Ya babu kuwaita (The 'grandpa call')

Salma and her 3-yr old son Anderson, my buddy, and family

The phone rang this morning as I sat at my office in Maryland. It was dear Salma. It costs just pennies to call  from Kenya. She'd called just to say hello and thank you and that they missed me being around. She and her brother have become like family to me. The times we've had just to sit and talk have been family time.

OK so a couple of hours later, the phone rings again, and it's Salma and you can hear her family laughing in the background; she says, "Anderson wants to say hello to his friend." Ha!  I got a "grandpa call" from Kenya! So my 3-yr old buddy Anderson gets on the phone and laughs and says something typically incomprehensible, and I ask him if he's being a good boy, and he laughs and you can hear Salma and her sister and mom and grandmother laughing along with him. It's about 10 PM where they are; just a little family fun before turning in for the night, I suppose.

Friends are a joy.

They are all dear friends; scattered across the world, some whom we know intimately, some who are distant friends but whom we love nonetheless. Fourteen children here, thirty-eight plus there, two in Ghana, one precious fellow in India, a few in Ethiopia, plus their families. We've met enough of them face to face to understand that our family is large.