15 minutes

I think I may be the last one on the ship to write something about our patient screening day here in Congo. It’s just taken this long for me to process it all. This screening day was something very special for me again. I remember the feeling last year when I got home. It was early in our time with Mercy Ships and I got to really see what it was like to see so many people come together for a common purpose. It was a fabulous display of unity and I held to that day when things were tough last year. So coming in to this year’s, I was really looking forward to being a part again.

Patients waiting in line to be seen.

I realized very early on though that this year was different. Not because there was not the same sense of unity, but just my role in that was different. And with that role would come very different emotions. Last year, the people I helped to move around the screening site had all been told “yes” so far. I did not deal with a single person that had been told that we could not help them. This year though, my post would be to escort people towards the exit after they had been told that we could not help them. At 6:30 am, I met my first person who had been told no. He was having troubling walking.  A lump caught in my throat and then I began to understand what so many others talked about last year but I did not experience. We can’t help everyone and I was beginning to meet those we could not help. I tried to prepare for a long difficult day.

Our screening site was at a large school. The walk for these patients from where they came into contact with me was a long and hard one, up a little hill and through fairly deep sand. Mostly, we would walk with them and guide them toward the exit. The word “sortie” (exit in French) will never have the same meaning for me after that day. For some the walk was long enough that we would take a chair with us so that they could take rests along the way. There were some children that I carried. After such a long day of waiting, they were exhausted and their mamas were exhausted. They needed a break and I was glad I could provide that for them.  As I carried them, I would say a blessing over them, the same blessing I give my girls when Trace and I put them to sleep. I just didn't know what else to do for them. 

There was one girl who had cerebral palsy (I think) that I will never forget. As I carried her, she would seize up and at one point I thought she had stopped breathing.  Then she caught her breath and was coughing. I thought she was dying in my arms and it was breaking me. I brought her to the prayer station, gave her back to her mama and said a blessing over her that brought tears to my eyes. After that I had to take a break. I was emotionally drained. I was hurting and wondering what all of this meant. Why do people have to suffer like that? How does her mama cope? What if that had been Adalynn or Cora? I just needed to sit down and work through that before going back out.

Later in the day, a friend told me about this photo that she had seen of me that had moved her emotionally. I had seen photos taken of me carrying some of the children, even having the local Congolese television cameras come out of nowhere as I carried someone. All the cameras made me a little uncomfortable. One reason I am an accountant is that it is a job that doesn't get much attention and that is just fine with me, but I had no idea what kind of attention was coming. My so called 15 minutes were here.

The next morning, I checked my email and saw that someone had posted this photo of me on Facebook. It was the girl, my one. He wrote some very kind words about me with the post. Then as the day went on, lots of people here asked me about the photo. Lots of people back home re-posted it.  Then I had a call with my colleagues in Texas and they had seen it. I was growing uncomfortable with the attention, I tried to tell people what I was feeling when I was with her and it was just weird talking about it. Then someone came to let me know that Dana Perino had posted it on twitter as her favorite photo of the day. Dana Perino is part of a really popular program on Fox News and was a member of the cabinet of President Bush. She had joined us for the week and been sharing with her audience the happenings of the week. (At the screening, I was introduced to her with the line “I know he looks like he came straight out of the bush, but he is actually the finance director.”) After Dana posting it, the photo was everywhere.  Later that night, the photo showed up on her TV show. As the next week went on, the photo was in a bunch of Mercy Ships blogs. A different screening photo of me holding a little boy on my back was posted on the anniversary of Mother Theresa's death on the Mercy Ships site. To top it off, Dana Perino mentioned me by name on her show. I think my 15 minutes ended there.

I have had a lot of thoughts about that picture since all of that has gone on.

I thought about the attention itself. I just happened to be the one who had been asked to do that particular job. She needed to be carried. I just happened to be in line of the camera after walking with her a few minutes. Anyone else there would have carried her. In fact, that little girl had been carried to me by someone else. I spent the day with a sixty something nurse that made that same walk from 6:30 am until 8 pm with just a 15 minute break all day. She never stopped smiling all day. She was amazing but no attention. That whole screening took 300+ people to pull off. Yet, I felt like I was getting all of the attention. Why me?

I thought about how inspiration comes from a moment. There were thousands of moments that day, but mine was captured. I have not been comfortable with the attention, but many people were thankful for the picture and the story it told. I certainly have looked at photos like that and I am glad this photo inspired others. I hope the attention of that photo means more people care about the person in front of them whether or not the camera is around.

I thought about my family. It’s been an emotional time being here without Tracey, Adalynn and Cora and some people mentioned that maybe that moment with that little girl was why I was here without my family. Interacting with all those people we could not help was a hard day to do on my own.  I missed Tracey greatly at the end of the day. I missed holding my girls after the experiences of carrying that little girl and the other children.

I thought mostly about the girl. I thought about her face, her hair, her bony little body that could not support itself. I wish I knew more of her story. I wish I would not have needed to carry her. I wish her mama didn't have to carry her because of her condition and their lack of means to care for someone with that condition. Mostly, I wish I would have learned her name so she could have shared that attention. I was so struck by her condition and struggles that I didn't ask her mama her name.

I know that my Father knows her name. He knows her story and He knows her suffering. He knows the number of hairs on her head. I pray that He will bring peace and healing to that family. And I pray for the day when there is no more suffering and no more tears. The day when there are no more NOs.