The Long-awaited Sight

Speaking of daughters, yesterday I had a long awaited treat – my daughter Aliska arrived. From Bangkok to the bush she traveled, over days' time, as it turned out. Exactly a month ago, in our other world, we were throwing a Cinco de Mayo graduation party for her. (Was that really just a month ago? It seems a lifetime ago.) She’d completed her masters degree in social work and was ready to take on the world. Shortly after the party, I left for Kenya and she left for weeks of travel in Thailand. She was to come via Cairo and meet us in Kenya.How I’d longed to see her, this crazy daughter of mine who has shared my love for this piece of African soil. For five years we’ve worked together here, sharing the rigors of life, sharing the sorrows of the people during the drought years, sharing the satisfaction of seeing the children’s libraries open, and so much more.Three days ago, right before she was to arrive, I heard that she and friends had missed their flight in Bangkok – would be stuck there indefinitely. “No!” I had so paced myself to see her dearly-familiar face! I didn’t want her stranded in that city of chaos! But sometimes life doesn’t offer us choices. The uncertainty as to when she would arrive was mine to deal with.But yesterday it happened. She and her travel-weary friends pulled up to my door. There she was, the mirror reflection of my younger self. What seemed like a disaster had turned out to be a grand adventure. “The best part of all,” she said, “was that we had a 16-hour layover in Cairo. We went to the Great Pyramids in Giza and we rode horses at top speed around them! It was so awesome!” I pictured her as the little girl that would always opt out of the civilized life to be at the barn with her horse. I pictured her, with hair flying, racing around the Great Pyramid with her boyfriend Nate, imagining themselves to be wild Arabian horsemen. Sometimes fate brings us turns we never could have anticipated.Welcome to your Kenyan home, daughter of mine.