They climbed the tree hollering down, “I found one!” The others stood below to catch the toss. Wrinkly, yellow passion fruit landed in the cupped hands. Cracking open they slurped the pink, fleshy insides. I remember when I used to pull life to my face and suck the passion with a childlike hunger.

February bears the nickname Mud Month. How glorious to enjoy the back yard connected to the house. Complete with a sink and spigot the patch of grass and soggy dirt beckoned a frolic. A final fling with friends before school starts next week meant muddy fun.

Digging deep holes with spoons and letting them fill with sludge.

Throwing spades to break up clods and clip through the long blades overgrowing the plot of land.

Water balloons smashed with a plastic cricket bat by squealing children clad in swimming goggles.

The itchy dirt dried on bare kid skin.

A growing teen conscious of the afterwards quietly sets to work the mud back to its origin.

These 29 days officially inaugurated by a loud rumpus in the mud. I watched from the kitchen window, tethered to my grown up world of work and worries. I reassure myself of the goodness in the hardy play they display. Driven by desires, free from the mantle of duty, they simply play. I traded inhibition for ambition long ago. I wonder if I can ever right that wrong. I wonder if I should. I wonder.

At least the wonder still resides. While other adults bury and build and harvest crops in the mud of this month I watch wonderful play. Wonder whirls around with hope like the shady leaves in the passion tree my children climb.

Ambition says grasp.
Inhibition says bask.

Ambition clenches fist and jaw.
Inhibition breathes deep and long.

Ambition aims.
Inhibition flings arms wide open, face to the sky, toes squishing in the wet earth.

When coordinating a handful of simultaneous moves one must consider oneself a box: flexible, fill-able, empty-able, re-fill-able, and tough.

I go behind the grocery store and dig in the the bins for boxes. Flattened, the boxes stack on the scale so they know how many coins I need to give them. I feel like these boxes. Emptied of the original and deflated. I am emptying myself of the attachment we have had to this location for years.

Reformation of the 200+ boxes by way of rolls of sticky tape makes perfect work for children eager to lend a hand. They pile by the wall waiting to be filled. I feel like these boxes. Devoid of my former attachments I wait for re-purposing. What will I carry? What will the new load be? What will fill me at the new place?

Filled yet still in use the boxes lounge around. Items will be pulled and returned a number of times still before Monday. Then the final strip of tape will shut them up for the trip down the street. These boxes mostly likely won’t stay taped for long. I feel like these boxes. I am in the in-between. There are daily chores that feel suddenly odd even after doing in them every day for all time. I want to be at the new place but we are not there yet. So I have to unpack and repack myself various times in a day.

The Berenstain Bears tell a story of prepositions using the predicament of being stuff in a box. The rhythmic verse chants in my mind, “Inside, outside, upside-down…” Our things displaced fill our spaces, inside, outside, and all around. I feel like these boxes. Insecurity of not-what-was and not-yet thrust me forward, awkward, in the way, imposing. I want to rush and be done with this. I want to quit stubbing my toes on things out of place. I want to stop stubbing my heart on a jumbled up soul.

Monday we move our house. Other moving dates will come soon. For now I focus on this one. This sweet picture taken by their older sister, Gabrielle, captures the anticipation of my little ones. I feel like this box. The burden of making this move a good one for the whole family weighs heavy. I hope they don’t feel overlooked or shoved to one side. I hope I can absorb their insecurities and stresses in this time of change. I hope I don’t forget that they, too, are feeling all the boxes-full of emotions that I am. I hope I remember to run to the One who can tape together my seems when I feel things getting to be too much.

Way back in 2008 I blogged a series called green about envy. On the last day I revealed a notebook I used for a gratefulness journal. Oh the joys of a Sharpie gliding across the lush pages of a snazzy journal.

Origami made by my son. The green swan used to be an envious ugly duckling.

Way back a long time ago before that I learned the meaning of the word unabridged. I felt gypped. How could anyone dare defile the original intent of the precious words of an author? That very day I went to the library and looked for the unabridged version of ‘Little Women’ by Louisa May Alcott. From that day forward I accepted no substitutes. Being that Alcott ranked number one, at the time, in my long ‘favorite authors’ list I diligently read every book in the library by this esteemed woman.

During that stint of Alcott immersion a practice found in the life of the character named Jo stuck with me. I tucked it away and kept it for the ‘someday’ when I would be married and have children of my own.

