Trains, departures, Sudan, birthdays, pizza, and dispersal

November 1, rumbling southward through the sprawl of Philadelphia towards Washington, a tourist in my own country, relieved at successfully purchasing an on-line ticket, finding the right station, transferring in from the commuter line, scanning the bar code in the email, self-printing three tickets, and navigating myself with Jack and Julia and bags into the right line and onto the right part of the right train.  At least everything is in English, though the constantly running disaster preparedness video in the waiting hall was a bit unnerving.  I've rarely taken trains in America, but I love this mode of travel, the independence of walking place to place, light luggage, actually seeing the trees as we slide southward.  

Woke up this morning tired of saying goodbye, the final twist of cost to every reunion.  

Saturday we grabbed Julia straight from all-star practice to speed up to Philadelphia, racing the depressing creep of the gps eta past 7 pm.  The Massos were gathering for the finale of Acacia's Birthday (13!!!) at Catherine's, the house on Girard Avenue where some of our favorite people have lived post-Uganda.  This was Miss Becky's room . . this was Miss Bethany's room . . now Catherine is the lone Bundibugyo teacher still living there.  We made it just after the candles were blown out, but in time to be introduced to the famous Philadelphia Cheese Steaks, the culinary dream of our WHM friends.  

The party was concluding in time to move a few blocks down the street to Liberti Church's screening of a documentary film entitled "The New Sudan", At an hour-and-a-half it might feel long to those who aren't immersing themselves in what looks like home, that's the same teapot we have, the same jerry-can, the familiar look of a hospital or a mud-walled school. But it is worth the time investment.  The producers managed to get great face-time one-on-one interviews with political and religious leaders in South Sudan, and balance that with day-in-the-life-of kind of stories of four ordinary citizens.  Bottom line:  invest in water, health, education, and supporting the indigenous church.  Which is precisely what our team in Mundri is doing.  One comes away from the movie with hope, hope that such dedicated and resilient people will, as one person puts it, be able to "join the third-world".  They aren't asking for luxury, just survival.

Sunday afternoon we made it up to New Haven so Jack, Julia, Karen, and Acacia could see Luke.  The FCYU (Football Club of Yale University) beat Fairfield 5 to 1, and we  cheered for the particularly strong defense from #3, chilled by the sinking-sun wind, chatting with the other handful of parent-fans, sitting in the Massos borrowed camping chairs.  Then a tour of Luke's dorm room where Scott installed the pull-up bar high enough in the hall to accommodate Luke and his 6'5" crew-team suite-mate.  It's pretty much the only thing he's asked for since moving to college.  Then to pizza at Sally's, a seedy-looking but extremely popular and historic pizza place which unbeknownst to us is also famous for its slow service.  By the time we waited 2 hours in our little booth for pizza we were all pretty hungry, thankful for talk-time with Luke, but aware of the dent we had put in his study time for the weekend.  Goodbyes in the dark street by the dorms, and another 3 hours back to Philadelphia.  Treasured time really, 3 up and 3 back makes 6 straight hours of conversation with Karen, which was a real gift.

Which brings us to this morning, more goodbyes, kudos to Uncle Eric who swept over-sleeping Gaby to the train station to hug us goodbye at the last minute, he gets the TCK honor award for today.  The Massos are ensconced in Karen's family and the close-by community of WHM there, and we're grateful that they could make space and time for us to join in, even though it meant wall-to-wall mattresses in the kids' rooms.  We aren't likely to intersect with the whole family again for a long time.

The world just seems sort of large and complicated this morning, and parts of my heart are stuck with Luke striding out into academic intensity that he's not convinced is necessary, looking for a way to get back to the Africa he misses so much.  With Caleb who is navigating growing up too much on his own.  With Scott heading up to WHM leadership meetings that I'm not a part of any more.  With Acacia and Liana and Gaby who are being forced to accept the necessity of shoes and coats as the frost settles.  With Heidi and Ashley looking for clues about what's next.  With Sarah who called Luke while we were all in the car ("I have to interview an adolescent for a class, and you're the only one whose phone number I have") and Nathan immersed in a world of study and city-survival.  With Bethany thrust into leadership of a team holding their balance as the country teeters on the verge.  With Patton and Lilli  and Aidan and their parents and Anna in Kampala getting ready to step into the time machine that brings them to the 21rst century for a few weeks, disoriented.  With Pat gathering the energy after all these years to mold the old Chedester house into a ministry center for women and arts.  For the Clarks and Chrissy and rest of the teams, for friends in Uganda, for Basiime recovering in the foreign world of Tennessee, for my family and Scott's who have to put up with our fragmented hearts and good-bye weary souls.  

