Highs and Lows
You cause the grass to grow for the cattle, and plants for people to use, to bring forth food from the earth, and wine to gladden the human heart, oil to make the face shine, and bread to strengthen the human heart.
Psalm 104: 14-15
Last Monday our school was scheduled to be inspected by various clergy and other Diocese staff members. The Friday before, all students were given special cleaning tasks around the compound and staff members were assigned to oversee different groups. The groundskeepers worked extra over the weekend to make sure pathways were cleared and trees were trimmed. When Monday morning came the students picked flowers and placed them in bottles to decorate the teacher’s table in every classroom, and all staff members were reminded of the expectations they were to follow during the inspection. But teatime came and went, then lunch, and our visitors had yet to arrive. We received news as we were eating that the members of the diocese had been delayed at another school and they would schedule another day to visit us. While we were a bit let down that all of the preparation and anticipation ended up being for naught, this also gave us more time to finish the preparations that were skipped over due to short notice – the biggest one being cutting the grass.
KEMPS is a large compound, if I were to guess I would say six acres, with lots of open grassy area. While the grass in commonly travelled areas remains fairly short, in those large open areas, the grass can grow quite high. Every couple of months, the school hires one man to come with a weed wacker to trim down the grasses in those areas. The trimmings that don’t blow away are usually collected and disposed of by students during weekly clean up. So I was surprised on Tuesday morning when I saw, not the man with the weed whacker, but ten women, sitting in various patches of tall grass, cutting them by hand with a sickle. I passed them several times throughout the day as I walked to and from class, each time, their patches of tall grass getting smaller and smaller, their neat piles of clippings increasing. The women worked in one of the smaller, more visible areas of campus, and by the time we returned from our Tuesday run with the girls that evening, they had completely cleared it.
I stood watching with Madam Peace as they carefully removed the final individual pieces of tall weeds and added them to their piles before bagging up the clippings and placing the large satchels on their heads to leave. I asked Madam Peace about the women. Is this their regular work? They do this every day by hand? Where is the man with the weed wacker? She told me that the women are coming from a nearby village and most of them have very little money. She said that when they arrive, the groundskeeper gives them an area of grass for ten or fifteen thousand shillings pay (between two and six dollars), and then they get to take the clippings home to feed their cows. Madam Peace told me that whenever there is a job at the school the groundskeeper will have dozens of women coming to ask for a piece of grass to cut. “They have a very difficult life.” She told me. “Many people in the village are living like this.” We smiled and waved at the women as they headed for home.
Sure enough, early Wednesday morning those ten women were accompanied by at least ten more. Most of them were either pregnant or had nursing babies clinging to their backs. Others came with toddlers who played in the sand while their mothers worked. On Thursday there were at least 30 women scattered around the compound working on their patches of grass. Two of them were working right outside our house when I came home from class and went to check on the puppies, who had started getting seriously ill the day before. That was when I found Ruby.
Daisy had four puppies back in October. All girls, Millie, Penny, Lola, and Ruby, and all looking completely different. They formed a gradient of colors from white to dark brown. After the new year we decided to only keep two of the puppies, Millie and Ruby, and give Penny and Lola to staff members from school who had expressed interest in taking them. While I loved how playful and happy Millie was, Ruby was my favorite. She had long brown hair and floppy ears. She was calm and loved to cuddle, but she was also stubborn and independent. All of the kids loved her too. They would call her name and try to coax her to chase them around and let them pet her.
Like most dogs, both Ruby and Millie love dinner time more than just about anything, so last Monday when Millie wouldn’t eat, we were a little worried. We assumed she just had an upset stomach and made sure she had enough water. Meanwhile Ruby gladly ate her share of dinner. On Tuesday Millie still wasn’t eating, and she also wasn’t acting herself. She didn’t want to play, just lay in my lap and sleep. On Wednesday morning when I went to check on her, she and Ruby had been sick, and Millie had vomited blood. We called the vet right away. Because vets in our area don’t have offices, they only make house calls, it can take several hours for them to get to you after you call. By 6:00 when he finally arrived, both puppies were vomiting blood and were completely lethargic. I was so worried, and when the normally chatty vet examined them silently and seriously, I could tell he was too. He gave them both injections of antibiotics and multivitamins, and told us that he believed they had ingested some kind of poison. He said not to force them to eat, just to keep an eye on them, and that he would come back the next day for another round of injections.
On Thursday morning Joseph checked on them and said that they were okay, but he could tell they had been sick during the night. I taught my 8:00 class and walked back home, passing the women cutting grasses, greeting them as I walked. I dropped my bag inside and told Joseph I was going to check on the puppies. I noticed the sandy area outside of their house was covered in spots of blood. Millie sat up and I said hi to her. I called for Ruby, but she laid still. I called her again as I walked closer, but still nothing. I noticed she wasn’t breathing and started yelling for Joseph. The women stopped their work and watched, sensing from my tone that something was wrong. I ran to the house and called for Joseph again. “Ruby, she’s not okay. She’s not breathing. Get some water.” He started asking questions, but I ran back out to her. I called her name and nudged her, trying to sit her up. Her eyes flickered open and she coughed. Joseph was now standing beside me. I picked her up and she let out a terrible, loud, raspy breath, and then she was gone. I yelled for Joseph to get some water. “Why?” he asked. “It’s too late.” “Just get some water! Do something! Do something!” I yelled at him. I held Ruby against my chest. Her eyes were still open, sand caked around her mouth. “Lay her down.” Joseph told me as I started to cry. I laid her on the cement and knelt down in the sand in front of her, tears streaming down my face. “No, no, no, please no.” Joseph, aware of the women around us who had just watched all of this unfold, lifted me off of my knees. “Let’s go inside.”
