2-in-1 Yada Yada (15 page)

My boys (Marcus, 11, and Michael, 9) were tongue-tied during our visit—but once we got in the car they had a zillion questions. A good teaching moment.

Love to all,
Nonyameko

P.S. I LOVE the meanings of Yada Yada/Yadah Yadah! Can we keep both meanings even though we spell it just one way?

Nonyameko.
I'd forgotten that was her full name. How beautiful. And it was interesting to hear Nony talk . . . normal, like any other mom. Maybe it was the conference. Maybe it was those gorgeous African prints she wore. Maybe it was the way she “prayed Scripture” like it was her mother tongue. But I hadn't quite imagined her doing ordinary things like picking up her kids at school or laughing over Delores's nurse's uniform.

I called up “write message,” typed in “Yada Yada,” put “Prayer Request” in the subject line . . . then stopped. Any prayer request I had seemed so paltry and insignificant compared to Florida's missing daughter and José's recovery from a gunshot wound.

On the other hand, what was the point of a prayer group if we couldn't pray about everything? I went on.

To: Yada Yada

From: [email protected]

Subject: Prayer Request

Hi Sisters! Jodi again. This may not seem very important, but I just discovered my daughter Amanda is failing Spanish! I never took Spanish—for some reason I took French as my foreign language, which would make sense if we lived in Quebec or Europe. But Chicago? My husband took high school Spanish, but that was in the Dark Ages. (No comments needed.) Please pray that we find a tutor or someone who can help Amanda in the next few weeks to pass this class, and maybe get some help during the summer so she'll be ready for Spanish II next fall.

Thanks, Nony, for your report from José's hospital room. Anyone else who visits, please give our love to Delores and send us more praise or prayer reports. Delores is probably too overwhelmed right now to give us news and requests.

Everybody sleep tight! I'm so glad God put you—

The computer
pinged!
meaning I had a new message. I diminished the e-mail I was writing and called up the new message.

Another one from Stu.

To: Yada Yada
From: [email protected]
Subject: Church on Sunday?

Hi, people—but specifically Avis and Jodi. What time does your church start on Sunday morning? I haven't really found a church home here in Oak Park. Thought maybe I'd visit some of the churches you all come from. Uptown sounds interesting. Could you tell me the address? I figure it'll take about 45 minutes from here to get to Rogers Park in Sunday morning traffic.

Or do they do a big sappy Mother's Day thing? Not sure I'm up for that.

Thanks! Stu

P.S. Florida, my offer still holds. Let's get your girl home!

I groaned. Oh, great. Just what I needed. Leslie Stuart the Great coming to my church. Like we needed more white folks from the suburbs!

Resisting the urge to delete it, I closed her message and brought mine back onto the screen. I wished I'd sent my e-mail
before
Stu sent hers, so I could pretend I hadn't gotten it till some other day. Could I send mine now without answering her question about church?

Blowing out my frustration, I finished the last sentence: “I'm so glad God put you all in my life” . . . went back and deleted “all” . . . and hit “send.”

15

S
omewhere between breaking up a fight in the hall between two fifth graders and scraping fish sticks off the bottom of my shoe in the lunchroom the next day, I realized I missed Florida. She had plopped into my life—into my hotel room, to be exact—unexpected, unapologetic, and certainly a bit unusual. But she had accepted me at face value, talked openly about the challenges in her life, and seemed to have the determination of a locomotive on full throttle.

I wanted to be more like her.

Not the drugs. Oh God in heaven, thank You for sparing me from the dragons she's had to slay just to lead the semblance of a normal life!

But coming through the fire . . . whole, her faith intact, her will to overcome fueled by
knowing
what rock bottom is like. And thankful. I missed hearing her voice cry,
“Thank
ya, Jesus!” during worship. I missed the way she wrinkled her nose and said, “Girl, you are so funny” (which translated probably meant, “Jodi, I can't figure you out, but
whatever”).
I missed her energy, popping in and out of rooms, looking out for other people. I even missed the matter-of-fact way she had to “step out for a cig,” even though I hate the smelly things.

But that was Florida, the whole package. Take it or leave it.

