consistency

Her little body law sprawled out on the tile floor, but she can't feel the chill coming through the stone because her puffy jacket is keeping her nice and snuggled. Backpack the size of her whole torso and creeping up the back of her head--it is slid right up under the nape of her neck. Her arms still strung in the straps but stretched out on either side of her, her legs sprawled out in the same way. Her boots look two sizes too big and I notice that her pink striped hat is falling down over her closed eyelids as I lay down next to her. A whole day at school and the walk home in the brisk, January, Viennese air is the last straw for Ramana. She is exhausted. But living in the upstairs, sprawling apartment of the Missionaries of Charity house on the Gürtel with 5 or 6 other families (only women and children), she has to play dead to get any peace. And she doesn't know yet that I am there.
I mean, we're there every Tuesday. Nothing new. But its so easy to forget what day it is when you're six and too busy living in the present. Its so easy to think that a week is a month and three minutes, three hours. So I lay next to her on the cold, tan, tile floor of the entryway, until she realizes the still presence laying next to her, and opens her eyes. Her eyes look more like they are squinting as a smile broadens across her face, immediately occupying every muscle in her round, blushed face, framed by untamed dark locks and emanating a bounding spirit full of energy and love. It only takes her a moment to leave her exhaustion behind in the place where she formerly laid and jump on my back, resting her head on my neck as she wraps her arms around me.

"DU!!! Du bist da!!!!! JUHU!!"   (you! you're here! yay!)

It hasn't always been like this. walking back that evening with Alina I count back the months that we have been visiting the third floor of the sisters' house. wow. Its been five months since our first visit, full of formality, homework help, and shyness, later giving way to quick-paced Russian conversations and shoulder rides. Its been five months of new and old faces, of Tuesday afternoons, of UNO games, playing hairdresser, doing homework, drawing pictures, fighting, tickling, crying, reprimanding, pretending to be human jungle gyms, playing tag, drinking tea, cracking walnuts, peeling potatoes, smiling, hugging, loving, growing....

CONSISTENCY

the most important ingredient. One that has a sneaky way of being easy to forget in leu of our tendency to give into tiredness, timidness, annoyance, SELF. But it is the ingredient that makes all the difference. it is the leaven in the dough. it is the foundation of friendship. 

Not just in our visits to Luba, Louisa, Jeanette, Ramana, Ela, Ichmael, and everyone....

its in every aspect of life, every visit, every relationship. Being "there" requires consistency, a necessary dying to yourself and any momentary anti-inclination--not out of duty or obligation, but out of LOVE. 

Like after being away for two weeks with my parents, I hadn't been to the nursing home in two weeks, where we are normally visiting the residents of "Station 7" every Friday afternoon. But I didn't really feel bad. I figured--they barely remember me when I come every Friday anyway. So it is not a big deal. No one will probably even ask where I had been. 

I couldn't have been more wrong. 

"Where have you been!! Why haven't you been to visit? I wasn't sure if you hadn't gone back home to the USA or not!"

They didn't know exactly how long it has been since the last time, but they knew. They knew that the two girls that usually visit every Friday hadn't been there in 2 weeks and while we were being occupied with other things, they lived our absence. 

CONSISTENCY

In the nursing home I have learned its importance through an event of inconsistency. and with Ramana and the women and children Chechenian refugees, I learned it through the fruit of consistency. Now, after ringing the bell an obnoxiously super-fluent number of times, and walking in the door now, calling to our little friends to come out of their rooms and hiding places, I am greeted with faces shining with joy and excitement. I have truly never before seen such a sweetly twinkling look in the eyes as they gaze up at me upon our arrival. The arms that cling to my legs. The little boy voices and little girl voices filled with excitement yelling "Du bist da! Sie sind da! Schau!! JUHU!!" (You are here! They are here! Look! Yay!) The momentum of the little legs running down the halls, arms held out to you waiting for a welcoming embrace and the fulfillment of what they had anxiously been waiting for since we left the Tuesday before. 

It comes slowly and all of the sudden. This love. This ease. This comfortable excitement. The security and trust that leads to such moments of pure delight. That is the fruit of consistency. Of never giving up on love. 

Its slow, and all of the sudden. And slowly, those Tuesday afternoons and Friday afternoons become not something to live through but to live for. Because the consistency is the fertilizer of friendship and your delight is as much a part of the afternoon as theirs! 

Sitting around the table one evening while Alina helped Ahkmed with his math homework, and I held Ishmael and fed him a bottle, both of us surrounded by several others practicing their superman tricks, flying from the tabletop to the floor, we were joined by a sister coming upstairs to check on things. She is the mother superior of the house. Romana sat next to me and hung out as I fed Ishmael. Then Ramana, all of the sudden, catches Sr. Gabriela's attention and very matter of fact-ly states: "Schwester! Die Zwei--Ich liebe sie so sehr!! SO SEHR!!!!"  (Sister! These two--I love them so much! So much!!) Giving each of us a big hug and smiling her largest, sweetest, smile. 

my heart jumps and responds in a breathless whisper! 

o Ramana! I love you too!