El Trampolín: Loving

Yes, I run a tutoring center in Los Guido. Yes, I am a university trained teacher. I have lots of great ideas of how to make learning fun and engaging, involving various learning styles and never staying too long on one activity so kids don't get board. But most days, this is not what my children need most. They need someone who sees all of them and is able to respond to that with love and patience. As the kids trust us more, they let us into their worlds, their worlds that are often just barely hanging in balance, their worlds that affect every other interaction and decision. Being let in is a great privilege, but also an overwhelming responsibility. I now know that Maria calling other children ugly and stupid mostly likely stems from the fact her mom does the same thing to her, as we witnessed during a recent home visit. By no means does this make it okay for Maria to say these derogatory things to her classmates, but it's not a simple as saying, "Marie, we don't say things like that because it's not nice." This is a just a small example.

Each day there are countless interactions like this, many being much more severe in nature. I would like to say I embrace them all as "teachable moments" and we have calm discussions through each misstep, but we all know this impossible, especially in a second language. I would like to be able to stop and with patience and love talk with the child about why she is acting this way, why he said that, why she hates her. And sometimes it possible. But most of the time it's not. There are 15 other kids who need individual attention in that moment. Kids who's moms have brought them to get help with their homework, since after all, we are a tutoring center. This tension of seemingly conflicting goals (educational support v. overall life support) is something I struggle with almost everyday. I know that education is really just a vehicle to relationship and life change, but that vehicle needs to be effective if we are going to keep using it. But I don't want to be so stuck to the expressed educational goals, that I miss loving and serving the whole child.

The truth is, these kids have my heart. I will do pretty much anything to help them. This is why weeks like these last few, where almost everyday we have some melt-down or blow-up in the Center, are so personally challenging. I want to do right by my kids. I want to love them in the best way possible, but so often I don't know what that is or how to do it. No amount of university training can teach you that.

But I try my best. I stumble through Spanish. I hug them. I cry on my way home. And I trust that as much as I love them, God loves them infinitely more. Where my feeble attempts fail, he is still caring for them. He knows their situations, their language, their hearts. He can speak to them where my words are a jumbled mess of misused pronouns and conditional tense. He can embrace them when they run out of the Tutoring Center before I ever have a chance to talk to them. He loves them (and me) more than I can comprehend.

And so I go to the Tutoring Center each day, heart ready to love, knowing it will be hard and it will probably hurt, but trusting that I don't have to do it all.

Some of our faithful students. These kids are there everyday!