Only Just Begun

I can’t leave this place. I can’t. I keep trying to rework in my head how to stay – take a year off from college? No. I can’t do that either. I need and want to finish. I want to go to conservatory or get a master’s after graduation anyway. I can’t postpone the completion of my bachelor’s degree and I know that. The trouble is that I’ve come up with all these ideas for Layla. There are so many possibilities
swimming in my head and I only have two weeks left. Layla is changing rapidly. I know it won’t be the same place when I come back, which means I may have to brainstorm all over again. I won’t be here to flow with the change.

It started when last week (see 'Guitar Lesson' above). Though it had only
been two hours since I had said goodbye for the day, I still missed the children. “Why not,” I thought. “Why not step in for a few minutes to say hello.” In the courtyard a fierce game of soccer careened from end to end. Someone scored just in time for the bell to prayers. We gathered in the dining room, those of us who wished to pray, sitting on woven straw mats. Three or four younger children stood to lead our prayers. Those kneeling, squatting, and sitting on the mat punctuated in unison each amaseginallo with amen. Then we listened to Amharic spiritual music boom from the television before a concluding round of prayers. With the final amen, all children rose, rolled away the mat, and started off to brush their teeth and settle in to bed.

Wishing to say goodnight to each of my 64 darlings, I joined the procession to the bedrooms. In the class B room, T_____ knelt at her bed, manipulating her sheets into place. Two other girls were rearranging stuffed animals and folding away clothes from the day. This was my sister’s room when she lived here. It’s sunny yellow walls and pink curtains make the black iron frame beds look softer. “Would you like to hear a lullaby?” I interrupted my own thoughts. Only gazes of puzzlement met my question. “You know,” I continued, “a goodnight song. Doesn’t anyone ever sing to before you sleep? Maybe your mother did when you were little, or maybe your grandmother?” Nobody knew what a lullaby or a goodnight song was. I gathered the girls to me on the cement floor, pulling T_____ from her entanglement with the sheets. T______ is wheelchair bound – I account for much of her transportation. Warmed by the crowded huddle and T in my lap, I sang “Now’s the Time to go to
Sleep,” “Winkin’, Blinkin’, and Nod,” and other lulling songs.

Applause interrupted the thickly sleepy atmosphere and I looked up to see two little boys, Ashernafi and Gossa, peering through the wired opening at the top of the bedroom wall. “Song! Song!” They chanted. “Song for us. Me! Me!” I hugged the girls goodnight, whispering Wadishalo into each of their ears. It’s the Amharic for “I love you,” when addressing a female. Wadihalo is for a boy. In the next room, Ashernafi and Gossa, both about 7 or 8 years old, climbed into my lap for their goodnight songs. There was still too much noise and rambunctiousness going on.
“Boys, boys,” I called out. “I can’t sing until you are quiet. Some settled into their beds, others came down to the floor. “What would you like to hear?” I asked.
“Jack Johnson,” answered Bruk. He pulled and unfolded a paper from his pocket. It was the lyrics to “Remember When,” a song Gutu and I had taught the group 3 students that afternoon. We sang the same verse three or four times before moving onto the Beatles’ “Imagine,” followed by “Be Though my Vision.” Room by room I made my way around the compound, singing new and familiar songs, distributing hugs and goodnight kisses. Everywhere I went Ashernafi and Gossa followed along, curling
up in my lap as though they’d never once heard me sing before.

A phone call eventually interrupted my songs and I soon left for the evening, so glad that I had been random enough to stop in for a while.

Speaking with Ivy the next morning, I decided that at least for the next few weeks of my time, I would come in and sing lullabies and goodnight songs with the children. The trouble is, after I leave, who will continue on? No one, unfortunately. Then, this afternoon, I was daydreaming up a project for a rainy Sunday afternoon. Charmaigne suggested free writing. The children don’t do much of it, mostly copy work instead. Even better, we decided that they could draw a picture and then write something about it. The more our conversation carried, the better the idea became. Now we have a plan to compile a small book that includes self- portraits, children’s stories of how they came to Layla, poetry by the children and English translations, and writing bits on what they dream of and hope for one day. Also included will be the stories of volunteers and how they found Layla, and some of our photographs and descriptive writings/musings as well. It will something I can take home to show you all, to give you a better glimpse of the children and
what life is here. What we do, where we go, and how we got here.

And I’ve only just come to see how I can better teach and share music with these children, tutor them, love them, be there for them. And I have to leave? How? I will need a lot of soft (what the children call tissues and toilet paper). I need to be here for months, maybe a few years – not just a summer. It’s too, too short. I want to be here for these kids to let them know that just because they haven’t been picked yet doesn’t mean that they aren’t loved. I love them, cranky, bashful, eccentric, sassy, adorable – I love them all, and all the time.