I find it somewhat difficult to put pen to paper for this blog post (or finger to keyboard perhaps?). There are plenty of things I want to share and bring to light about this amazing life I live, but I’m not sure I can properly articulate them while also addressing the fact that you may be curious what kind of effect COVID-19 is having on Finca life. We will get to that later, I promise, but I don’t want to be one more thing that is inundating your life with talk of this pandemic. So, let’s begin with the fun stuff.
Every other Thursday evening, the missionaries and I have the privilege of giving the Tias (house parents) a break in the evening to watch a movie and spend some time together. This is one of the best opportunities for us to cover the houses for a few hours and “dance the night away” with the kids. This particular night, I was covering our older girls’ house, and let me just say, I’ve never laughed harder than when hanging with these lovely ladies. We had made a large pot of soup for dinner and decided that we would share our leftovers with some of the other houses. I was still working on eating a few more potatoes in my own bowl during our travels, but when we had finished the distribution, one of the girls told me she wanted to have a race back to the house. I told her I couldn’t since I still had this bowl of potatoes in my hand. Well wouldn’t you know it, she grabbed the bowl out of my hands, shoved the remaining (large) pieces in her mouth, and sprinted for the back door of the house, leaving no time to properly chew or swallow and me standing absolutely dumbfounded though just as equally impressed.
Once everyone made it back to the house, there was more competition to be had. Let me rewind a bit here. I had strategically asked to cover this house in particular because I knew I could get them to “help” me make some donuts. Now, these donuts didn’t deserve a glass display case or anything like that, I will admit, but they were not that bad. I never claimed to be a baker or anything and maybe they were a bit crispier than most donuts, but again, they weren’t “that bad.” In any case, I wanted to gift them to a neighbor of ours who was sick, but the girls told me (and I’m paraphrasing) “You’d be better off just eating them all and making a new, ‘better’ batch tomorrow. In fact, these donuts would be put to far better use if we had a donut eating contest right now.” You can’t argue with that logic. And so, the contest commenced. It was me against two other lady competitors, and we weren’t allowed to use our hands. I was hungry (hehe) for the victory. No way was I going to lose. 3, 2, 1, CHOMP. The race was on. I scarfed down my donut and smiled a smile of pride with donut chunks in my teeth. I had smoked the girls. It wasn’t even close! So, what did they do? They threw a second donut onto my plate. HA! I was confident I could finish two donuts before they had even finished one. It wasn’t easy, and my stomach wasn’t too pleased with me by the end of it, but I just barely managed to squeak out the double victory. To be fair, the girls were hysterically laughing (mostly due to the ridiculous nature with which I devoured the sugary pastry), so that may have affected their eating abilities. Thank goodness we were nearing bed time. I was prepared for a good hibernation with dreams that the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest might one day be in my future ;).
At the beginning of March, we were joined by 11 students from the University of Central Florida who elected to spend their spring break working at the Finca. It was a blessing to have them here. Of course, we didn’t know a single one of them, but their presence was a reminder of home and allowed us to effectively share (with other English speakers, mind you) this incredible experience that we live every day. They worked on re-staining the parquesito [park], they re-varnished the pews in our church, replaced our leaky roof in the mission house, and re-painted the convent and office building exteriors. A lot of re-doing but re-ally helpful, too! Every breakfast and lunch we, the long-term missionaries, accompanied two of the volunteers to one of our houses to eat and spend time with the kids and Tia. Our main job was to translate for the volunteers, and boy was it a confidence booster to realize that I could actually do that. Sometimes you wonder if you’ve progressed at all in the 8 months of being away and around Spanish so frequently. It was such a gift to see how much they were loving on our kids. The whole week, I would say, was reinvigorating for us long-term missionaries. They were a reminder of what a joy it is to live with these extraordinary human beings. We were able to show to them how special these kids are and the beauty it is to be a part of their lives, to encourage them, to love them, to teach them, to foster their growth and love for those around them and especially Christ.
