Pray for Mama. She has had a few bad days as far as the pain
in her knee is concerned. She was hesitant to go to church last night because she
was hurting so badly. She ended up going in spite of the pain – partly because I
offered to take her out for dinner – but mostly because she and I enjoy going
to church for the preaching, for the fellowship, for the blessings it brings
and for the time to serve and to encourage our church family. I was able to get
a medical device working that we used on her last surgeries. It will pump cold
water through a sleeve that can be wrapped around her knee. The wrap allows
both the front and back of the knee to be simultaneously cooled. That should help
with the swelling. Reducing the swelling should help with the movement and
increased movement will eventually reduce the pain.
Also, the device has wraps that squeeze the calves of both
legs while the knee is cooled. That should help. At first, we were not able to
get the sleeve that the cold water is circulated through to fill with water
from the reservoir, but I left it hanging while I had the device elevated and
last night I discovered it had finally filled so that we can use it on Mama.
She is excited. She did finally have a good night of rest last night. She was
awake when I got up for work, happy that she had slept uninterrupted for seven
hours. For her that is a victory we can celebrate.
Last night Mama played a video for me of Savanna counting to
ten in Spanish. I am not sure where Savanna got her West Virginia draw, but it
will definitely influence her diction as she progresses in both languages. I will
look for a way to capture the videos so that they can be shared, but to date I have
not taken the time to discover the pathway to accomplish that. Marco Polo has
become the de facto communication app and I enjoy the times I get to see those
video chats, but they are not necessarily easily transferred to other media for
distribution.
Digressing a few days, I have not written anything about the
time Victoria spent in Honduras. Obviously, she had a wonderful time – most of
it spent in Cori and Nate’s house with the kids. Victoria was only there for a
couple days so it was over far too quickly. Probably the most notable parts of the
trip were her surprise arrival and her sudden departure. The exuberance at her
arrival was answered by an equally emotional response at her departure. Cori
told Mama that for several days after Victoria left, Savanna was very needy,
always wanting to be help and cuddled, plying her with constant questions about
when Victoria was coming back. The lack of understanding about the cost and the
effort involved in Victoria getting there and back is lost one so small. But the
visit will continue to play out over the next few weeks and hopefully, Mama and
I will be able to make our way down there late in the year and stay long enough
to make Savanna understand that we are now far away from her house. That we
will not be able to come and see her very often.
A few weeks ago, Nate shared a letter with us. It is a letter
written by a missionary wife about the emotional struggles of moving to the
mission field – especially as related to her children. In that letter she
touches on the idea that as family does make their way to the field to visit those
serving on a foreign field– generally one at a time – the time they are able to
spend with each other during those visits provides a unique context for
personal interaction; unlike anything normally experienced when they were
geographically close. What she worried about in relocating so far from family
was that the connection to family would be lost. However, she has discovered that
those connections are only made stronger as, one by one, family members come to
spend time at with them at their place of service. It is a bonding that works
both ways – on those serving far away and on those visiting those serving in
those faraway places.
Victoria found that to be true.
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