Our story

I went to take them dinner. He had had surgery on his hands and I thought it would be nice for his wife to take a night off from cooking and they could just relax. I had no idea if he understood my phone call telling him that I wanted to bring them food at 4:00 today. "Okay, okay, thank you, thank you my daughter," had been his reply. When I walked in their door bearing my "gifts" they laughed and looked at their dinner table shyly. Oh boy. Maybe he thought I said I would be there at four to eat lots of their food?! Khoula loves to cook and she pulled out all the stops. Cooked onions, tomatoes and eggplant stuffed with a yummy rice mixture, homemade yogurt, watermelon, and the ever present Fanta. The table was set for our whole family but it was just me (Joel was at work and the babes were with Evan at home finishing their nap.) So, though I was not at all hungry and had told Evan I would just drop the food off and be on my way, I found myself sitting down and eating. And eating. And eating. Then I helped them learn the meaning of the word "favorite" and then the English teacher in me kicked in and somehow I found myself in their living room drinking tea and delighting in simple conversation and their excitement of learning how to make comparisons (You are older than me. That chair is bigger than this one, etc. etc.). They would smile and clap and write it down when they understood. I left an hour and a half later with my arms full of food (the rice yumminess, some kind of pastry she made, some yogurt, and pumpkin chocolate chip muffins) as well as a necklace made of wooden beads that she had made while living in Iraq and a pink shawl from Jordan.

Oh how often it is that when we go to give, we leave with our arms and hearts so full,
Jen