We said good-bye to our friends from Florida on Friday, March 13th, and all of a sudden, we were caught up in the panic of this growing illness people were calling coronavirus (sounds funnier in Spanish. The kids like to say it a lot). Maybe you can attest to this yourself, but we weren’t even thinking about the virus before the volunteers had come. It’s amazing how quickly things can change in just a week. The following Sunday after they had left, Honduras announced that they would be closing their borders for an indefinite period of time. As the days progressed, we made the decision to cancel school and reassess resuming classes in two weeks, we stopped unnecessary trips outside of the Finca into Trujillo, and began limiting who would be allowed to come into the Finca. The response by the Honduran government was and continues to be aggressive, eventually limiting travel within country and leading to a Quedate en Casa [Stay in House] mandate. The Finca has also taken aggressive measures to ensure the prevention of infection to the point that currently no one is allowed to enter or leave the gates, our security guards and their families have temporarily moved in, and for a week, nobody was allowed to leave their houses. Spiritual events were canceled, work projects canceled, no playing on the campo, no visiting other houses, no going to the beach! It was a tough week to say the least.
I can think of a particular day (or series of days, really) these past few weeks where I was feeling so frustrated by everything going on, wrestling with the idea of staying or leaving the Finca, wanting to understand how I could properly serve the Finca and its mission when my job as a teacher and serving the kids in the day to day had been stripped away. I was feeling very obsolete, and knowing that I may not see my family for quite some time was not helping either. It was so easy to just be angry and annoyed and complain. It wasn’t good for our community. Everyone was feeling this strain and expressing it in a variety of ways. Some even had expressed their decision to return to the US, and naturally this caused a rift among the missionaries, not because we wanted it to, but we were divided in our intentions. I didn’t like any part of that time, but thankfully, I found myself able to reflect and pray and wonder what the heck was going on in this community, in the country, in the whole world!
So even in our rural little spot of Honduras, we are feeling the effects of this global pandemic. Unfortunately, it’s very easy to complain about the inconvenience of it all. Visits from our family and friends have been canceled, summer vacations are up in the air, it’s unclear when we will be able to resume school again, and being stuck inside the Finca walls can feel suffocating. However, all of that is very, very miniscule in the grand scheme of things, because the reality is that I am EXTREMELY blessed. This is one of the few times our rural and isolated location is advantageous to us. It’s a huge benefit that we are able to put ourselves in lockdown and control who comes in and out of the Finca. We have a nurse on site to take care of us should the virus sneak its way into our community. We have food to sustain us during this time. We have each other to traverse this crazy time together and support one another (and extra play time with the kids is always appreciated). For the time being, we’re fortunate enough that every Sunday we are still able to receive Jesus in the Eucharist with a communion service led by our Franciscan Sisters. Keeping all of that in mind, it has really helped to put things in perspective for me, especially when I consider those who are sick and/or dying from coronavirus, the family struggles and strains of losing jobs and trying to care for loved ones, and of course, the uncertainty we’ve all been thrown into as a result.
And so I thought, “Alright. So, this is the reality right now. Mass chaos and uncertainty. Great. There must be something God is inviting us to enter into, right? What’s the meaning of it all? What am I supposed to be learning right now?”
I know I’ve only just taken on the teacher life, but I want to avoid this becoming a lecture. So, I offer the above questions as maybe something that can help your own reflection, but I’ll also share for you my own thoughts on the subjects...
There’s an overwhelming sense of gratitude that has emerged from this whole mess. In all this isolation and staying at home, our lives have been stripped of SO MUCH. Simple things like walking out to visit our friends in Mohoguay, soaking up the sun at the beach, traveling to Trujillo for a day of rest and to treat ourselves with an iced coffee! Much larger things, too, like my job at the school, spiritual events with our community, the ease and frequency with which we receive food, the freedom of seeing the kids in their houses and spending hours with them. These are blessings that I didn’t necessarily recognize as such until now. Of course, the fact that we are all healthy and safe here is another huge blessing that I am grateful for every day but certainly something I took for granted before. I’m grateful that technology in all its advancements has made it possible for me to contact my family frequently (just this past Sunday, they had a big sing along with the extended fam over a zoom chat!), helped in the creation of online prayer groups and Sunday bible studies with friends, offered a plethora of movies and TV shows available to watch (FOR FREE!), and game nights to be had with friends in a virtual reality. Yeah, the technology thing is a big one. I mean, could you imagine this happening 15 years ago?
