, (read, still-to-date) I was a Lost junkie.
I was obsessed with that show before we even left for North Africa. And when we
got there a scratched bootlegged DVD of the first half of season 2 with Chinese
subtitles became my coping mechanism for culture stress. Those of you who have
watched the show know that it jumps back and forth between different times and
places in each episode, usually with the sounds of the coming scene overlapping
with the end of the present scene. In other words, before Jack flashes back to
a conversation with his dad at a hospital, the sounds of an OR being prepped
for surgery will play while Jack is still standing on the desolate beach of a
crazy island.
I’ve felt like that a little lately. Three days before I fly
back across the world and already the edges of this scene are fading. Driving
down I-20 at 65 miles an hour I hear the rattle of donkey carts sloshing water
down the road. Over the hum of my washing machine I hear the whirling chirp of
a thousand crickets. In the quiet roar of humanity at a Wal-Mart on Saturday
morning I can just make out the pleasant buzz of price-haggling in Arabic. I
feel like any second I will walk out of a room and this will all disappear
behind me. My current reality is trembling with transience.
Several well-meaning people have told me lately, “Wow, you
must be SO ready to get back to Africa by now. I mean that’s really your home
anyway.” I appreciate the sentiment. They are aware enough to recognize that
America is not always the land of milk and honey we make it out to be, maybe
especially for those of us who have lived a long time elsewhere. But their
comments make me feel a little guilty. Like I should be dying to leave this
place and get back to what really makes me happy. And if I was getting on that
plane on Thursday to return to a place and a people that were familiar, that I
had known for a long time, I know I would be. I would have been ready to get
back months ago, (though even then not without a trace of sadness). But on
Thursday I am getting on a plane to fly back into the unknown. Our home, like
the homes of so many we once knew, is buried in a ghost-town haunted by
soldiers. The friends we once shared tea with are scattered in refugee camps that
don’t even meet the minimum standards for a crisis situation. I am dying
to get back. But a part of me is still hesitating, still asking yet
unanswerable questions.
I’ve spent a lot of time weighing my feelings, which are
varied, trying to assign appropriate value to each. The big ones are these: I
feel a deep longing for a home, for a place my children will at least remember
through some of their childhoods. I think I am being honest with myself when I
say it doesn’t even have to be a terribly comfortable home. Just a place I can
call mine for a while. A place I can plant a few vegetables and be there long
enough to eat them. I also feel a deep longing for the sharp-edged beauty of
North Africa again, for its people, language, food. The other day Annabelle was
listening to a children’s song that counted to three in a bunch of languages.
When the voice in the speaker chirped out “Wahid, itneen, talata” I felt a
crushing sense of something akin to home-sickness and burst into tears. I want
to be there again. Badly. But one of the most intense things I have been
feeling is a lack of clarity. Is this move to a hard place, to a people in more
desperation than I have ever encountered in my life really what is wanted from
us? Can we really make a difference? Again, I am confident I am being honest
with myself when I say I would do the most outrageously difficult things in the
world if I was flat-out asked by the one who knows best what this world needs.
But what if I was doing it just for my own pride, my own desires or dreams…?
My mom’s side of the family celebrated the marriage of my
cousin last weekend and Bryan, Annabelle and I drove out of town for one last
gathering with all my relatives. My grandparents were there, the ones who
served in Thailand and the West Indies for fifty years (literally). The ones I
hardly know. On top of the literal days that I could count that I have spent
with them in my 29 years of life, they are getting old, albeit with grace. My beautiful
grandmother gave me a strong hug and firm kiss on the cheek when she said
hello, but her voice registered a friendliness that lacked recognition. Over
lunch on Sunday I felt a pang of jealousy as Bryan chatted away with them both,
asking detailed questions about their incredible lives that I should have known
the answers to, eliciting amazing stories I had never heard. At one point Bryan
asked something about their early years in Thailand. Oddly enough, I don’t even
remember the exact question now. But my grandmother put down her sandwich and wiped
her mouth in a ladylike fashion. Then she looked us right in the eye and said, “You
know, at some point you will get to a crossroads and you won’t know which
direction to go. You should pray and then…” with a delicate wave of her hand, “…then
you go.”
I don’t think my grandmother saw the tears rolling down my
face. She hardly knew which grandchild I was much less the details of our
situation. There is no way she could have known how badly I needed to hear
those words. And yet somehow, this woman of faith spoke directly to my heart. Though
she will someday pass from this world without us ever having known each other
well, I will treasure her wisdom until the day I follow in her footsteps.
God alone knows how intensely we want to make a difference
in the darkest parts of this world, how sincerely we want to follow him,
wherever that leads us. He alone knows how difficult and confusing that can sometimes
be. And how beautiful.
The walls of my heart are caked with prayers. I feel a
tugging at my arm. It’s time to go.