Some days like this, ready for the last good-bye.

Domestic Days

In between churches and road trips, we have assembled a bit of temporary life here in Virginia.  My old bedroom, cluttered now with all our personal papers, books, clothes, computers, a card table for Scott's desk and TV tray for mine .  .  . the rest of my mom's house is unerringly neat, so I'm not sure how I failed to emulate that, but this room is scattered.  Mornings at the dining room table coaching Jack and Julia through Geometry, vocab and grammar.  Highlight of my day is figuring out a formula for how many discreet areas 100 intersecting coplanar lines will create, and then trying to explain it.  Or finding a latin root cross-over in a mathematical term.  Afternoons in the car, doing the traditional Northern-Virginia-Mom thing, driving to soccer practices (now extras since both kids made all-star, and never at the same time or same day), music lessons.  Thankful that this little period of a couple of months can be a time to launch my youngest two with opportunities the older two missed:  clarinet for Julia, drums for Jack, piano for both, hopefully enough to get them started in case they want to keep on with it in Kenya.  Library runs for books. Pulling from the abundance in the fridge, strawberries any day of the year, unlimited salads.  Seeing deer cross the back yard.  Trying to squeeze in some medical study/updating time.  Trying to get Caleb on the phone (success yesterday!  Hooray!  miss him so much).  Posting support letters and sending out our video to those we can't personally reach.  Maintaining life, no glamor, just plugging on.

Scott in the meantime spends a lot more forward-focused time.  After weeks of email exchanges the import taxes on a new vehicle to Kenya have just proven prohibitive.  As the American economy falters and our support account sputters, we scale back expectations, which feels right.  Downwardly mobile missionaries.  Find out we're moving into the same small duplex housing at Kijabe where we stayed for about six months post-ADF when Jack was born!  Will be a bit tighter with three teens than three toddlers and an infant . . but part of the simplifying of life.  And the full-circle sense is satisfying.  

This USA time is more than half over.  We've been present in all six churches that support us in some way.  I can't even count the number of meals and beds with gracious friends, the encouraging words from those that still care for us.  Another paradox, the peculiar juxtaposition of multiplying the interactions in America and yet aching for those we've left behind in Uganda.  Of deep and yet time-limited relationship.  Being back, but always moving on.  How to explain to people calling and emailing now that even though we don't leave until Christmas, we can't maintain this social pace all the way through to the very last day.  Scott is already in Philadelphia for meetings with WHM and will be mostly there until mid-November, then one more trip southwards to my sister's, Thanksgiving with both sets of parents, and then the final stretch.  Hate the awkwardness of being non-committal to people we'd love to see.

On prayers and answers

Basiime Godfrey landed in Atlanta Saturday night, and today had a successful surgery on his best eye.  If his recovery goes well, he'll preserve the limited vision he has left, which is enough for him to function in Uganda but be declared legally blind in America.  He is overflowing with thankfulness for this opportunity, it is a bit like a benevolent millionaire offering someone time travel into the future to save their life with a procedure not yet developed in the present, there is the relief of getting taken care of, and then the over-the-top amazement of the vastly different world he has entered. The same things our kids notice when they come here, automatic garage doors and dishwashers and quiet empty streets and strangers who pray and give sacrificially.  America.

Pray for our Bundibugyo team's two days of prayer tomorrow and the next, a pause for breath as they come towards the end of this tumultuous transition-filled year.  Nothing is ever smooth, or simple, evil never rests, and when one problem is solved another one comes.  The Johnsons and Anna will be on a month of travel to the US for meetings, so Pat, Chrissy, and the Clarks need special prayer to "keep on holding on to the One  who's holding" them as our prayer video sings.  In Sudan Bethany is now the interim leader as the Massos begin a 7-month HMA too, so we have a team of hard-working and creative and caring very young people living at the edge of a national crisis as the vote on the referendum approaches.  The Kenya teams need prayer for wisdom in mentoring church leaders, working with Somali refugees and immigrants, and teaching Bible storying.  

