Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Wow, leaving is coming upon me like a big heavy wave, knocking me backwards and flipping me over and over and getting me all disoriented and wet. I just read Holly’s blog about closure and detailing everything that’ll be happening in the next few weeks and what all we need to do and basically, the plan. I need to eat a snickers. Anyway, it all just came upon me like a huge wave and I’m realizing how bittersweet it’ll all be. I say that in the future tense, because I’m the kind of person who generally doesn’t start feeling intensely emotional until an event actually happens, or even sometimes not til after. Like, it’ll be all the changes and the closure activities that finally will make it all hit home and that’ll make me well up with tears. But I can feel a little of it now too – now that I know what all is going to happen and I can visualize it. This Sunday we’ll have a big meeting on closure and how we’re going to achieve it. We’ll talk about what our last activities are going to be with the kids and the branch. We’ll wrap presents for our kids to give them as we leave. We’ll write thank you notes, we’ll get gifts for the outreach girls and a few more things. The week after that is…the last full week. That…will…be…hard. The week after that, we’ll probably only go until Wednesday. Since half the group leaves on the 12th, their last day at the orphanage will be Friday, the 8th. When they leave, Podul will close down and we’ll only go over there to use the internet. As a side note, Shannon has Michael Buble’s “Home” playing on repeat right now and I’m pretty sure that’s affecting my feelings too. Anyway, I don’t know what else to say that’ll express my feelings, but I think you all understand at least a little bit. Everyone has had to say goodbye to something or someone. Before I move on, I just have to throw in that I actually did almost cry when I was reading the blog, at the end, when Holly said, “you know that old saying ‘last best of all the game’ you guys have been my best group by far (she’s been here 3 semesters and is going home for good). I don’t know why, but that just made me lose it. Anyway, yes, ok, so I need to move on. Starting with this morning, Dancu was really really hard. Iuliana was in possibly the worst mood I’ve ever seen her in. No matter what Shannon did she would just scream and cry. Finally, about a half hour before we were to leave, both Shannon and Iuli fell asleep. Costica was also a bit of a pill and could not be comforted either. Mihai, however, was surprisingly good and content and Petrica, well, Petrica is always good. Today he was just sitting on the couch, all slumped over and rocking and I lay face down on the couch and slid right up to him. I put my head right next to his and put my hand close to where his chin would come to when he’d rock forward. I coaxed him into not rocking anymore and got him to rest his chin on my hand. Then I just lay his head against my shoulder. He let out this big sigh and just relaxed onto me. All I can say is I love him more than I can explain. Today, Maria and Dada were working and we got fed an amazing lunch. On our way out of Dancu we saw this teeny tiny adorable little scared puppy on one of the side roads. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a dog that small. He was a little afraid of us, especially at first, but after trying to coax him for a few minutes and managing to get him to let us pet his face a little, he trusted us well enough so that when we decided to leave, he started trotting after us. It’s a good thing he was really slow and we were really fast, because should we have let him follow us across the street, he may have gotten run over. At the hospital, we found out as soon as we walked in, that Ionut passed away either last night or this morning (for all of those who are reading this and can’t place him or don’t know which Ionut I mean, he’s the baby with hydrocephaly). I had a feeling, yesterday, that he may and so I went in there specifically to say goodbye to him. Melissa had been with him and told me he looked particularly bad, so I went down there and just rubbed his tummy a little and gave him a little kiss and left. I’m sooo glad I need because otherwise I would have felt just horrible, like I’d passed up on a this huge opportunity – spending time with this kid when he had so few hours left to offer us. It’s good that he died though, because he was always in so much pain and was always so uncomfortable. I’ll be excited to see him when I die. And besides, this way he didn’t have 3 lonely weeks without any of us to comfort him. After I found that out, I went on the first floor with Shannon to see Gigi. I was with him the entire time and he was such a pill! He’s definitely institutionalized – it shows. He’s very moody and wary of people and seems to be actually afraid of a lot of things. Shannon and I did get him to smile a little, but he probably whimpered and cried more. Most of the time he just looked at us like, “um, yes?” At some point I noticed that he would freak out if a nurse came in and didn’t stay with him and left. There was especially this one nurse, who he seemed to really like. She’d come in and he’d start making all these noises like, “oh no you don’t, come here to me!” And she’d usually just watch him from the door or something and then leave and when she left he’d start bawling and be so mad! It made me mad too, because I was like, “geez, stop coming here if you aren’t going to play with him!” I mean, I don’t think she was trying to be a problem, but she wasn’t exactly being insightful. While Shannon was still there, a nurse came and brought a new baby in, and it was rooster baby! Shannon rocked her for a little while and then decided to go elsewhere, so I was left with the two kids. Gigi was good for a little while, but when he started getting fussy I had to put Petronella down and try and calm him down. After a while I noticed that he was sleepy and so I held him and rocked him and sang to him. By this time, though, he was to the point where if anyone (including the moms) so much as walked toward the door he’d have a fit! It was really frustrating, especially since at one point he was aaaalmost asleep when one of the went out again and he heard the door open and woke up and started screaming bloody murder! I was just like, “my goodness, is it really necessary for you guys to walk in and out so much? You can see how much trouble it is making!” Not only that, but he was heavy and I was getting tired. After a while a nurse came in to check on the kids and had me put him down. While she was in there Jenna came in and told me the doctor was coming and I had to leave. Apparently there’s a nurse who warns her when the doctor who doesn’t like us is going to come so we can leave and he won’t even have known we were there. By that time it was pretty close to when I needed to leave, so I just wandered around for a few minutes and left. I had to walk home alone because, Melissa didn’t go to the hospital, Shannon was going straight to Dacie and Jess and Megan had already left at 2 to go to Gima. After I got home, Jess, Megan and I went over to Moldova Mall and got Kebabs. I’m really glad we’re getting along lately and that Megan and I’s fight actually kind of had a good effect. After that I used the internet for a while. That’s when I started thinking about closure and then wrote in my journal a little. Shannon got on half way through this though, and I took a shower and thought a lot about all of this. Then I just kind of took it slow and read a little bit of “Peacock or a Crow.” It all kind of hit the spot. I mean, I’m still really emotional, but I think it’s healthy.