"musings" about the hands of friends

One of the high points of this summer course has been a weekly feature called "Monday Musings with Meredith". Every Monday night, we would all come together and Meredith would create a relaxed environment for sharing thoughts and feelings about our experience (candles, music, etc). This past Monday, everyone came over to our apartment in Cape Town, where we ate fish tacos and shared in our last Monday musings. It was so mellow in fact that Charlie (Z) chose to snooze through the whole event in the other room.

So since today is Wednesday, I feel free to muse about the hands of friends, on behalf of Z Charles. To try to communicate what I observed of her personal experience.

One of Z's biggest adjustments has been to how large her family has become. First, Becca's students all are very close to Z. There's an inner circle whose faces/voices/hands she loves and is going to miss very much: there are some who play peek-a-boo with her for hours(Fatima, Naomi) whose lap she sits in gladly(Iris), who makes her do Swazi kicks (Zehra), who gives her a bottle (Kara), who makes her light up (Brandon), who inspires her burps (Alex), who dreams about her (Alexis), who wave and yell across the table(all!)

Also, her family of African friends is huge! This man on the right, who is one of Musa's neighbors, offered Becca 5 cows for Zora at the opening of the new outdoor theater. This was a dowry offering, of course. In Swaziland, and in Cape Town, everyone likes to pass the baby from hand to hand, from boy to girl to man to woman and back. In this way she is blessed by the hands she passes through. Sometimes, Z will smile at her new friend, and then at the next. But inevitably, she starts to wail in the ear of one of her new brothers or sisters. In this moment, all her ten chins will jiggle, the tears will roll and we hear the sound of her crying from a deep, deep place in her soul. I choose to believe that the crying is not triggered randomly, or by some sense of strangeness -- instead I believe the tears come when she realizes that this chain goes on forever. Not being able to handle the enormity of the human capacity to love, she needs to release her overwhelming emotions.

Every Monday Musings began and ended with the holding of hands and a moment of silence.