And lastly, World Harvest Mission is about to enter a season of meetings.  Scott leaves Wednesday for the first phase, a prayer and fellowship and spiritual accountability retreat with the other overseas field directors. Next a week-long leadership meeting in Philadelphia, then another week-long team leader training in a small town outside the city.  I'll join him that third week.  Pray for our mission to collectively listen to God and each other, to love, to risk, to bring clarity of vision without eliminating the important things that Jesus himself would have us do and be.

Yale Family Weekend

Fall colors, exploding in New England, brilliant, rich, as sun filters through the trees. The solid stone campus, clusters of families in and out of buildings, chatting, showing. Yale Gospel Choir, enthusiastic harmonies, swaying, clapping, beautiful praise. Walking and walking, in the breeze, absorbing time together. The Yale Sustainable Farm, organic vegetables arranged on fresh pizza from the brick oven, inspiring creativity with rutabaga and ricotta, delicious. Popping into the rink to see an ice-hockey scrimmage, violent, fast, sweaty odors on icy air. An elegant dinner of Spanish tapas with Luke's buddy from RVA up visiting his sister at Yale, three kids from Africa all finding their way through the Ivy League. A men's varsity soccer game, Luke's room mate playing with speed and precision, but a loss to harsh refereeing decisions, under the lights in the chill of night. Church on campus, rousing praise, and a powerful sermon on the Prodigal Son. Afternoon club soccer games, Yale wins twice, Luke in uniform, happy to be outside, playing the game he loves, team camaraderie, meeting a few other parent pairs on the sidelines. And the weekend ends with an orchestral performance in the Battell Chapel, students filling the building with Rimsy-Korsakoff, building, spiraling, crescendos. Then the goodbye, another tearing of the heart, another inevitable sadness, a young man finding out who he is amidst late-night all-suite discussions of politics and Jesus and the environment and love, finding out what he can do in classes with the most brilliant of the world's youth, finding out what his priorities are and who he will become, while we cheer from the sidelines.

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the gospel in Charlottesville

This past weekend we journeyed back to our college days at UVA, to thank Trinity Presbyterian Church for many things. Supporting us. Fasting and prayer for our lives during the ebola epidemic. Believing in us over decades, particularly a former professor of mine who has encouraged us greatly, a former director of the Center for Christian Study who was one of my primary mentors in faith, and the former pastor who impacted our lives through his preaching and his concern for Uganda. And, the fact that Scott and I met BECAUSE I needed a ride to church as an 18 year old first year student one Fall 18 years ago, and he was a year old with a car and picked me up on a street corner one Sunday morning. Trinity has sent us a solid group of interns, at least two missionaries (Mary Ann Carter and Ashley Wood) . . . and two of their pastors over the years as John Hall became a missionary to London and Bob Osborne our executive director. So this was a homecoming in many ways, and one in which we were blessed. The current pastor opened the service with a moving gospel invitation, for the weary and broken to find resurrection life. This set the tone for a spirit-filled worship service that spoke to our souls. And after two services, we were joined by a good quorum of interested people at a luncheon where we once again showed our video and shared our life. Ashley's dad ended with a true benediction, good words of blessing, as he told a story from his time in Uganda speaking with experienced military types unrelated to us at all, who said the real impact on Africa only comes through people who are willing to live out their lives in villages, small-scale and long-term. It was a kind and gracious conclusion to our reporting.

The weekend was also very significant because we stayed with Ashley's family, who had been to see us in Uganda. And not only did we enjoy reuniting with Ashely, Heidi was there as well! So there was this interesting combination of "It's Sunday late afternoon, must be time for family soccer with Ashley and Heidi .. . " and "It's Sunday afternoon, must be time to watch Redskins football with the 'dad' in the den". I felt our family relax.

