64/365

Daylight fades to evening dusk and lights create shadows in unexpected places. Dust covers nearly every surface, and so too do bright papers with letters. We play a seeking game, searching out letters in a mixed up pile, another step in learning to decipher the code. Upstairs, bigger kids begin to construct light circuits and another group sits around the table, ready to create images of light and dark. 

Eight students registered for my class, and tonight only one shows up. He's a bright one, and the two hours pass in a blink. We unscramble letters. We read tag-team style; he takes the letters and I take the text,
"A,"
"told,"
"B,"
"and,"
"B,"
"told,"
"C,"
"I'll meet you at the top of the coconut tree."
We sing and jump and wiggle and write. Watching a kid learn, making the connections, that can be a thrilling process.

We're trying a new thing at the community center, registration-only classes one afternoon a week. In these couple of hours, we hope to go deeper with these kids, deeper in knowledge, deeper in time together, deeper in relationships. We know that there is opportunity for so much more than where we currently are. It's a learning process, on every side. For kids in this place, habits form slow. Days and hours don't mean as much in a place where calendars and watches rarely show themselves. We never know who will attend when the afternoon arrives. On this cool and rainy day, attendance was down. But the weather is only a guess as to why. We consider that all too many other reasons could be behind the absences.

And so, I'm ever aware that every time we have together with these kids is important. I'm ever aware that we have no time to waste, not in teaching, not in learning, not in our speech, not in our actions, not in how we love. Our prayer is always to show and speak of our Lord's goodness, that we would be His witnesses in this place. 

"Skit skat skoodle doot flip flop flee."

(Quotes from Chicka Chicka Boom Boom by Bill Martin, Jr. and John Archambault)