Free to laugh. Free to dance. We are family.

This Monday afternoon, I heard a quiet knock from my atop my plaid-covered bed. And the timid opening of our painfully creaky door where I reside. Followed by the squeal of a young girl in a smart, hot pink pinafore, who proceeded to hurl herself onto me. Trailing quickly behind was a young lad, smart too in his pink button-up and daily polished black school shoes. With a quiet grin he too gave me a big hug, the biggest a skinny boy of age seven could muster I believe. Retracing their steps away from the mat they removed their shoes, then climbed atop my bed beside me. Puppy dog eyes the size of goose eggs that time back had looked around my room with bewilderment were more at home this day. Sharing gnuts together, to fill the tummies of beloved children who had likely not eaten since posho and beans for lunch, the young boy was especially glad, and careful to eat all, even the crumbles. Puffing up his cheeks and popping the air out with his small fingers, likely laden with dirt form the schoolyard, I knew he loved me. Words were not necessary. After sharing laughs, reading about Yertle the “Kabaka” Turtle, and dancing the calypso, I reminded myself that “a visitor is not an intruder” (Taylor). And thus purposed myself to treasure my time spent with these lovely children, knowing too that my time here with them is on the brink of being over. Pasting stickers on each other and translating animal names of the stickers to Luganda, I remember the deserved giggles for my fumbling tongue.

Free to laugh. Free to dance. Unhindered and unashamed. Living outside my fearful self and enjoying life and love.

Holding hands we closed out dance party to “We are Family.” Hands and bodies forming a circle of three, spinning and moving our feet to the tempo, the girl exclaimed, “we ARE family” with purity on her smiling lips. Flooding emotions filled my heart with the inclusive intimacy that my sister had invited me into. I am remembering now what Dr. Brooks shed light on just the other day: Jesus allowed the agendas of people to interrupt Him and was fully present in loving and teaching them. “To live is Christ,” to love is Christ… He who says he abides in Him ought Himself also to walk just as He walked” (Philippians; 1 John 2:5-6).

What if I had not let their interruption conflict with my coursework? What if I had rushed them out after handing them a lollipop like last time? We never would have danced as a family. I never would have seen the lesson of life played out for me. Life is relationships. Presence. Selfless love. And lived not through the tick marks beside a long list of to-dos, but through the allowance of sporadic interruptions to exceed all plans ever imagined. “This is your life/ are you who you want to be” (Switchfoot).