A Smile! At last, a SMILE! And a frown…

Posted by pookzilla on August 11, 2009

The yearly update and photo of my sponsor child arrived today. Her updates have been incredibly consistent – not the best scholar, but a very hard worker. Health generally okay, but not exceptional. The other consistency? She ALWAYS has a sad look on her face. Never once a hint or a trace of a smile. Except this time. This years photo shows the same arid land, the same palm trees, the same girl (only so much larger) but now she has a bright and beaming smile. It’s really quite wonderful to see after all these years.

I’ve been sponsoring Emelie now for a very long time. I don’t rightly know the exact date, but I’m fairly certain (after some reflection) that I was in my teens when I started, likely 19. Why do I remember this? Well, I know I was in school at Dalhousie and I remember it being incredibly difficult to afford (but did so anyway because it was the first thing in years that my parents actually seemed proud of me for doing). Emelie was 4 when I first started sponsoring her which would make her in her mid teens now.

This is really hard for me to reconcile mentally. In many ways this girl who I have never met is one of my oldest connections. She’s certainly my most consistent. When I saw her picture and started doing these mental calculations I managed to get myself really upset. What happens when she’s too old to be sponsored? Will I still get updates from her? I don’t look forward to the day when yet another tie to my childhood is severed.

She and I haven’t interacted a whole lot. We’ve exchanged a few letters over the years but the relationship has been mostly hands off and financial in nature. I’m feeling a lot of regret over that now. In many ways I feel like I’ve squandered an opportunity to get to know her. In my mind she’s still 4 years and there was always time but now the time is running short.

This is starting to feel like a reoccurring motif in my life.

This post is a lot darker than I intended it to be. I really just wanted to talk about a smile.