Today our group split in ½ and the group I was assigned went
to the Home for Sick and Dying Babies. I
prayed days in advance that I wouldn’t be afraid when this day arrived and as
we stepped off the tap-tap, my hands shook with fear about what I’d experience
behind the walls we entered. However, as
we walked through the door to the room with the sickest children, I was
grateful my prayers were answered and I immediately became transformed. The fear was replaced with overwhelming pride
that I was given the opportunity to be with these children that just wanted to
be held. They would happily stay in a
wet diaper if it meant you would hold them one minute longer and for a few
short hours today, I felt the strangest mixture of being the most helpless and
useful at one time. Helpless there were
more than 30 beds of crying babies I couldn’t hold all at once and useful that
I didn’t have to do anything but give these babies my time and love. As I was holding two children because neither
would let me put them down, I knew for the first time what it meant to be loved, needed and wanted unconditionally.
Later in the day as we drove to Apparent Project, I was amazed to see along the streets how resilient Haitians are able to make use of everything around them. Wooden pallets American businesses complain about how to dispose of are transformed into tables, stools, benches and chairs as well as served as railing on a second story building. Beads were fashioned from colorful empty cereal boxes cut into narrow strips, discarded plastic water pouches were sewn into bags of different sizes and broken glass was ground down into beads of various sizes. Wheel barrows with broken wheels or no rubber wheel at all were valuable tools of transporting heavy treasures back and forth. I was humbled by how blessed myself, family and friends are to live where we do and enjoy all the luxuries we take for granted each day.
Tracy
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