every once in a while, life comes running at you
and you get this funny feeling that you knew it was coming.
that's how i felt when i finally got my mission call.
it was a feeling that i didn't realize i was missing, but
one, that as soon as i felt it, knew i was looking for all along.
i was one of those people that didn't do research about my mission before setting off for the mtc.
i didn't even ask questions about what the mtc would be like.
i decided to just go along for the ride, and let it take me where it would.
fast forward through the rollercoaster that was the mtc,
and the first couple of weeks of my first "cambio" (or exchange) with my companion.
(for those of you who don't know, a mission is divided into sections, called exchanges,
usually six weeks long. every mission calls them something different, but
being spanish-speaking, we called them cambios.)
my companion and i had had great success finding people to teach
and helping people come unto christ.
but i felt like we were lacking on something i felt like we, as missionaries,
should be taking a bigger effort to do: service for those in our area.
so we set off to an appointment one day, without really thinking too much about it.
andy, my precious andy, wasn't home, so we decided to spend some time
meeting a few new people in the surrounding area.
we ended up behind a school not far from andy's home,
and i felt prompted to knock on a giant red door.
it was the only one on the whole street i felt like we should knock, too.
when i did, guess whose big, adorable black eyes answered the door?
andy.
andy had gone over to his grandma's house after school
because she had been sick the last couple of days.
he would spend the afternoon in her company,
before it got too dark and he couldn't make it back home safely.
when we got there, we spent some time with andy,
but something wasn't right.
we felt the need to talk with andy's grandma and help her in her need.
as sister missionaries, we could only pray and ask in faith
that she would be healed, but there was something more we could do:
serve.
andy's grandma made a small comment about not being able to offer water
because all the cups and other possible cups were dirty.
that day was the day i learned the word traste,
the word the nicaraguans use to describe the dishes in general.
my companion and i spent an hour washing all of her dishes and putting them away with andy.
when we were done, she offered to make us jugo or refresco
but by then, we felt like our work there was done.
we excused ourselves, and went on our way.
little did i know, that andy's grandma was a less active member
and that andy had been begging her for months to come to church
(ever since he started taking the lessons, really).
the next sunday, guess who was sitting next to andy at church:
grandma.
in the remaining months i was there in loma linda,
grandma's health came and went.
but andy never failed to come with grandma to church.
there are many times in my life, that i wonder what it would be like to go back to nicaragua
now that i have lived on my own again for two years.
a lot of things have changed, and a lot of things have not.
people would still view me as fachenta, or rich, because of my white female status.
i often dream though of yelling buenas over crude fences and doors of zinc.
of the smiles and cries and abrazos that would be inevitable when they recognized me.
i can't decided if i would want a party or just a few minutes at each home to catch up, pay my respects, and move on.
there really is no other way around it:
soy nica y nada me va a cambiar.