That journal I started in 2008 got about half way full. I put it away, for a time. Last year, as family and friends, we began writing what we are thankful for on the wall in our home. Then around the beginning of December I ran across this glass-half-full journal. As I thumbed through the pages I saw sweet Jo at her writing desk and the images of the tucked away practice returned to my mind as the first time I read about it.

SPOILER ALERT! (If you have not had the joy of reading Little Women and Little Men then you might want to wait to read the rest of this post. Really, I don’t mind. This post can wait for you to get done reading the gems. If you have an e-reader you can get the books here free: ManyBooks.net)

Jo March married the good Professor Bhaer, much to my chagrin; I wanted her to be with the passionate Teddy. She inherited her Aunt’s big old house, Plumfield. She and the professor started a school. Every so often Jo sits down with a journal and writes down admirable things she sees in her pupils. She then finds a quiet moment to share these observations with the young ones to encourage them.

I wanted to start doing that with my family. So I re-purposed the rest of those snazzy pages and started right away. I write down what I admire about my husband and my children. Then I read aloud to each one individually what my own hand has written, from my heart to theirs. The reminders help me appreciate each one. They feel good as I choose to see the good, and in turn tell them about it. I write with green ink, my favorite color for my favorite people.

Secretly, I hope to be able to do this, also, for the Lifetime Dreamers. Someday.

Like everything?

By this time next month:

• the church will be in a new location.
• the ministry office will be in a new location.
• the orphanage will have a new rental house.
• the Washington’s will have a new rental house.

By the mid-year the bowling alley will be in a new location.

The only thing not moving? The school. We are fighting tooth and nail (whatever that means) for the land where the school is so it can stay put.

Moving our family excites me most. Perks:

• Three stories
• A bit of an outdoors with a little grass
• A half a block from a HUGE park
• A block and a half from a main street

A rough sketch of the floor plan:

Oh, yes, and to finish this post I wanted to share with you a verse from the New Living Translation version of the Bible found in Isaiah 54:2 which applies to our situation.

“Enlarge your house; build an addition.
      Spread out your home, and spare no expense!”

Isn’t that a refreshing look at the old verse about lengthening cords and strengthening stakes? Yes!

Surrounding the elevated statue of Simon Bolivar, the Great Liberator of South America, in the plaza at the center of Bolivia’s capitol city Sucre you will find a ring of golden words. Words. Powerful words which read: Sucre, Bolivia, the cradle of liberty.

The city holds the wonder of words which gave me the power of liberty. Our first months in Bolivia beginning in 2001 we forced our tongues to converse with the people in the language of the heart of this land. When the uncomfortable unfamiliarity traded places with familiar ownership we pushed past the easy into the mechanics of the language. By taking a trip almost exactly ten years ago I spent a few weeks in Sucre learning the rules of the Spanish language.

In the city where liberty meets law my tongue and brain submitted to language laws which gave me social liberty. I found a freedom to befriend Bolivians. I saw the reason behind the ramblings. In this cradle of liberty I felt like a child learning to speak, full of uninhibited vim.

El Poder y la Gloria // The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene

A decade later I return with my husband. I carry in my bag a book I started reading a few weeks ago. I picked it up at a flee market in Cochabamba. During my time on this vacation I determined to finish reading this book.

How poetic that I would finish reading my first Spanish novel in the city where love for the language was born. I’ve read other non-fiction books out of duty or obligation. I am not too proud to mention I have also read a small mountain of children’s books in Spanish. I’ve also started, and re-started, reading the classic monstrosity ‘El ingenioso hidalgo don Quijote de la Mancha‘. This one, ‘El Poder y la Gloria’ (The Power and the Glory) by Graham Greene, I choose for the sheer pleasure of the reading.

The story tells about a Mexican priest being pursued by a lieutenant during the polemic 1930s. The British author wrote the book in English. Knowing I read a translation from the original I felt like I lost some of the artistry of the work. Yet, being able to read the book in the primary tongue of most of the characters enriched the experience.  I recommend the book (in whatever language you prefer).

Who doesn’t love the opening of Dumbo when the stork struggles all plucky over the clouds until he finds the train where Mrs. Jumbo awaits the arrival of her precious child? Such sweetness when he plays a note and then sings Happy Birthday to the little tyke.

Where did all this stork business start anyway? Wouldn’t the pouch of a kangaroo make more sense? Or if this delivery creature had to fly why not a big strong pterodactyl?

So we somehow have this idea that offspring find their way to us by a mystical force. Logically a stork has little or nothing to do with the acquisition of children, so maybe fate plays a hand, or possibly God. As parents we know the process involves more than the multiplication of cells and the influence of genes. Heredity gets us closer to idea of a child placed in our family by design. Be it through conception, adoption, marriage, or other family-making ways it would seem that a force is at work placing children in the arms of their parents.

