Between two walls
On Monday night we celebrated thanksgiving—all twenty of us. In ‘normal’ times, thanksgiving is the event of the year in the Kinbrace calendar. It’s a time of welcoming back past residents and sharing feast-worthy food from a dozen different countries. We decorate the Grandview Church hall with string lights and autumnal-toned fabric draped from the ceiling. There’s live music. And it almost always ends in dancing. Kurdish dancing. Or line dancing. Or salsa. It’s a beautiful sight.
This year was a more intimate affair. For the first time in months, we were back in our regular dining room, rather than eating in the backyard. It was candlelit and cozy. We feasted on a classic Canadian turkey dinner (halal, of course) with sides of Palestinian green beans and East African chapati. There was joking and laughter...and babies crying. At one point, J started crying, followed by L, and then S: the domino effect, or some unspoken agreement among infants. A young man from South Africa called out “Who else wants to cry?” More laughter.
One tradition remained the same this year: at the end of the meal, with bellies full, we each wrote down our gratitude on a paper leaf, then took turns sharing around the table. At the end of the night all twenty leaves were strung up on the wall.
“Love, community, safety.”
“I am thankful for being here today and being part of Kinbrace.”
“My bike.”
“Shared meals.”
“New friends.”
“Freedom.”
After dessert, we helped clear tables and wash dishes. I took out the compost. When I opened the gate into the darkness of the alley, it took my eyes a moment to adjust. At first all I saw was an ember-y orange glow in front of me. I smelled cigarette smoke. Ah, it was Zahra.
“Ca va?” I asked. She said nothing, unless I missed her body language. I dumped the compost bucket with its characteristic slop and came back to the gate.
“Comment vas-tu?” Now she asked me. I hoped to exchange a few simple words, and then slip past to finish the clean-up and retreat to my upstairs apartment. But ten minutes later I was still there, compost bucket in hand. She let her cigarette burn down to nothing between her fingers; the orange glow was gone.
“I’ve started noticing that I speak in the past tense all the time,” she said into the darkness. “‘I used to do this or that’, ‘I used to have my job’, ‘I used to be with my family’. It is so hard to live in the past.”
A pause.
“And right now the future is uncertain, while you’re waiting for your refugee hearing,” I said (as usual, not knowing what to say).
“Yes, what future is there to speak of?...When my life is controlled by the people I had to run away from and the people who will decide if I can stay in Canada. I am between two walls. What am I supposed to do?”
As she spoke of past and future, I couldn’t help but think about the present. About the way Zahra puts up with the joking of her neighbours—her ‘brothers’ at Kinbrace—and the way she fires back with incomparable wit. About the older Afghan couple she graciously shares her home with, and the way she ‘shares’ her daughter with them, too—as honorary grandparents who are far from their own grandchildren. About the time she hosted me for dinner only days after she’d arrived at Kinbrace. About her spare-no-extra, exuberant hospitality.
This is what her life looks like, ‘between two walls’.
“Remember your doctor?” I asked. “The one who told you that you were strong before you gave birth to L? I believe that. You are incredibly strong, Zahra. And even when you are weak, God is strong.”
“Yes, my God is strong,” she said. “And God will give me strength to continue.”
…
Last week during our staff prayer time, we read and reflected together on the words of Richard Rohr. He speaks about the margins of society, where those who are excluded from systems cling to the edge. “We must go to the edge to find the center,” he says.
So there, at the edge of the property, just outside the gate on a damp October evening, we found something of the center.