It may come as no surprise that one of the only things keeping me sane during this crisis is all the time I now have to sit in prayer. I’ve seen many a meme or profile status with the words, “I never planned to give this much up for lent.” God’s a jokester like that, I suppose. One of my Lenten commitments was to pray a little more, try and deepen my relationship with Christ by actually being with him in prayer, you know, talking to him like he is a real person. Well, jokes on me. School is temporarily closed. I can’t leave the Finca. Many of my responsibilities have been reduced or cut for the time being. I can practically give my whole day to prayer and relationship with God if I wanted. Now, I’m not on my knees in front of the tabernacle all day, but certainly I can set aside some additional times throughout the day to take maybe a 15 to 30 minute breather, read the daily readings, reflect, pray the divine office. Algo asi [Something like that]. Before you get any ideas, I am not at all suggesting that this illness was a terrible ploy to get me to pray a little more, but I will be taking advantage of the opportunity.
History has never been one of my best subjects (just take a gander at my AP US History and AP Government exam scores), but if my memory in these classes serves me correctly, human beings have always had a knack for innovation and creativity, particularly in times of hardship and crisis. I’m fascinated with the creativity of so many around the world and the response for our brothers and sisters at risk or in need. Because of the heavy travel restrictions put in place by the Honduran government, it’s been a bit of a struggle to access the food available in the grocery stores of Trujillo. The neighboring towns of Mohoguay and Coraz Alta are facing the same reality. The solution? The Honduran military recently donated a large sum of vegetables to the Finca, and for the other communities, they are expected to be donating pounds of food for every family living in the respective communities. The Garifuna community in Santa Fe has also been giving out excess provisions they possess to support these communities. It’s insanity! Such kindness! Though not super innovative, the missionaries and I have devised a few ideas of our own to help keep morale up and support the kids while their education is in a less than ideal situation. Our first genius idea was a fashion show out in the middle of the campo, sporting all the latest in “poor college kid turned missionary” apparel. We will be working on some obras [acts] to perform, and Zoomba classes and movies are always a hit. The kids receive a week’s worth of school work every Monday, and we’ve been offering our services to tutor as best we can (though I’m gonna be honest, I can barely remember how to manipulate equations with square roots let alone try to explain it in Spanish). Es bien complicado [It’s really complicated].
I would say the biggest lesson learned for us missionaries has been recommitting ourselves to this mission. Despite the cautions of the US Embassy and pressure from some back home, I have made the decision to remain in Honduras while this pandemic continues to trouble our world. It wasn’t easy. There are plenty of good reasons to return home, but also plenty to stay with my community here. Ultimately, I found myself saying “yes” once again to what I had first said “yes” to back in August. And what a good thing it was to be in that situation because I understand better what that “yes” actually means. I am greater convicted in my call to serve, to be present to these kids, to love and care for them, to be Christ’s hands and feet. I guess this idea isn’t so clear when the decision is made initially, but every day thereafter becomes an invitation to renew that “yes”, in fact, I would argue saying it is imperative in order to thrive. It wasn’t a one-time thing in August like I thought nor a one-time thing now, but every day I am saying “yes” to living out this call to mission, to service, to sacrifice and hardship, charity, compassion, solidarity and humility of heart.
And so, I’m saying “yes” to the mess. It’s not easy, and it’s not necessarily glamerous. Some days are exhausting and the homesickness eats away at you, but I trust I am where I’m meant to be. With so much love and growth to be shared with these kids, I couldn’t possibly leave now. There is joy and there is sadness; there is laughter and there are tears; there is beauty and there is pain; there is success and there is struggle. But above all, there is peace in this place. And, yes, I want to be a part of it in every way that I can.
As always, I appreciate you traversing my long strands of thought that I have splashed on the pages of these blog posts. Please know of my prayers for your health and safety and that of your family and friends during this time of uncertainty and distress.
Until next time
Ryan
