Photo of the week - 6/22-6/29

this isn't the best photo i've ever taken. but my best work doesn't necessarily mean the photo of the week. i chose this photo solely for the subject matter.

little yajaira.

she is actually andre's sister. she's feisty. disobedient. excellent hugger. loving. nurturing. and she's got a bit of a twinkle in her eye. but the day this photo was taken, wasn't her best day.

we'd just gotten down to the hole and were about to feed the kids. i was chatting with felix abreu, the pastor in the hole, just wondering how the kids were doing. he said it wasn't that good of a day there. the police had been around all morning. i asked if anyone was taken. sure enough. the police stormed a house that morning, kids all watching in horror, as their dad was grabbed and escorted out. yajaira and andre's dad.

i immediately scanned the tables to find her, to see how she was doing. there she was smiling, hugging, playing with an american woman as if life was as normal as could be. i couldn't help but wonder about her. about her demeanor. did she really feel ok about what went down that morning? was life just like that, that it's no big deal to see your own dad dragged out of your house by a bunch of armed men? has she seen so many awful things in her seven or so years that a scene like that just doesn't phase her? or is she just so used to these things that, in her seven or so years, she's already learned to bottle it up? to push the hurt and pain, confusion and sadness, as far down as she can as to not feel it?

my heart ached for her. whether she was aching or not. that a little girl should see something like that and go about her day as if it were just a normal day. but there was hope after all that. she showed up at the feeding center, greeted by people who love her. people that were there only to love her and give her some attention. let her know that not all things end so painfully. that hope is revealed through love. and who else to show her love but the god who is love.