The List

Sunday I was playing with the children after nap time. I sat with a 6 year old girl on my lap and she was going through "the List". This is something the older children do when a volunteer leaves or a child gets adopted. She said the names and I said where they are. "Neo...Canada. Thabo...Sweden. Leah...America" My friends Lindsey and Lindsay were added to the list since they left on Friday. But then she said my name, something she never had done before, "Boostina" and I said, "soon America." She then got up and ran away crying. When I caught her, she kept saying, "Boostina no America!!! Maseru!!!!" (Maseru is the captial of Lesotho.)

I am learning how hard it is for people to leave on the children. I wonder if my time here is a good thing or a bad thing for them. Yes, I am here for 4 months and have played with them, laughed with them, made their breakfast, and kissed them goodnight, but soon I will leave and they will have to adjust again. For the most part they are fine after someone leaves and after a few days they don't go through "The List" anymore and every time they do they forget about someone. So life does go on. I just feel bad that in 20 days I will be leaving them and their will be no more volunteers to go through "The List" with them.

A huge part of me is VERY ready to go home. I need to process the things I have gone through. I need to be able to go some where to just sit and think about everything I have seen and had my heart broken because of them. The past 2 days I have hit a point where my heart just can't take anymore. I have held a 7 day old baby that was found in a toilet pit, where the bugs had already started feeding off from his face and shoulders. I have seen things and heard noises that make you stop in your tracks. I LOVED my time in Lesotho and I know that when I get home and I am going to want to come back, but right now I need to breathe.

The thing is I feel really guilty about typing that. I need to breathe and have a break, but these children never get a break. They are here and this is their life. They are orphans. I am so glad that they are in a place where they are taught about the One who will not leave them as orphans (John 14:18). He will never leave or forsake them (Duet 31:6). Nothing can ever separate them for His love (Romans 8:38-39). He is the Father to the fatherless. (Psalm 68:5) Because of these promises it will be easier to give them the final kiss goodnight.

I may only be here for 20 more days, but a part of me will never leave Lesotho.