The Wuthering Wind, The Blathering Words

I was in Kenya over the weekend to visit Colin at Kijabe. The place certainly lives up to its name with the way the wind wuthers around the old buildings every morning and evening. I half expected to see Heathcliff out on the moor when I looked out the window. What a noise!

I bought a winter jacket when we first moved to Portugal in 2000 and I was glad I had it along for that little strip of Kenyan highland that runs along the top of the escarpment. The vastness of the landscape with its steep drop to the broad Rift Valley floor would have, no doubt, inspired Ms. Emily equally as well as anything she ever found in Yorkshire.

The wuthering and the blathering... These two words have been on my mind. I think they have a lot in common.

I hope, some how, that as I continue to grow, I'm learning to listen more and more.

(Colin, by the way, is doing nicely. He smiles his boyish smile, the one that squeezes his eyes up into little half moons, and the world around him seems to settle and sigh as if reminded that "all manner of things shall be well.")

I Continue to Grow Up (or so we hope)

Colin sounds good these days. So good.

I love to hear the smile in his voice as we chat on the phone. I love to hear the plans he's hatching with his friends at boarding school. I love to hear that he got high marks on his recent poetry writing efforts, though he's never attempted poetry before. I love the way it surprised him. Colin the poet--who knew?

Colin's successful adjustment is good reason to celebrate.

But wouldn't it just be great if he missed us so badly that there was still a little tremble of a tear in his voice when we spoke?

No.

Colin's love for us, for home, is not measured by pain levels. His coping well at school does not mean he's glad to be away.

I know this absolutely. I rejoice in the achievements of transition this (beautiful) 16 year old has made.

(But secretly, I guess there might just be a little part of me that misses the feeling that he can't live without us.)

Barf Happens

I woke up at about 2:30am to the sound of terrific retching.

"Retch-splat!"

Moms have good ears for these things. Dad ears are, frankly, a little faulty in this regard. (Though they are very good at listening for security alerts like the things that go bump in the night that I don't seem to hear.)

"So, anyways..." Colin was at the kitchen sink getting rid of his dinner. It was shocking how intact it still looked. It was a big bowl of spaghetti slapped into the sink and only slightly decomposed. (Sorry for the details.)

Today he is still feeling poorly. He's snoozing on the sofa, half hot and sweaty and half freezing cold.

I guess this is Colin doing some solidarity with our Nelly .

Foto4Friday

The boys are back in town.

Colin, (on the left and aged 14) and Chase (of the Russell fam, on right and aged 15) went off on a safari of their own. They have been planning and plotting and preparing for a long time. They took 2 forms of public transport out to a tiny town and then hiked in 5 hours to the home of a Maasai friend. They set up camp near Ole Kukan's house and did day hikes up into the hills to spy on wild life, enjoy the views and generally have great adventures like getting caught in thunder storms and the like.

My camera is on the blink so they just held up my little Mac and smiled into it right after they arrived home.

They were tired, hungry, happy and very pleased with themselves. We were extremely pleased to see them again. At one point the Land Rover they were in was briefly chased by an elephant, but they had no other terribly dramatic incidents.