As I walked down the dusty dirt road that had so quickly
become familiar, I found myself reasoning with my surprising emotion, “Kelly,
this happens every month. You know it is
coming and you prepare yourself for it.
You will be fine.� I
accepted my reasoning and walked on toward P’ Bow and P’ Boot’s house, with a
bit of a hardened heart, meant as a means of protection. When I get there, the children are all over
the place, bouncing from the farewell feast, to us, to the pick-up game of
soccer going on and so on. It feels a
bit overwhelming, but it’s such a lovely chaos, one that I have become so
accustomed to. Ploy is loving all the
cameras and pictures being taken and little Tia is playing the “I’m going to
pretend to play hard to get, but really I love all the attention� game. It feels so natural. P’Tone says a prayer over our team and the
meal and opens way for us to start eating.
The food is fantastic, as usual and leaves us telling P’ Bow over and
over again “Aroy� (delicious).
Being around all the love starts picking at my heart a bit
and in moments I feel my emotional defenses start sliding, but I keep my wall
up, not wanting to feel the full effects of what goodbye means.
I sit with the children as well as some of the missionary
families and interns that have become like family in our short time at Remember
Nhu. It feels surreal, knowing the
finality coming around the corner. Also,
you should know that I almost always will not cry if I feel pressure (this is
something I have realized while being on the race). I’m awful at goodbyes because I feel an
underlying expectation to cry and it therefore causes me to shut down in a
subtle way. I’m pretty sure almost everyone
at home can attest to this, as it explains in part my lack of tears as I left
for the race.
Anyways, this is me: stubborn, hardhearted and unwilling to
yield emotionally.
But they got me. They
sneak attacked me. They hit me with an
overwhelming love in such an unsuspecting way.
I was walking to get some homemade, absolutely amazing Thai tea when a
group of the teenage girls came up to me with their hands behind their
back. They started giggling and brought
out a package, as well as three sheets of laminated paper. The package contained Thai pants, which have
already been put to great use. It was
the three sheets of paper though, that
started my downward spiral towards feeling the gravity of miss within my
heart. All three of the children’s
houses had drawn out a portrait of their portrayal of me and every child had
written a little love note to me. They
are such precious pieces of paper. My
favorites include the picture of me holding a rake in one hand (because of the
work we did on the new land for them) and a heart in the other, while wearing
an exact outfit I had worn and the countless messages saying that they will
“miss and pary for me�. Tears started
welling in my eyes and I looked around to thank as many dear children as I
can. But as I turned around, I saw them
all grouping together and the other girls waving me towards some chairs set up
for us.
This is where they really worked their magic; their
overwhelming love magic.
All of the children that had become so incredibly dear to my
heart were together, singing farewell songs, hiding their beautiful Thai eyes
at us as they smiled. After they were
done singing, they overtook us. They
literally ran to us and swarmed us with hugs.
I lost it.
My walls broke and the floodgates opened. I hugged countless faces and cried with
several special girls, many of whom came back for second and third hugs when
the line had died down.
A random baby powder war started and that provided a good
break from the sappiness. But as we were
saying our final goodbye, the tears started again. Ing, a little girl whom we had gotten close
with, was swinging as I walked away. She
yelled to me “P’Kelly God Bres You�. I
yelled back “God Bless you too!� and a few seconds later, she said “P’Kelly…God
luh you�. It hit me right in my
heart. Such an overwhelming love. Love from the Father, love from this ministry
and these girls, love from the missionaries that had been working alongside
us.
I am overwhelmed. But
in the best kind of way.