To cap it off, we drove back to northern Virginia Monday via the Skyline Drive. Not exactly efficient, but beauty rarely is. Fall, muted somewhat this year, but still glorious, spreading over the Blue Ridge Mountains we love so much.

Now we've visited all five of our supporting churches, and a good number of individuals as well. Just in time to plunge into major planning meetings with WHM through the first half of November. Semi-homeschooling and survival, travel and correspondence, not as restful as I perhaps imagined, but I think we're where we are supposed to be this season. Not a lot left to offer, but that's the message of the gospel we were reminded of, we receive and carry the Life in spite of ourselves.

breaking news . . .

Just got an sms from Godfrey in Uganda. He has the receipt for a visa, and will pick up his passport in 24 hours. Many thanks to all who prayed, and to Congressmen Wamp and Wolf. Now for what should have been the harder part: traveling for the first time out of Africa, on an airplane, to America, and having surgery!

Soccer Debut, part 2

From the truly crucial (see Godfrey's latest, below) to the apparently frivolous, we return to Jack's soccer game on Saturday evening. But even as I say that, I know that the game was not frivolous, that our kids love the sport, and the lessons of hard work, team play, cooperation, excellence, exercise, reward are all essential to life.

Jack played his first ever game on a team. This child has been kicking a soccer ball since he could walk, but in a country where the first organized sport opportunities occur for 16 year olds and above. So he was pretty nervous driving to his game, wearing the jersey, and doubting his worthiness. His team is undefeated, and they played the only other undefeated team in the league. Jack started as a left-sided striker, and played all but about ten minutes of the match. And he played hard, got the ball, had drove through the defense, and had many strikes on goal. In the second half he finally scored, which went a LONG way in boosting his confidence. Another of his strikes bounced off the inside of the post, and was probably over the goal line. He also drew a foul in the box that resulted in a team score, and had many good passes. And at the end of a very close and exciting game, he consistently ran back to help the defense, even though he looked exhausted. The final result was a tie 6 to 6, and by that time it was so dark we could barely see which kid on the field was ours.

So we feel one step closer to being real Americans this weekend. Now all four of our kids have played community soccer (Luke in 2nd grade and Caleb in Kindergarten in 2000; Julia in the U14 and Jack in the U13 groups in 2010). It was fun and nerve-wracking to cheer on the sidelines, and a huge relief to see each of them score and celebrate with friends and start to feel a part of things.

Pray now

In seven hours Basiime Godfrey will have a second chance at the US
Embassy in Kampala to convince the consular officer that he really is
going blind, really does have a sponsor for surgery, really can make
it to the US and back without dropping out and becoming a person who
illegally drains American resources. Please pray this evening for him
to be calm and confident and articulate in a very intimidating
situation, and for the embassy staff to actually read his extensive
medical documentation this time around. And mostly for God to bring
healing to his eyes and peace to his heart, by any means that He
chooses. Thanks.

Sterling Lightning

Our very first community league soccer match today, and Julia's team the "Lightning" won 5 to 0 against a Reston team. Perfect Fall day with gusting breezes, falling leaves, brilliant sunshine. A handful of parents in folding chairs, cheering. Excited girls, dedicated coaches. Neon-orange jerseys, laughter. Julia played "stopper", a roaming defender in the center in front of the three backs. And she did a lot of stopping, as well as making the pass that initiated the first goal. In the second half the coach moved her up to left mid-field. And from that position, she scored one of the five goals! She had a fantastic time, and we couldn't have asked for a better first-experience.

Yet we're all still learning. At one point in the game, every player went down on one knee, and Julia looked around confused, turns out it's a rule in this league during a stop for injury. She caught on fast. Both kids were somewhat appalled by the shortness of the standard-issue shorts (girls don't even really show knees in Uganda, let alone half the thigh) so we weren't sure if it was OK to substitute longer shorts, but gambled on it, and it was. I asked other parents where we should put our chairs, and tried to cheer appropriately So much to learn, it takes energy. And as we pulled out from the game, I made a U-turn and was stopped by the police. I wasn't fully in the turn lane, I was straddling one of the lanes in the highway. Whoops, another rule I didn't know. It just all weighs down at at times and is a little much. Thankfully the officer was merciful and issued me a warning, but no fine.

Now on to Jack's game!