Last week at a meeting the Head Teacher at Mawego Girls Secondary School and a dear friend, Grace Ataro, told the room that it is as if I am “called to be in Kenya.” Just before the meeting, Mariah and I had been talking about the language of “being called” and how, though I don’t use those words, I do already know that my relationship with this country and these people will be life-long.
I said to Mariah “you know how in romantic comedies they say that when you are proposed to, it is the easiest question to answer because you just know? I believe that my answer to Kenya was that easy. I knew immediately in 2009 that this is to be my life.” Though I have no specifics about what I will do or how I will do it, I know that this is where my heart lies.
So as Grace told the room that my continuous returns to Kenya showed that this is my purpose, I found myself agreeing. But over the last few weeks, as we have worked closely with Umoja’s long-term volunteer, Laura Steed, I have been trying to determine what it would take for me to be here on my own for an extended time and have slowly been adding to a list, as always:
- Community surrounding me from both sides of the ocean
- Courage to let pieces of myself go
- Drive to reach beyond my limitations
- Comfort in my identity
- Purpose
Over the past few days, both in Eldoret and Chulaimbo, I have experienced a coming together of experiences that I believe leave me closer to completing the above list.
Thursday, I went with the three visitors from the US to visit Kimbilio Hospice in Turbo during their week visiting programs and organizations in the Eldoret area. I have been interested in pediatric hospice since I came back from Kenya in 2010, challenged and needing to heal from the deaths of many children we met and knew. While Kimbilio Hospice is not specific to children and at times is more of an emergency relief and transition home for its patients, the mission for the organization began from the death of a child. We sat in a small room and, over tea and bread, listened to the director and creator of Kimbilio speak of realizing, through the death of this child, that it is not about the end result, but about the process. That in the end, if the child lives or the child dies, what matters is if they were held, and loved, and cared for throughout.
Later that day, I sat with the visitors and led a short reflection to close the week in Eldoret and prepare for their upcoming week in Chulaimbo. I read a quote from Dr. Joe Mamlin which I use frequently when writing about Kenya (see “other writings”: Pamelas) to discuss how the group needed to grieve what they had experienced, how they will rebuild their smiles for the next half of their journey, and how they can display hope and courage to others. I was asked the ways in which I was courageous in Kenya and though I had never considered it previously, I knew immediately the single time in Kenya in which I have felt courageous: the day I held Evans in my arms, fully aware that he was soon to die, and cradled him with love (see other writings: Evans).
The next day I sat waiting for a meeting, reading poetry to pass the time. Hidden amidst John Donne, Maya Angelou and Pablo Neruda was this quote by Mary Oliver:
“To live in this world, you must be able to do three things: to love what is mortal; to hold it against your bones knowing your own life depends on it, and, when the time comes to let it go, to let it go.”
I don’t believe in fate, per say, but I do believe that life is about timing; the combination of these three moments led me to a further confirmation of Grace’s belief in my “calling”. In concrete terms, the three occasions grew my interest in pediatric hospice and confirmed my belief in the need for all children to have the right to die surrounded in love. In the abstract, the past two days have led me to believe that my list is not so much a ‘to-do’ list still in need of completion; rather, a future in Kenya may be something of which I am capable. And while my purpose is still in need of clear definition, this sequence of moments reminds me that my general purpose in Kenya is to hold, to love, to care, not matter in what capacity or in what company.
So I move from our week in Eldoret and into our last three weeks with the Umoja Project considering this list, this future, this purpose and thanking Grace, thanking Kimbilio Hospice, thanking the visitors, thanking Mary Oliver for their combined wisdom. While I am far from knowing what my life will look like, or in what way I will end up holding Kenya, I now take each step considering how it will shape my future and how its wise timing affects, strengthens, challenges, defines this business of “being called.”
callie daniels-howell 