Subscribe for email updates on new releases and current projects:

Subscribe

* indicates required

Intuit Mailchimp

Wednesday, February 13, 2013

Dividing hearts

It always amazes me how easy it is to transition from one place to another.  When we arrived home from Honduras a week and a half ago, there were so many new thoughts, fresh memories, fledgling relationships.  It felt like those things would make a permanent impact in my life.

To some extent, they have.  I find myself thinking and talking a lot about Honduras and what we experienced there, especially about the Manuelito Project.

But I'm also amazed how quickly the tyranny of the urgent reasserts itself and I find myself putting all available energy into things that, two weeks ago, seemed like trivia.  Even while my focus is on the minutiae of life in Minnesota -- a snowblower axle that is stuck so I can't fix my snowblower, a hymn we've sung two Sundays in a row, concern about the roads between here and St. Paul and whether I squeeze in a hospital visit and still make it back for the noon Ash Wednesday service -- at a deeper level I'm aware that there are kids in Talanga hoping to get past the gate at Manuelito to dig through the garbage in hopes of finding food or recyclables.

I find that I have to be intentional about that, however.  It's too easy to forget.  So yesterday, under my bulky orange sweater, I wore my new t-shirt that reminds me, "Children shouldn't live in the street."  Los niños no deben vivir en la calle.

Yes, at the moment I'm responsible for a lot of details here in Minnesota.  It would be irresponsible of me not to have my head in the game right here, right now.  But I don't want to forget, don't want to transition so easily.

This is one reason I'm glad I was part of a group.  I can't imagine how hard it would be to hang on to these memories, these perspectives, if I had been alone in Honduras.  So our group is getting together Saturday evening.  And in the meantime Julie and I share memories, or I check in with the girls, or I look on Facebook and see what's new at Manuelito.  Because once again, as has happened so many times before, my heart now lives in more than one place.

No comments:

Post a Comment