so beautiful

I know I've already mentioned how busy we are down on the wards. We're so close to the end of the outreach, and it's the time when we're faced with the reality that if we don't do the surgeries we've planned, they may never happen. Every morning, when we meet to decide who will be admitted for the day, we're holding lives in our hands, trying to weigh futures against the already-bursting wards. Suffice it to say, this is not my favourite time of year.

But in amongst all the heartbreak, there is joy. I was working in B Ward this morning when I heard the drums start to pound in A. Four of the VVF ladies had come back to dress in fine, new dresses. They had come to put on makeup and string necklaces and bracelets. They had come to dance, because they were dry.

In the midst of the celebration, I needed something from the desk in A Ward, so I tried to quietly sneak in and out. One of the disciplers called me to the front of the room. Sis Alice, you will pray for one of our women. You will present her with her gifts.

I tried to say no, to go back to my work, but when I looked at the bag she was holding out to me, I realized how foolish it would be to pass up the opportunity. I took the package and looked over to the ladies, four women in all their finery, sitting proudly in front of a room of people where only weeks ago, they didn't dare to show their faces in public. On the far left I saw the beaming face and wiggling eyebrows of one of my favourite ladies, Irene. I headed to her chair with my gifts and my meager French and I tried to explain what I was giving her.

Scented soaps, so she can wash and know that, in Christ, she is clean. A Bible, so she can study the word of God. A mirror, so that she can know how beautiful she is. She grabbed me around my neck, planting a loud kiss on my cheek, and we bowed our heads together to pray. I prayed in English, but she seemed to know what I was saying, inserting loud Amens! when I asked God to give her joy, to make her a testimony to her village.

And then I slipped back out. Back to the relative quiet of B Ward and back to the endless work that waited for me.

Much later, around eight in the evening, when I was finally finishing up some extra paperwork that needed to be done yesterday, I stopped in D Ward on my way back to my cabin. There in the corner was a familiar face. Anicette and her mama have been Mercy Ships fixtures this outreach, spending long months on the wards and in the Hospitality Center. Ani was far too small for surgery when she first came to us, malnourished because of her cleft lip and palate. But under the watchful care of our feeding program, she's gained ounces and pounds.

Today, when I went to her bed to give her mama a hug, little Ani's lip sported some sutures, the steri strips over top of them making a smooth, unbroken line. She gazed up at me with her big dark eyes and held tight to the finger I offered. Her mama, Zenabou, called over another patient's visitor and relayed a question to him in Fon that he then asked me in French.

Is she beautiful?

My heart shattered into a million pieces, thinking of all the patients on the wards right now. All the VVF ladies, all the little kids with crossed eyes and huge tumors and burn scars. They all just want to know if they're beautiful, and so I answered for all of them. For Irene and Bidemi and Belvida and Pascaline. For Anicette.

Oui, elle est belle. Hier. Aujourd'hui. Demain. Elle est belle.

Yesterday, today and tomorrow. They are all so beautiful.


(Photo by Meg Petock.)