That's the way this wheel keeps turning now.

Leaving sucks. I'm pretty sure that in the garden of Eden when things were perfect leaving did not exist. Everything was probably all-inclusive.
Not here, not now. Now we leave for vacation, for college, we leave our hometown to move cities, we leave stages of life behind and at each transition, we leave people. And as Johnny Mayer says: that's the way this wheel keeps working now. Because in the imperfect version of this world, life is mixed with goodbyes and hellos. It's a never ending wheel.
"And if you never stop when you wave goodbye, You just might find if you give it time, You will wave hello again, You just might wave hello again."
The wheel is getting to me. This entire week has been emotional as I have tried to detach from this place and my babies. I have teared up at the most unexpected times- like the other night when I had a little girl in a onezie sitting on my lap and she wouldn't sit still because she just kept wanting to hug me. Or while I was doing Ana's hair and one of the most rowdy little boys decided to be my assistant and hand me bobby pin by bobby pin. (strange moments...) Or this morning when one of the boys was on the toilet and the other was playing with his tooth brush in the sink and I came in the hurry them up and they both smiled preciously and said "Hola Lorena." Those little kids... they stole my heart. And what's worse, I need it back now.
The worst was definitely on Monday. I sat down with Charlie (obviously fake name...) and he had just scraped up his knees. Because I had his full attention and we were one on one I decided to explain to him again that we (Andrea and I) we leaving. Last time he laughed at me when I explained it, so I knew I needed to try again. I explained that we were going back to our families, and that he was going to stay here in his house with his house moms. And he scrunched his brow and I asked him if he understood. "No..." "We have to leave and go far away soon and we are not coming back soon. And you are going to stay here in your great house!" His eyes started watering and lip quivering and ... he cried. "Charlie, do you understand what is going to happen?" "Si!" he answered angrily through his tears. "are you crying because you are sad?" "SI!" My heart hurt.
I swooped him up and told him how God sent us here especially to play with him and to make him feel special at his new house (he had only come to Casa Bernabe 1 week before we had) but now God told us that we had to go home and that he was going to send new friends here to be with Charlie. He shook his head, but he was still angry. This little one had been abandoned before.
Since then, I have told Charlie everyday that he gets to stay here at Casa Bernabe and he even smiles now and says "Si!" He's getting it, praise God, that we REALLY don't want to leave him. And he is happy because he is affirmed in our love.
But I am not happy nor appeased. I keep assuring them of our love and telling them how we have to leave, and am getting worse for it. That day in the park tore me up. I had to go inside and cry. Because when it comes down to it, Charlie will heal, he will get it, and I will still be missing him and the others wishing I could be the one to love them.
After all, this is the closest I have ever come to feeling like a parent. After this short time of changing them, disciplining them, playing with them, and feeding them my kids have commandeered my heart. The more I worked on their behalf, the more deeply I loved them. And after this short time, the kids who are friendly with everyone have started to respond to us in a deeper sense. They trust us to insure justice when someone hit them, they know we will change their diaper when they ask, they will come to us to help them with little things, to do their hair, to give them their clothes, and they always want to tell us when they did something good, or how they behaved in school. They know we have been there for them and they show it. And that is a sweet reward from God.
But now we leave. And thanks be to God, they truly don't need us. Charlie cried because he was sad because he has grown to love us, but he will move on because he has so much love here. They all will. And God will provide for them.
But me, that's a different story.
And thus I am here constantly tearing up because I don't get to be apart of my kids' lives anymore. I don't get to take them to school anymore. I don't get to change their diapers or watch the younger ones get poddy-trained. I don't get to pick out their clothes... And I am going to take some time and pout about it before I go home :D.
That's the way this wheel keeps turning now. We pour out, we leave. And it was good to be here, and I wouldn't trade it. But when Charlie cries, and my heart hurts and I have to say, leaving sucks.
"And if you never stop when you wave goodbye, You just might find if you give it time, You will wave hello again, You just might wave hello again."
Pray for us.