We were both overcome with guilt, feeling like we should’ve done more, and incredible sadness, knowing that our sweet Ruby was gone after only five months of life. I haven’t wept like I did that morning in a long time. After taking some time to console ourselves, we found a box to lay our puppy and buried her in one of the far corners of campus.
While we were completely overwhelmed and so sad, we were also worried that Millie wouldn’t make it. She had seemed much worse than Ruby. I brought her into the living room and tried to make her comfortable, but she was obviously agitated. We decided to put her back in her house with Daisy (who never got sick during all of this), and I checked on her at least every half hour. The vet came later that evening to give her another injection and was saddened to hear about Ruby and encouraged us to keep a close eye on Millie. Friday, she seemed to have improved some and Saturday brought no change. She still refused to eat, but kept drinking water, and was getting sick less frequently. Yesterday morning when I opened the door to check on her, she perked up. We left her door open and she ventured out a couple times. By the evening she was even trying to run around with Daisy. When it was time to feed the cats, she snuck in the house and started eating out of their bowl. I was so excited, I stood as still as possible, afraid that if I moved or said anything, she would stop eating. She only ate a little, but it was progress. The fear of losing her was slowly fading away. Today Millie seems even more like herself. She’s been following me around, tail wagging, and I could not be happier. Thank you to all who have been praying for her. It’s a miracle that she got through this.
Losing Ruby so unexpectedly on Thursday had us feeling really down going into the weekend. On Friday evening we got dressed for our usual date night at our favorite restaurant in town. It was a cold night and neither of us really felt like going anywhere, but we needed to get away, even just for an hour. As we waited for our food we talked about how the week had gone. We talked about Joseph’s projects and what he was planning to work on next. The topic shifted, as it often does, to life in the US. Joseph asked about how people start businesses there and the possibility of starting his own business. I said, as I often do, “I just can’t wait for you to be there and experience everything. I can’t wait for you to see how much easier life can be. Sometimes it feels like it’s never going to happen.” As we continued the conversation, I decided, since we were discussing the US, I would check the status of our fiancé visa petition (I limit myself to checking once per day). I was so used to entering our case number, clicking submit, and seeing the same response, that I had to do a double take when the word “Approved” popped up on the screen. I grabbed Joseph’s arm. “They approved it! They approved our petition!” “What?” he said, confused. Then more excited, “Wait, what?!” I showed him the phone, shaking my head in complete disbelief. We hugged, laughing and taking deep breaths, thanking God over and over again.
Last year on April 13th, we submitted our petition to apply for a fiancé visa. We were told by our (former) immigration attorney that we would get a response within 2-3 months. If the petition was approved, we could continue with the process (health screening, visa application, and interview), which would take another month or two. The petition, including evidence of our relationship in the form of pictures, identification documents, and written affidavits from friends and relatives, was the key to getting the visa. So after submitting way more than enough evidence, we waited. And we waited and waited and waited. By October I had sent numerous emails to the attorney inquiring about the delay, many of which never received a response, and finally started doing my own research to try and figure out when we would know something. After a message to another attorney friend who had another attorney friend, I found out that the actual wait time for a fiancé visa petition filed last April was 7-8 months, not 2-3. So we continued to wait. December came and went. Still nothing. In January, I started checking the website daily, hoping that any day could be the day. One day, the message changed. They were requesting more information. In their letter, they stated that although we had sent pictures, there was no way to verify that the date indicated on each one was accurate, and since we needed to prove that we had indeed been in the presence of one another during the two years prior to filing the petition, we needed to submit travel documents or passport stamps, indicating that we were in the same place at the same time (insert huuuuuge eye roll). Thankfully, I had our plane tickets from last year when we travelled to Zanzibar with my cousin and her friend. I submitted them along with a PDF of every page in my passport, showing all of my entry and exits, as well as all 50 blank pages of Joseph’s passport, indicating that he has never left the country. It may sound overkill, but I was not about to be accused of not submitting enough information. We submitted the documents on February 10th, and I continued checking the site every day, until last Friday, March 5th.
Nearly eleven months. Eleven months of waiting to hear if the US government believed that my relationship with Joseph was legitimate enough to allow us to apply for a visa. Eleven months later, we are finally “Approved”.
We’ve all had these moments, right? When we finally get the answer that it seems like we’ve been waiting forever to hear. When we feared and anticipated the worst so that we wouldn’t be disappointed if it doesn’t work out, knowing that we will still be completely devastated. And when we get the good news, relief washes over us like cold water and we can finally breath again, as if we’ve been holding our breath through the waiting. It’s awful, regardless of what’s at stake, but when what’s at stake is whether or not your God given partner will be able to come to America, to see your home town and meet your best friends and your grandmother, to worship at your home church and go to a football game, to have his first McDonald’s cheeseburger and walk through his first Walmart, to be married and have that marriage recognized by both the church and the government, when that is what’s at stake, the waiting is nearly unbearable. So while we have more steps in front of us, we are breathing easier these days.
It’s not like Joseph to post a lot on social media, so sometimes he questions why I post about our struggles and triumphs on Facebook or Instagram. I remind him that we have a whole community of people who are praying for us, and they mourn with us in our heartbreak, and celebrate with us in our victories. We are so thankful for the way that social media can shrink the miles and keep us connected to you, our community, and one of our greatest blessings.
Mungu akubariki,
Allee
If you would like to donate towards my work in Tanzania, you can send donations electronically using:
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If you would prefer to send a check, you can mail it to:
Alison Gomulka
15601 Shady Brook Lane
College Station, TX 77845
Our Ruby
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