Family Time

Each 12 to 13 week term at RVA is divided by a mid-term long-weekend
break, to give the staff a breathing space away from 24/7
responsibility for the boarding students, and to allow the students to
reconnect with their families or guardians. New students are advised
not to plan to leave Kenya since their passports are usually still in
process in some labyrinthine government agency in Nairobi for
acquiring student visas. Since this was our first six-week stretch of
family dispersal, we decided that this time we'd trek all the way back
with all five of us to see Luke. Hence the over 1000 km of driving
each way, about 23 hours in the truck spread over 2 1/2 days, the lost
school days for the younger three, the jumble of making plans for
being gone, the necessity of abandoning many tasks to our capable but
overworked team. A steep investment, but well worth it. We had
initially planned a grand climb-Mt.-Kenya adventure, but after Luke's
injury we switched to a more sedentary plan. God knew we all needed
the rest.

We rented a cabin at Sunrise Acres, where a steadfast missionary
couple in their 60's runs a dairy farm on the side of their church and
orphanage work. They have constructed four simple houses, the kind
you might rent at a state park in West Virginia, with clapboard siding
and patchwork quilts and wood-burning stoves and shelves of dog-eared
paperbacks, forming a semi-circle around a shady yard with flower beds
and playground equipment, and bordered by pine forest and cow
pasture. My sense is that the decades of faithfulness the Stovers
have put in have somehow cleared this spiritual oasis, so that an
American family can pull into the yard and enter into peace. The
elevation on that side of the Great Rift is about 8 to 9 thousand
feet. It is cold, breezy, quiet, and probably one of the best bargains
in the world (the six of us got our own house, three bedrooms, milk
and strawberries galore, for less than fifty dollars/night).

Mostly we just WERE. I cooked a lot, trying to fill up the weeks of
cafeteria-food cavities with grilled meat and fresh vegetables and
home made bread and pie and cookies. We played ping-pong and shot
baskets, kicked around a soccer ball, put together a puzzle, played a
few games, watched our kids' two favorite movies: A Princess Bride,
and The Emperor's New Groove. We all eagerly listened to RVA
stories. There was a spike of Rubik's Cube mania as Luke and Jack
competed to solve them in close to two minutes, Caleb figured it out,
and Julia decided to give it a go too. We slept, long and hard,
under wool blankets with closed windows, no noises to wake us.

One day we drove down to Nakuru, and visited a national park we had
not previously seen. Lake Nakuru is home to thousands of pink
flamingos. Again, this day was a gift, because riding on the roof of
the truck through forest and savannah scanning for animals is a key
part of our family experience. We spotted two leopards, distantly, in
a tree before they climbed down and disappeared. Dozens of rhino
amazed us with their mass and their prehistoric horns and knobby
skin. We watched V's of pelicans take flight, clumps of flamingos
running like showgirls on their delicate legs and high-heeled
impractical feet, springy gazelle and even a few huge eland resting in
the grass by the water's edge. Warthogs, ostriches, baboons, buffalo,
zebra . . . and a picnic lunch on the escarpment, far above the pink-
fringes of the lake.

Then we headed back to Kijabe and said goodbye. Still hard, but not
as heart-breaking as the first time. Perhaps the key difference is
that we have now seen first-hand that this is a good place for Luke.
He has some great teachers, challenging classes, interesting
activities, a library. He has learned to follow the schedule and pace
himself on work. He's been empowered by independence, and we know
deep down this was the right plan for him. The culture is nearly
American . . . a good laboratory for learning to survive amongst a
crowd of giggling teenage girls and video-gaming boys. Luke's knee
still hurts at times, and he completes his enforced inactivity period
on Tuesday when he will see the orthopedic surgeon again. The
inability to play on the team is still the hardest aspect of his life
there and we are praying he can return next week.

In all a hidden blessing of sending our son away has been the right to
snatch five days of family time from the middle of intense months of
ministry. We're thankful.