I Cried

I cried. First I thought it was simply a release of my day at the orphanage, but as tears began to fall I realized it was because I was no longer going to be living with Dany either. We fell into each other’s arms crying, and my tears did not stop until I walked into the front door of my new house. Crazy. I feel like I just moved to another location completely. Although I am only a few blocks from Estela’s house, my social environment is completely different. I have a mom who will bend over backwards for me, a little sister who is obsessed with TV and Hannah Montana, and a dad that works hard as a school teacher to support his family. Their home is beautiful – they built it fifteen years ago and have artisan furniture and pieces from Jalisco all over. I have a giant king sized bed and outside of my room is a huge beautiful balcony. Feels weird to be treated like a guest. I have become so accustomed to my life at Estela’s. I feel like I am on vacation or something. The bathroom is HUGE. I showered in hot water for the first time in MONTHS. Felt nice. Such a luxury though. So are many things….

We eat a dinner of jugo de papaya, tortas de platano, frijoles, and tortillas. Afterwards everyone drank their glass of milk with pan dulce. Felt silly, really. This is definitely a hard working, yet upper middle class Mexican family. Will be a completely different experience from Estela’s. And although it was hard to leave Dany, I think this experience will be fulfilling for me. In many ways….

Back to the orphanage….I realized I have never been to an orphanage. We walked inside and I was shocked. Wow. I thought, this is beautiful, like a forest. There were huge trees surrounding the grounds, beautiful murals of animals in nature, clean looking buildings, and a huge playground with space to play AND a stadium for basketball with bleachers.

We were all excited to see and begin working with the children. We began in groups, we had a group playing soccer, a group dancing, doing art projects, and yoga. After about 30 minutes the groups seemed to disappear, and the children began to do their own thing and demand attention from us. Their demands ripped me apart. These children have no one to love them, I thought to myself. No parents, no home. This was their home, and as beautiful at it was, I could see and feel that the children were very much incomplete. As if their souls were very far away. Lost, needing love and everything more. It was so sad. So sad. So draining to be with them. And one of the harder parts about it was that many of them had disabilities, as if their parents didn’t want them because of this.

I began to think of all of the children in the world who are abused, or left without parents or anyone to give them food, shelter, or love. The millions of children. And they are going to grow up to….be filled with hate, anger, aggression, and who knows what else. Makes me feel sick. And worried. I just want to give them love and a sense of belonging. Such hard work. Where do we begin????