The Surprise Gift

This blog started out as a letter to my friend Carolyn Williams( who celebrates her big 50^th Birthday next month!) Last Year you celebrated with we Gal-pals in my home, Where will you be in 2007 ? Happy Birthday my dear friend! I love you!

Marie

Dear Carolyn June 19, 2007

Chatting with you on the phone is as if I am only a mile, not a continent away. Thank you so very much for buying the minutes that make such a connection possible.

Interestingly enough when I first arrived in Uganda, Lynn emailed Diana (who was going thru her own personal hell) and said “Marie’s friends call her from the states, do you think she’ll get the full Ugandan experience?” Also Jennifer told Carol I was across the world, not the country and she should let me adjust and not call me.

Diana’s response is one you will understand but not be able to repeat, which was “Screw the Ugandan experience!”

My response when Carol told me what Jennifer said was ”She is probably right, but don’t you dare stop calling!” Ha Ha Ha!

The truth is that after almost 4 months here, your calls (and occasionally from Bert, Joan and Scott) have been a touchstone of sanity when life felt out of my control. I am fully aware that I do not now, nor have I ever had full control over my life, but at least I had that illusion at times(smile). Being here in another country with another language and another culture took away any sense of control I thought I may have had, but a ring on the phone from you and/or Carol picked me up and put me back on the proverbial horse again. Thank you both so much for your constant caring, friendship and prayers.

I sometimes explain myself as an enigma as I love solitude and my time alone equally as much as I adore the gathering of friends in my home, as I did this past weekend. Then I say “What do you mean an enigma? It is exactly what you have prayed for since you were in your twenties----a true “Mary/Martha balance. Now you have it, so shut up and be grateful instead of trying to apologize for it.

And indeed I do have it! The hustle and bustle of preparations for the company this weekend was actually FUN, especially since it all turned out so well.

Let’s see: I planned an outdoor dinner for 16, but because of a most unusual very heavy rain storm, had to be moved inside. The surprise gift was that we all (14) fit perfectly around the very large table that Grace and I carried into the equally large kitchen. We were dry and warm and the house was filled with new friends (Jeff and Courtney, Trish, Greg) somewhat older friend Diana ( we went thru LMH Mission school together, so 10 months seems like a lifetime) and the laughter of children(Ellis-age 8 yrs, Marie-age 5 yrs and Gabby-age 3yrs)

------------ I planned to pick up a gas cooker (two burners) which I did, but was unable to purchase the gas or tubing or connections needed, so therefore Grace and I had to cook an entire meal on two mini hibachi charcoal stoves. The surprise gift was that fish and chips and cabbage and squash and baked beans and yummy bread (that I doctored with a basting of butter and honey and cinnamon) tasted even better cooked on charcoal,

--------------I planned to help serve the food to the hundreds of guests here at the Jubilee Celebration on Saturday, but instead was requested to assist adorning the church for the Mass. The surprise gift was that I did a terrific job and helped set the perfect backdrop for the three Bishops and zillions of priests that came to dedicate the opening of the new Church.

…......(Next time, I’ll have a series of Golden Jubilee Photo’s to share with you)…….

----------------I had hoped to be involved in the Jubilee Celebration Mass as a lector or help Father John in some way, but was unable to pull it together, or even learn the hymns well enough to be in the choir. The surprise gift was that Fr..John did request my help thru the liturgy and I was able to live out a childhood dream of being an altar boy (unheard of in my day-smile).

It was a fun filled, spiritually nourishing, emotionally packed weekend and I am grateful to my guests and the Staff at St. Francis (past and present) for allowing me to celebrate this happy occasion of the 50 years Jubilee of St. Francis Hospital, with them.

…...Then the perfect balance of the Active/Contemplative life that I prayed for as a young woman peaked on Monday: I was just leaving work for “tea” about 11 am when a beautiful smiling woman greeted me. I responded appropriately but she continued to stare at me until I looked fully at her and gasping said ”Maria?” Yes, it was Maria Goretti Nyirabucayungura, the woman I have been home visiting with HIV-AIDS, who shares my name and patron saint—St. Maria Goretti. and whose story ”Tears of Hope” you have been following in my blogs..

What a surprise that she was able to walk several miles to come to the hospital to visit with me and see the Dr. Apparently the blood pressure medicine had worked and the dizziness she had been struggling with had gone away.

After a wonderful reunion and a good meal, she visited the Dr., who again tried to convince her to take the ART. She, again, refused stating that she is unable to have the foods necessary or the firewood to cook what food she does have, to tolerate taking the drugs. After a visit with my supervisor, I walked Maria to the gate and paid a boda-boda driver ( a bicycle with a padded seat on the rear wheel) 500 shillings (about 30 cents) to take her home.

It seems Maria communicated to the Dr. and my supervisor, Justine, that my two visits had given her new life and our praying together in her humble home had sealed our friendship. She now felt hopeful and wanted to live, she believed I had been sent from God to be with her on her journey,

She understands I am a medical missionary, not a rich American come to fix her life.

That is a problem all amuzunga’s (white people) face here----that we all have the money to support them and send their children to school.

Then at the close of my work day, I decided to pray in the small St. Francis Chapel, taking my numerous devotional books with me. Admittantly, I have not spent the time in personal prayer that my calling to the Missions necessitates, but this day I took the time to read, pray and even meditate. Then I walked up the hill to another convent to see if there would be a 6pm Mass, as there sometimes is on Mondays. I was surprised to find Fr. John (his day off). He came down from the altar to give me the missal with the readings in English, as he was going to say the Mass in yet another of the many local languages in this country.

Fr. John is so kind to me and thoughtful of my language weakness. He always tries to include me and reaffirms my calling as a lay missionary.

It was indeed a very personal Mass for me and a perfect conclusion to an earlier hour in His Presence at St. Francis Chapel. I went to sleep last night feeling very whole, very balanced, indeed, very blessed.

My new friend Greg, a dentist from California, volunteering in Nychbale for his one month vacation, said ”You are in Paradise here”.” Yes, Greg, this is Paradise and I am the luckiest woman in the world”

Special thanks to the real “surprise” gift in my Ugandan experience “my helper Grace”. Trust me when I say, without her there would have been no happy ending to my dinner party Friday night. Thank you, dear Grace!

Keep your eyes and your heart open to all” the surprise gifts” God want so desperately to give YOU today.

………………………………….Marie…………..

.

.

* Just as I was writing this letter, I responded to a knock at the door. Synchronistic ally, my visitor was one of Maria’s children,Gerald, who is in boarding school not far from here. We had a very nice visit, prayed together regarding his future when he graduates from high school next year and talked of his mother and her health. He agreed that his mother should take the ARV’s, but also agreed that the food is not available to help her tolerate the medicines.

I am left with the dilemma of how much I can, or should, get involved. I know I can’t solve all the problems in the world, or even this community, but I can arrange for Maria to have Irish potatoes (that’s what we are known for here in Kisoro) and I can encourage her children to gather the wood to cook them. Hum—let me pray on this one………….