We were together at the women's conference for less than forty-eight hours, yet I felt . . . changed, somehow, by knowing her. But unfinished, too, like taking a bite of chocolate and knowing I had set it down somewhere, because the expectation for the whole thing is still unsatisfied in my mouth.

I would call her tonight, I told myself as I herded my class back to our room after lunch. Within minutes I had to comfort a weeping LaKeisha, the child's small, bony shoulders shaking because Mean Old Kevin had poked a pencil through the watercolor picture she'd worked so hard on for Parents Day. Kevin, sitting in the corner as penance for his misdeed, rocked the chair legs back and forth and sent imaginary darts in my direction. Once LaKeisha had calmed down, we would practice “conflict resolution,” which usually required some form of restitution from the perp—though for the life of me, I couldn't think what could restore LaKeisha's masterpiece to its original third-grade perfection. The pencil hole went right through the forehead of her portrait of our school namesake, Mary McLeod Bethune.

“It's still a beautiful painting,” I pointed out, though that brought on even louder wails. LaKeisha was certain in her heart that wasn't so. “But,” I went on, “Mrs. Bethune suffered a good many problems establishing a school for black girls a century ago. She might say that hole in your portrait is a good reminder of all the difficulties she faced.”

Sniff, sniff.
The wailing stopped, and I gave LaKeisha a tissue to blow her nose. “That—
hic
—really be so,Miz Baxter?”

“Yes, I think that's what she'd say.”

Mollified, LaKeisha took her picture and pinned it proudly to the bulletin board. The crown of little beaded braids all around her head bounced—just like Florida's had at the conference.

Just like Florida's . . .

I walked over to the bulletin board. “LaKeisha, how old are you?”

She beamed up at me, tears forgotten. “Eight. But I'll be nine in June when I graduate to fourth grade.” And she skipped away.

I don't know why I asked. I had a whole classroom of eight-year-olds, though at this time of year they were turning nine like popcorn. Eight years old. Just like Florida's Carla. If Carla went to this school, she could very likely be in my classroom.

The dismissal bell rang. The quiet work suddenly erupted into orderly chaos—but the faces of the children who filed past me froze in my mind, frame after frame, like pictures snapped with a digital camera. What if Carla
was
in my classroom, but her foster parents had given her a new name? No, no . . . that couldn't be so. That would be too weird. Too coincidental. There were scores of Chicago neighborhoods where Carla's foster parents might live —maybe they'd even skipped town altogether without telling DCFS.

But I was so rattled with the possibility that I forgot to ask Avis on my way out of school what to do about Stu's e-mail about visiting Uptown Community this Sunday.

AS IT TURNED OUT, I didn't call Florida that night or even the next. Josh had a soccer game against the Senn Bulldogs, Lane Tech College Prep's archrivals, so Denny, Amanda, and I sat on the sidelines yelling our heads off for the Indians—then had to cope with a disappointed Josh because Lane Tech lost by one point, which affected their standing in the playoffs. The following night— Thursday—was Bible study at Uptown, a rather mind-numbing affair with Pastor Clark trying to unpack the Book of Revelation and the meaning of endtimes prophecies. How can anybody really know what the leopard-like beast with ten horns and seven heads means, or who the “twenty-four elders” are?
Really
know, I mean.

Avis likes this study though. Denny, too. They like digging into prophecy verse by verse. Which is a good thing for me. If there's anything critical I need to know—like Jesus is coming back next week—I'm counting on them to tell me.

I caught Avis after Bible study. “Did you get Stu's e-mail, wanting to come to church here at Uptown on Sunday?” I paused, leaving her to fill in my meaning.

The outer corners of Avis's plum lipstick flickered upward a fraction. “Yes. Yes, I did. I answered it this morning—no, yesterday— when I came in to the office.” She shrugged. “Gave her the address and told her it was a great Sunday to visit since we're having a potluck after worship, and no, Uptown didn't overdo the Mother's Day thing. 'Course I told her she didn't have to bring anything as a guest.”

