Day 6: Bungoma County, Kenya.
“How tall are you?” I asked the man who seemed to reach to the sky. “I believe I am five feet, yes,” he responded. I drew in close to him and looked up. “I believe you are a kind giant. And I will call you my Abe Lincoln.”
I sat on the simple blue chair in his mud hut and we talked about life as a widower with six children. Clothes hung outside on a line – clothes that would become bedding for his family. He was proud of the tin kettle that helped transport water for cooking, and he smiled as he showed off his kitchen hut. Woven twigs served as shelving there – his own design. His perpetual smile was refreshment on a stifling September day.
“You came to visit me in my home. Today you have become my sister. We are family.”
I thought about those words – and how something so simple as welcoming can be so transformative. “Yes, my Abe Lincoln. We are family.”