Here I am back on Xanga.

I need to express a few random thoughts about life and decided to come back to Xanga where friends can read posts without needed to register to get these updates. 

On April 12 - I flew out from Nairobi, Kenya and left behind my Michael, Paul and Gracie along with my life love, Lee. I few to LA - alone! That is weird! I like traveling with my husband and children. 24 hours of alone is boring. I did watch several movies and sleep -but not much on the sleep.

I arrived in LA to meet and greet my very pregnant daughter (and her husband ) who looks great and feels great too! Amen and Amen to that. About 36 hours later I flew to San Antonio to watch Adam graduate from Air Force Basic Training along with his finance (I mean wife - that is another story) and their friend. It was an amazing time and I so loved watching Adam walk and talk with something called "military bearing" it is a good thing and I think my little boys would do well to watch big brother for a while.

I am now back in LA and we are waiting for Dante. Danielle is beginning to slow down a bit - but not much. Today we took 12  LACS students on a school tour to APU. It was a fun day and they seemed to really enjoy seeing the University campus and eating in the caf.

I have been thinking that maybe I will still add thought here from time to time ...more of a place to express random experiences and idea.

Today and very decrepit, ragged old man  - who must have lived many hard years on nothing but alcohol - helped me free my car from a tricky spot - all while it poured down rain. I so wish you could have seen him. All I could do was call out to him "Asante Sana!". He was very simply one person helping another ....reminding me of the humanity found in all forms.

Did you know that our petrol stations are "British Petroleum" and "Oil Libya". It struck me as very odd.

Last night -this boy went to bed and he was 10. This morning he woke up a full 11 years old. He has been counting down the days.  He is handsome, smart, funny and sensitive. He gets moody and grumpy when he is tired - only he never really knows when he is tired. He loves to read and we have often caught him reading late into the night under the blankets with his flashlight. We cured that by refusing to give him new batteries! He is very strong and athletic. He loves to WIN! He loves being a follower of Jesus and works to figure out how to do that every day.  He is on the swim team and is looking forward to soccer practice starting. He is almost as tall as I am and tips the scales are well over 100 pounds these days. 

Michael wanted Chocolate Chip Pancakes with whip cream for breakfast. He wants to have Curry Chicken for dinner and a Triple Chocolate Fudge Cake - I think I had better get cooking!

I love this kid so much my heart feels full to overflowing!  

We Americans are very careful about our rights. We live in a nation founded on the need for personal freedom and rights.  One of the things I like about living in Kenya is the fact that I don’t need to protect these rights quite as much as I used to. For instance, when the neighbors dogs bark all through the night and repeatedly wake me up – I don’t really worry about it. It doesn’t upset me and I have no intention of complaining.  It just IS.  When other neighbors are playing music so loud that it feels like it is in MY house or drums are banging repetitively for hours in some sort of ceremony – I don’t have to worry that my rights are being infringed upon. 

When a matatu driver cuts me off, or drives down the wrong side of the road - it may irritate me –but I certainly am not thinking I should “do something” about it. 

This idea even applies to shopping – buyer beware – certainly applies here. In fact, there are even outlets available for me to open the package and test the light bulbs I want to buy – before I take them to the check out – because if they don’t work – that is MY problem, not the stores.  Before I buy a fan or a toaster – the clerk and I plug it in and be sure it is working properly.  After I take it home – I am on my own!

My neighbor may kill a goat in the yard of our apartment building and I don’t need to worry about it. In fact my neighbors once had a funeral with 50 men in our front yard, bowing towards Mecca, on their knees praying – while they carried the coffin out of the building – we just happened to be going IN the building with interns at the same time.  It wasn’t a problem, or an offence – it just was. 

I have realized that it is very liberating to not have to worry about protecting my rights all the time. I don’t have to protest the things that upset me or “infringe” upon my rights – because quite frankly – no body cares! 

There is a negative side to this that I don’t want to skim over – while I don’t feel that sense of “indignation” rising up in me and the need to “take a stand” over many trivial rights. I do still have my basic human rights met. I have freedom to choose where my children go to school and what I will do and say and where I will go. But, for many Kenyans these important choices are not theirs to make.  If the local school is full and the teacher doesn’t show up – there is nothing to be done. If an “officer of the law” takes their money or rounds them up in a raid – simply so that bail must be posted – there is little anyone can say or do except pay and pray for safety.  If their house is torched by an outbreak of violence – there is no one who has to “pay” for damages. 

Our rights are a funny thing. While we may have gone to extremes in America with ludicrous law suits and defensive posturing by every manufacturer around – I don’t ever want to take for granted the freedoms that I have as an American. I am so thankful to carry a passport from the land “of the free and the home of the brave”. 

On Saturday I went to visit the Boarding School called Joska. As we drove, I realized that I had forgotten many things about the slums. I forgot the congestion and the slight feeling of fear. The crowds and cars and life all press in so tightly. Driving is tricky on any real roads that penetrate the slums- because any space between you and the car in front is an opportunity for those crowding in their cars along side of you - to press in and take your spot. In fact, you might never move as matatus slide up either side of you and try to over take every chance. But, keeping a space is often wise - lest you find yourself in an event or activity - you want to get away from. When you are bumper to bumper and packed in on all sides - it is hard to flee a situation. While this is not "normal" life for me - it is for literally millions of Kenyans who reside in the slums and must travel in and out daily. 

I forgot that everything is the color brown. The earth is brown red clay, packed down hard from millions of feet traveling over it. The buildings are mud and stick, the color of brown earth. The stone structures are brown stone cut from the ground.  The tin shacks are rusty brown and the piles of garbage are brown with filth and dirt.  Everything is covered with the dirt that blows and the dust that is in the air leaves a fine film everywhere. I realized, again that not one green growing thing was visible. It was as if a sepia lens had been placed over my eyes - everything is the colored by this filter.  Only the filter never changes.

As we drove through we passed a small open area. It was flat and the edges were surrounded by tin shacks with rocks on the tin roofs to hold it together. Women were in clusters with their wash basins, bent over and washing their laundry.  Piles of rubbish with chickens picking at it formed another boundary.  In the middle were children and young men playing. I saw a girl jumping rope with a piece of twine. I saw toddlers running around barefoot and just enjoying the freedom to run. Central to this was a soccer (football) game. Close to me was a tall young man wearing a bright red and white striped knee-high football sock. It reminded me of a Christmas stocking. He only wore one - because his other leg was shriveled and bent at the knee into a queer right angle with a distorted little foot hanging off the end. He was using a stick like a cane for balance. Then I saw the most amazing thing. The ball came towards him and he put all of his weight onto the stick and with his good leg - beautifully and perfectly kicked the ball. He was GOOD! In fact, considering he had one leg, he was GREAT!

Sitting there, hardly moving I was able to watch him for a few minutes and I was in awe and humbled by his ability of live with his condition. Not just live, but play. Lee looked over and watching him said "No, special Olympics here huh?". Right, no Special Olympics here.

Life is hard in the slums. Life is very real. People work, laugh, play, cry, pray, are born and die here - it  is all just a  whole lot harder.