“Oh.”
Knowing Stu, she would anyway. Probably flaming cherries
jubilee or something equally exotic.
“I—uh—didn't know how you'd feel about that after she made such a fuss about
not
having a leader for the prayer group.”

Avis wagged her head. “Jodi, if I got offended every time somebody said something insulting or silly or ignorant, I'd spend most of my life in a funk. Don't have time to be offended. Takes too much energy. I'd rather spend that energy on praising or praying.”

I nodded like I understood. I didn't. How could she not be offended by that little episode?
I
was offended, and it wasn't even me Stu had dissed.

“Well . . . good. Just wanted to be sure one of us answered.”
Lies,
lies, all lies, Jodi.
“See you tomorrow.” I did smile then. “Last week this time we were looking forward to the women's conference.”

Avis chuckled. “Right. All we have to look forward to
this
Friday is staff meeting after school.”

Oh joy. I had totally forgotten. “Right. See you then.”

When Denny and I got home from Bible study, Josh was on the Internet—doing research for his American history paper, he said. “Huh,” said Denny, peering over his shoulder at the long list of web sites about the Vietnam War. “Vietnam was ‘current events' when I was in high school.” He slouched into the kitchen, shaking his head.

“Midlife crisis,” I murmured to Josh—then made him take a break to scoop Willie Wonka's poops in the backyard.

“But it's dark, Mom.”

“I noticed,” I said, handing him a flashlight.

I saved his research as the back door banged and called up email for BaxterBears. Several new messages addressed to Yada Yada
pinged
onto the screen. Good. At least husband and offspring had been quickly trained to not delete anything till I'd had a chance to read it, though Josh thought the name was a hoot. (“You starting a Star Wars fan club,Mom?” he'd teased.)

I opened the first message.

To: Yada Yada

From: [email protected]

Subject: Spanish

Hola! I'm on the school computer and others are wanting to use it, so can't be long. God bless you all for the visits to José. It means so much to Delores and the whole family— even Ricardo, though he won't tell you so.

Jodi, about your daughter. I want to teach Spanish and could use the practice. Would you like me to tutor Amanda? Delores is taking two weeks off to stay with José when he comes home so won't need me for babysitting for a while. I could come to your house, if that works best for you.

Edesa

“Denny!” I screeched. “Amanda! Look at this!”

As they read the message over my shoulder, I told them what I knew about Edesa—that she was from Honduras and Spanish was her native language, that she was a student at Chicago Community College (I was guessing—but what else could CCC.edu mean?), and she babysat for Delores Enriques. “They met at Church of the Holy Spirit or something-or-other in Spanish.”

“Cool,” Amanda said.

“What does she charge?” Practical Denny.

“What's the party?” asked Josh, bungling in the back door with Willie Wonka and the pooper-scooper. When we told him he said, “Sweet. Can I have the computer back now, Mom?”

“Give me a few more minutes,” I growled, shooing them all out of the dining room except for Willie Wonka, who leaned happily against my leg. I sent a quick reply back to Edesa, thanking her profusely for her offer and asking how much she charged, then opened the next message.

To: Yada Yada

From: [email protected]

Subject: [blank]

To pray the foster family be located is good. To know the child is safe, smothered in love, and cared for like their own daughter—of course you want to know. But if all is well, is it the best interest of a child to be taken away and returned to a parent she may not even remember after so many years?

Ruth

I had to read Ruth Garfield's message three times before it sank in. Was she saying Florida's little girl
shouldn't
be returned to her? Then, horrified, I realized her message had gone out to the whole group. Including Florida.

I clicked “next,” got something about Internet virus protection, clicked “next” . . .

A message from Florida. I was almost afraid to read it.

To: Yada Yada

From: [email protected]

Subject: Re: [blank]

Do I need advice? God is God all by Himself and knows what is best for me and my family. Do I need prayers? NOT IF YOU'RE PRAYING AGAINST ME!

16

I
was so shaken by the exchange between Ruth and Florida that I tossed and turned all night. Why in the world would Ruth raise a question about whether Florida's daughter should be returned to her? And Florida . . . I was the one who'd urged her to share about Carla with the whole group. But I hadn't expected this!