Last

The last time we visited the orphanage was on Thursday when Keza and I went back to say our goodbyes. We had been to the Home of Hope many times and had by now frequented the baby room to pick Keza up for the day and then mournfully return her each night.

We walked with a Sister through the entire orphanage and adult home. I loved the men and women's wards. Old, wrinkly, mentally unstable, physically handicapped: the forgotten lined the rooms. The women and men alike had tears in thier eyes when they looked at Keza in my arms. We traveled to each bed and waited for a dry, wrinkled hand to touch her. One woman took my own hand and smelled it. Another kissed my arm. Another wouldn't let me go. It made me think of Rwanda, of the hundreds of thousands who have died, of a country where the median age is 18.5 because mothers and fathers are dead. These rare old souls, I realized, were once Rwanda. Now they are withered and confined. And how could they not love her, sweet little child that belongs to them, that started in them?

I loved the room of handicapped children. We all did. After leaving I thanked my mother for raising us the way she did. We were surrounded by the mentally and physically handicapped. We welcomed them into our home and cared for them. We were taught to be fearless, because they are people just as we are. Talking and touching these children my belief that God's holds people such as these in the center of His heart was magnified. They were so beautiful and so sweet.

The baby room was the hardest for me. Because Keza is only 5 months old, I didn't expect her to react a certain way while we were there. But, to my surprise, it was the hardest place for her as well. We walked into the room and were greeted by the workers and the cries of babies. Keza's lips and chin immediately started quivering and when the nuns and workers, sweet as they are, tried to hold her she burst into tears. It was obvious that she knew where she was, that she didn't want to be part of this room, that she was ready to leave. I held her tightly and whispered that she never would have to lay in this crib again and that she would always be mine. As I spoke to her I saw her brothers and sisters stacked in rows. Children that look just as she looks, that smell just as she smells, that sound just as she sounds, that need families just as she does.

The Sisters at Home of Hope are incredible. They love these children and care for them well. They do everything they can do. But it isn't enough. The babies never leave the room. They are held long enough to be fed and changed. How many hours might that take a day? One total? Maybe? And what of the other 23 hours? They lay on their backs, in a hot, stuffy, crowded, noisy room. They listen to the sounds of other children crying and being cared for. They don't have the kisses and the skin on skin. They don't have tickles and raspberries blown on their tummies. They don't have the security of parents and of family.

And I want them. I want them all.

After leaving the orphanage our Power of Attorney told me that every time she walks through the orphanage children ask her, "Are you going to bring me a family next?" I wonder if the little boy who held Heidi's hand asked that. I wonder if he knows he is HIV positive? I wonder if the little girl with the blue dress and bottomless brown eyes asked that? And I wonder, how many families could love these little ones if only would open thier eyes and see.

The sign in the courtyard of the Home of Hope says, "Make your life something beautiful for God." I've been thinking about that. I've been thinking that I have a lot to give, that I can bring something beautiful to dark places. And that I want my eyes to always be open.