Some intimate conversations followed my writing an article on our orphanage blog called “Sometimes I don’t know how to pray“. Then a few other blog posts trickled in giving me cause to pause. One friend speaks of the waiting pangs as they painstakingly walk the steps to adopt their first (or first, second and third kids all at once). Another dear friend rejoices over the eleven children God has blessed them with; arms wide open to more should they come into their lives.

So I wonder which ones are mine.

Hannah cared for Samuel for just a few years after month after month of agonizing infertility.

Moses’ mother let the child suckle at her breasts in preparation for a destiny of liberation away from her.

Jesus started to pull away from his mothers’ grasp as a youth as he discussed business with grown-ups.

Rebekah had a boy with failure to launch issues.

Moses ended up running away from his adoptive mother after a life of privilege.

Our children never really walk out of our lives. No matter how long, or short, they stay physically close to us a mother is changed forever. Each child leaves a mark.

I currently mother five children. They are mine. I know this.

We have an orphanage. We provide for the kids. We interact with them and they know us. We have placed caregivers in the home.  But, someday I will be more closely involved in the lives of the children who live in The House of Dreams. I have yet to mother these children.

Because, I wonder which ones are mine.

To date 53 children have lived at the House of Dreams. Seventeen of those are still with us: 10 boys and 7 girls; ages 10 and under. Two of those 17 are assigned to be adopted soon. Two others are on a course to be reunited with their birth parents. The math and statistics tell us the 13 that are left will grow into adults under our care.

So, I wonder which ones are mine.

Should you choose to believe in dreams one of those 13, a little girl, is destined to a family. I saw another of the 13, a boy, running to his adoptive parents in a vivid dream one night some time ago. That would bring the number to 11.

11+5=16.

Which ones are mine?

When we started our adoption process (before we knew how things worked) there were three little girls in our orphanage we would have loved to adopt. Pati, Carolina, and Ximena are now lovely European young ladies. Our girl is Kaitlynn. She came to us as a surprise, hand-picked for our family from an orphanage on the other side of town.

People ask us if we will adopt again. It was never in the plans. So to give the surface answer I say no. Yet I know that about a dozen or so kids will be dropped in my mothering arms. Maybe sooner than I think.

I ask myself why I do not yet mother them, the 17 over there. The reasons too deep and hidden still, I settle back into mothering my five. I don’t feel guilty about it. It just doesn’t feel like the time for more yet. I know it’s coming. I know there will be a time when some of the children living now in the House of Dreams will be mine.

So I wonder why I don’t run over there now and squeeze them all tight. I wonder why I don’t say to each of them, “You are mine until you belong to another.” What am I waiting for?

I am waiting to know which ones are mine.

Dare I ask the Great, Stork-like, Pterodactyl, God person?

Which ones are mine?

I keep cactus plants on my porch. It would seem this one bloomed just in time to watch the full moon rise this 7th night of the month. This is the first bloom we have seen on it since I brought home this fuzzy, bullet-shaped, stump three years ago.

See how the flower faces the moon? Pure mystifying beauty!

A few months ago a member of our church told me she had an idea of a way to honor us for ten years of service in Bolivia. She had rallied some other people from church to help her with this idea. They wanted to bring DaRonn’s mom down for a visit. She had never been to Bolivia before. This member of the church said that she wanted DaRonn’s mom to see all we had accomplished and be proud of her son. I told them this was a great idea.

For the following weeks we communicated across the continents to prepare: the tickets, the time off work, the passport, the visa, and the vaccination. Finally she came! We had a wonderful week with Grandma Charlie in town.

On her final day in the city of Cochabamba we observed Pedestrian Day, during which use of motor vehicles is prohibited. After the church service we had a nice little walk together. Back at home we made fun photos for posterity.

We are so very grateful for this amazing gift given to us by the church body here at Iglesia Cristo Nación. ¡Los cristonacioneros son lo máximo!

Enjoy some pictures from our final day together.

"Aragatza" best ice-cream in town and it's sold from the side of a truck

Gabrielle wanted to bring our poodle Shep along for the walk (photo by Raimy O.)

Another photo by Raimy O. of Timothy

DVD sales in front of our gate. That's our ministry's sign. DaRonn and his mom share a love of movies.

The blue graffiti says "Rechaza el Engaño" which means: Resist Deception

Our neighbor in the market. She sits here every day.

The Washington family with Grandma Charlie

Mother and Son