Home at last

We were eating French toast this morning when a short figure with tousled black hair and pink pajamas appeared at the kitchen door.  Pear said nothing, only smiled warmly and lifted her hands and a wai, the traditional Thai greeting.  She joked, or rather teased with us for a couple minutes, then left to get dressed.

I've written about Pear in several posts since we met her about 6 months ago.  She was adorable from day one with her button nose, disobedient wavy hair and impish gregariousness. "I want her!" exclaimed Judy.  At the same time she was wild, acting out the chaos of her unmanaged and unloved life.  She will soon be 14, but has already had far too many experiences a child should never have.  At first she stayed at one of our women's centers but did not thrive.  She talked often of wanting to run away and sometimes did take off with permission.  One of those nights she ended up being raped by an older teen.  Craving attention, she would make up stories about herself that we quickly exposed as false, which only made others at The Well completely annoyed.  Finally Pear ran away and didn't come back, right before she was scheduled to start school after a year and a half absence.

She ended up working and living at a night-time restaurant not far away as waitress.  We went to eat there several times, finding Pear dressed in new sexy clothes that she said the manager bought for her.  We noticed that the main customers seemed to be single men.  One would come, sit and eat with a woman then leave with her.  Although Pear has since told us that she only waited tables and was not asked to sell her body, at the time we were very frightened.  She would sit and talk with us only briefly, guarded and reserved.  We asked the manager, a woman approximately 40, to please release her back to us but she refused, saying that Pear's mother had entrusted Pear to her.  We called Pear's mother, who said hadn't done that but at the same time she would do nothing to help. 

We were looking into getting the police involved when finally Pear left and called us from her mother's small slum home.  I talked to her a bit, then put her on the phone with Marquita, our 15 year-old.  Marquita then gave the phone to Judy, planted her arms firmly on my shoulders and ordered, "Dad, go get her now!"  I've told Marquita that someday God would take her passion for justice, now used primarily to defend herself in sibling rivalry, in a big way in His Kingdom.  This was a taste.  Within an hour Pear was in our home.  That was late November.

Over the 3 months since then we've enjoyed seeing Pear discover the joy of being a loved one.  At first when I would say, "I love you, Pear," she would look turn away with a short "Yeah."  Now she replies with a warm, "I love you, Dad."  There were a couple of tests.  When her father got out of prison just before Christmas, he immediately put Pear in the middle of his conflict with her mother, trying to manipulate her into choosing his side and sending her into emotional turmoil.  One day last month Pear ran off from The Well and I had to spend 3 hours with a volunteer tracking her down.  I knew that if we waited for her to return she would dig a hole for herself, and that she needed to know that she was so loved that we were willing to take any means necessary to hang onto her.  Since then Pear has settled down. There is no more making up stories, no more talk of running away.  She seems to have emotionally distanced herself from her father's unhealthiness.  

The 1985 film Trip to Bountiful delightfully illustrates the basic human need for home, for belonging, and features Cynthia Clawson's rendition of "Softly and Tenderly Jesus is Calling". Here's a more recent live version I found on YouTube. This is what it's all about.

 

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