From inside the clinic I heard a little voice, screaming, pleading "Blenda, no! Blenda, no! Blenda! Blenda! Blenda!" I promptly set down my afternoon coffee and rushed to the clinic where I found little Hannah sitting on the lap of one of the cooks, a security guard holding her legs and arm while Nurse Brenda held her right hand. Her right thumb was swollen, the skin shiny and taut from being stretched from infection. As soon as Hannah saw me peeking over the cook's shoulder her cries changed, "Melly, help! Melly, help! Melly! Melly! Melly!" (She can't quite pronounce Rs.) Hannah watched, her eyes wide and filled with fright, as Brenda sanitized a razor blade so she could puncture the skin and release some of the puss. Tears gushed from her eyes and her face was covered with sweat as she struggled with the cook and the guard, her words choked in her throat as she begged me to rescue her, and I felt like a complete traitor.
I wiped her face and softly told her, "Brenda is helping you. She doesn't want to hurt you. The pain won't last long. It will feel better when she's finished. She needs to do this for your good." But how can you rationalize with a 5-year old in the midst of a painful moment? Of course she could only think I was lying when I told her it would be better in the end. (There's a great analogy here but it will have to wait.) After Brenda had cleaned her thumb and given an antibiotic to fight the infection Hannah clung to me, shaking from the pain and fear and perhaps feeling betrayed that Brenda had hurt her so intentionally?
Precious Hannah Montana, as the other kids call her, five years old and bursting with personality. The best part is that she's a twin and little Eli is basically her male clone.
Their story is so common it can seem insignificant but the testimony of their lives, of any life, is worthy. Two babies came into the world and the mother who had carried and birthed them left it. A poor father unable to feed his own children brought them to an orphanage, wanting to give them a life he could not provide, hoping they would live, where they have thrived.
I love this picture because they're clasping their hands the same way without any prompting.
Nature vs. nurture is a mental game I play often with myself and I know that these two are advocates for the dominance of nature. They have been raised in the same environment but they have different house-mothers, local women who live full-time at Harvesters and care for their daily needs, and both of their house-mothers are good, kind, caring women. The only time I see them together is during meals where they sit side-by-side at the preschool table, but Eli and Hannah are so much alike. So much that I know I could identify their father in a crowd. Strong-willed, independent, full of joy, curious, a bit stubborn, with quick smiles and bubbling with giggles at anything funny.
I once found Hannah with a long jump rope and she'd tied one end to the fence and was swinging the other end and trying to jump over it. I watched as she grew frustrated by not being able to swing the rope high enough over her head and finally asked if she wanted my help. "No Melly, I will do it, you watch," she instructed me. Yes, ma'am.
Almost every night, without fail, Eli sprints from the bath house to his room carrying his dirty clothes. When he finally gets to his room he throws his clothes in the air hoping they'll land on the roof. They never fly high enough and when they fall back to the ground he runs to catch them. He tosses them up again, and they float back down. Over and over, every night, the clothes never reach the roof but he keeps trying. He giggles, running in circles, chasing his clothes in this strange, childish little ritual.
Tonight, as I think about these two my mind lingers on the quote, "One death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic." The same could be said of orphans: one orphan is a tragedy, a million orphans is a statistic. The number of orphans in the world is staggering: millions of children have lost both parents and tens of millions have lost at least one parent.
But the millions of orphans on this earth are not statistics; they are not faceless, nameless, homogenous children living on distant planets. They are Hannah and Eli, with matching button noses and playful eyes, abandoned by their parents because of death and poverty and necessity. They talk in class and dance in church and insist on swinging jump ropes themselves. And they hurt their fingers and cry real tears, tears that moisten their clothes and stain their cheeks. Some of them have been blessed to live at a place like Harvesters, but many of them are alone, fending for themselves on the streets of Brazil or India or Thailand.
On nights like this, when my heart mourns for those orphans who weep unnoticed tears, I am reminded of the words of Psalm 56:8:
You keep track of all my sorrows.
You have collected all my tears in your bottle.
You have recorded each one in your book.
