On Tuesday afternoons I go to my church for a couple hours to hang out with the kids and help them do some of their homework. It's a program called GLAD and I can never remember what that stands for. But it's an afterschool program for the elementary schools around our community to keep kids out of trouble and help them build relationships with "mentors." (I hate that word though.) The kids are fun for me to be around and I look forwards to Tuesdays when I can take a break from my mountain and be with free spirited and crazy children who ask funny questions and help me jump around. For those two hours I'm totally absorbed in their lives and words and mine seems to fade compleatly. I love it when that happens.
There's this little girl though named Asundra. She didn't warm up to me easily at all. We're still working on it. One day a week isn't much and so the relationships can be slow. Asundra is very hestitant with me and seems slow to trust. She doesn't look at me when we talk and she mumbles a lot. When I talk to her I get the feeling she just gives me the answers a "teacher" would want to hear. She doesn't feel comfortable around me and she doesn't care to learn how. Asundra is hisbanic and speaks beautifully fluent spanish. She has many of her girlfriends at GLAD and that seems to be enough for her. She talks fast and loud with them. She opens up with them. She sings with them and dances too. I see her personality when I watch her with them. But Asundra isn't as free with me. She shuts down and sees me as "tutor" instead of friend. She sees me as judge intead of equal and instead of a girl named Sienna whose thinks she (Asundra) is amazing and beautiful. It's frusterated me in the past couple weeks as I've tried to be undestanding of her and talk with her and get her to see that I just want to be her friend and not someone who speaks endless rules to her. As we do her homework together I try new ways of explaining things or I get up and do a dance randomly for her and try and make her laugh. Then I'll ask her to shake it like Shakira...It works sometimes and I'll see that faint smile and feel for a couple seconds like I've got her. But then it's gone and she's closed up again.
But yesterday I saw her smile. The smile lasted more then a couple seconds and she smiled at me. I got to church at 3:15 and my girl, Shakayla, ran out of the church when she saw me and gave me a huge hug and said something like "hey girl!!". She spotted my camera that I had hanging over my shoulder and I quickly took that oppertunity to ask "Can I take a picture of your beauitful face!?!" She got all excited and looked straight into my camera as I snapped a perfect shot. We took a couple more and then Shakayla ran inside. She was out again before I knew it with Asundra and my other little girl, Maria, to show them my camera. Asundra wanted their pictures together and indiviudally but more then ever she wanted to take pictures. So I showed her. I showed her where to look and what button to push and how to hold a camera. I did it with her once and then let her try it alone.
And that's when I saw her smile.
and she kept smiling too. Homework time went a lot better yesterday after our that photoshoot. When I was helping Kashayla with her homework and would look over at the usually sullen Asundra, her smile hadn't faded.
and it made me smile too. a lot.
There's this little girl though named Asundra. She didn't warm up to me easily at all. We're still working on it. One day a week isn't much and so the relationships can be slow. Asundra is very hestitant with me and seems slow to trust. She doesn't look at me when we talk and she mumbles a lot. When I talk to her I get the feeling she just gives me the answers a "teacher" would want to hear. She doesn't feel comfortable around me and she doesn't care to learn how. Asundra is hisbanic and speaks beautifully fluent spanish. She has many of her girlfriends at GLAD and that seems to be enough for her. She talks fast and loud with them. She opens up with them. She sings with them and dances too. I see her personality when I watch her with them. But Asundra isn't as free with me. She shuts down and sees me as "tutor" instead of friend. She sees me as judge intead of equal and instead of a girl named Sienna whose thinks she (Asundra) is amazing and beautiful. It's frusterated me in the past couple weeks as I've tried to be undestanding of her and talk with her and get her to see that I just want to be her friend and not someone who speaks endless rules to her. As we do her homework together I try new ways of explaining things or I get up and do a dance randomly for her and try and make her laugh. Then I'll ask her to shake it like Shakira...It works sometimes and I'll see that faint smile and feel for a couple seconds like I've got her. But then it's gone and she's closed up again.
But yesterday I saw her smile. The smile lasted more then a couple seconds and she smiled at me. I got to church at 3:15 and my girl, Shakayla, ran out of the church when she saw me and gave me a huge hug and said something like "hey girl!!". She spotted my camera that I had hanging over my shoulder and I quickly took that oppertunity to ask "Can I take a picture of your beauitful face!?!" She got all excited and looked straight into my camera as I snapped a perfect shot. We took a couple more and then Shakayla ran inside. She was out again before I knew it with Asundra and my other little girl, Maria, to show them my camera. Asundra wanted their pictures together and indiviudally but more then ever she wanted to take pictures. So I showed her. I showed her where to look and what button to push and how to hold a camera. I did it with her once and then let her try it alone.
And that's when I saw her smile.
and she kept smiling too. Homework time went a lot better yesterday after our that photoshoot. When I was helping Kashayla with her homework and would look over at the usually sullen Asundra, her smile hadn't faded.
and it made me smile too. a lot.
Asundra
Asundra & Kashayla
photo taken by: Asundra
5 comments:
I think it's "Glenwood Learning Adventure Days."
who are you Heiders?
i'm Heidi Kaufmann, sorry, the "heiders" name is my default blogger identity. this entry interested me because my sisters and I used to work for GLAD.
Awwe i like that story sienna.. Ive had a bad day and that just for some reason brightened it! Thanks.
That's cool, sienna, and encouraging.. is GLAD a part of new city fellowship?
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