Next week I plan to do a post about Tanner and his cultural adventures in island Little League Baseball.  But this week I’d like to focus a bit on Andi.

For both of the older kids, their number one challenge since we arrived here eight weeks ago has been their lack of friends.   And we still haven’t really overcome this yet.  It’s not that there are no kids here their age; it’s just that we’re having a hard time meeting them and getting to know them.  Tanner has had an easier time at this because there are boys his age that live close by.

But Andi really has nobody.  Thank goodness Michelle came down here with us, because she’s helped tremendously in easing Andi’s homesickness. Those two have been good friends for Andi’s entire life.

 

Sailing Lessons:

When we first arrived on the island we were determined to find activities the kids could join, and of course the goal in doing so was twofold.  First:  so the kids could do something fun.  Second and more importantly: so they could meet people and make friends.  With Andi we discussed multiple activities and eventually she decided she might like to try sailing.  We made some inquiries and heard about youth sailing lessons at the St. Maarten Yacht Club.

Sounded promising.

So about four weeks ago we stopped in at the Yacht Club dock and met Micah, the youth sailing instructor.  Micah was wonderfully kind, gracious and encouraging, but what we initially heard wasn’t promising.  The conversation went something like this:

“We’d like to enroll Andi in sailing.”

“Wonderful!  You’ve come to the right place.  How old is she?”

“Thirteen.”

“Has she sailed before?”

“No. “

“Never?”

“Never.”

“Oh.  Ummm…. Well, then she should really start out with a beginner sailing class.”

“Ok,” I said, sensing that something was strange.  “How old are the other kids in that class?”

“They are all young.”

“How young?”

“Six, seven, maybe eight.”

“Oh.” I said, and I could feel Andi cringe at my side.  “I should explain that the main reason we want to enroll her in sailing is so she can meet other kids her age.”

“Ok, well… in the intermediate class there are lots of kids her age, but they have all been sailing for years.  She would have a hard time jumping right into that class.”

I said nothing, suspecting that if I kept quiet she would eventually propose her own solution to this problem.

“But…” she said slowly, “… I guess we could try and put her in the same boat as the kids her age.  She would just have to catch up to them.”

“Okay” I said quickly before she could change her mind.  “Andi, sound okay to you?”

We both looked at Andi who shuffled her feet, looked at the ground and mumbled, “I guess so.”

“We’ll discuss it together and get back to you,” I told Micah.  I thanked her for her time and we left.

Back in the car I asked Andi why she seemed less than enthused.  I thought we had discussed sailing and that she wanted to give it a try.  She explained that she didn’t relish the idea of being thrown in with a group of kids who all knew each other and who were more advanced than she was.  She would be the new girl who didn’t know anything about sailing.  And plus she really wasn’t all that excited about sailing anyway.  And could we please just find something else?

We went back to the list of options and looked into a few others. Everywhere we turned we found dead ends.  A couple other activities had the same problem: she had no experience and would need to start in the beginner’s class with the grade school kids. Sailing was the only activity we could find where she would be able to jump in with kids her own age.

Reluctantly, she agreed to give sailing a try.

Schwarmas, and a Mini-Miracle:

On the Friday evening before what was to be Andi’s first sailing lesson, Cari and I went on a date.  We headed out intending to eat dinner at a Brazilian steak house we’d heard a lot about.  But despite the directions we’d been given, we were unable to find the place.  Reluctantly we decided to settle for Abu Ghazi’s, a place that Matt and Cecily Lew told us about that was supposed to have good schwarmas.  We’re a fan of schwarmas, but they don’t compare to Brazilian steak.

The schwarmas were good.  Okay, they were exceptionally good.  As I type this, my mouth is watering just from the memory. But the most interesting thing about dinner at Abu Ghazi’s wasn’t the food.  It was the people we met there.

As we were enjoying our schwarmas, a mother and two daughters came in and sat down behind us. The two girls looked about Andi’s age.  As we were leaving Cari struck up a conversation with them, and in the course of that conversation we learned that one of the daughter’s, Nina, was in the same sailing class that Andi was about to join.  We shared with them Andi’s concern about jumping into a class of advanced sailors where she didn’t know anybody, and they immediately offered to introduce Nina to Andi before class so that she would know somebody before her first day.  We exchanged phone numbers and set up a date for them to meet.

Introductions and First Lesson

Nina’s mother, Kim, owns The Scuba Shop.  They sell and rent scuba gear and lead diving expeditions.  A few days before Andi began sailing lesson we dropped her off at The Scuba Shop and she and Nina spent a few hours together eating ice-cream at The Carousel and watching the big boats go in and out of the lagoon when the bridge was up.

All of this helped tremendously when we dropped Andi off for her first day of sailing lessons on Thursday the 10^th.   I met with Micah and filled out paperwork while Andi helped Nina and a few other kids haul gear down to the dock.  I could tell she was still nervous and self-conscious, but determined to give this an honest try.  When the paperwork was done, I said goodbye to Andi and told her I’d see her in two and a half hours when I picked her up.  She gave me a wave and a faint but brave smile.

When I came back after her class was over I stood a ways off and watched them finish up.  I noticed that Andi was somewhat keeping her distance from the other kids and wasn’t really interacting with them.  One the drive home she was less than enthusiastic about the experience and was borderline tears when she described how the lesson had played out.  The two other kids in her boat, Nina and Bart, had been nice enough to her but they also had a hard time hiding their frustration at her lack of sailing knowledge.  Apparently they yelled at her a lot because she didn’t know what she was doing, and while choking back tears she expressed her strong desire to never go back again.

“All I could think the entire time was, ‘I just wish I was back at home.’”

Sometimes Being a Parent is Hard

It’s at times like these when I become painfully aware of my own parental inadequacies.  I didn’t know the right thing to do or say, and all I could think to do was give her a hug, tell her I’m sorry that this is so hard, and promise that it will get better.

Inside I knew this:  One day she will look back on this time and be grateful for all that she is learning and experiencing.  Leaving comfort zones is never fun or easy, but in the long run it is always beneficial. Up to this point she has lived her entire life in the little town of St. Cloud, Minnesota.  She’s never been the new kid. Finding and making friends has never been an issue, and finding things to do has always been easy.    This experience is forcing her to learn new skills far beyond sailing that will pay dividends for the rest of her life.

But I also knew that trying to explain this to her now would be the exact opposite of what she wanted to hear, and would only make her mad.  So I just hugged her and told her I loved her.

Tears:

Last Thursday morning (the 17^th) Andi and I were doing math together for home school.  I could tell something was off.  Andi and math don’t get along that well, but there was something else bothering her beyond Pre-Algebra. Then, in the middle of working through a problem in the white board, she broke into tears and sobs and said, “I do NOT want to go back to sailing today.  Why do I have to go?”

I should stop at this point and point out that Andi is normally an incredibly cheerful and happy girl.  She is natively smiley and happy.  At home she is a pure delight and brings sunshine and laughter into our life.  She has a clever sense of humor and continually delights us with her jokes and stories.  She is a happy person.

So when she behaves this way, I know that something is deeply bothering her.  This is not the normal Andi.  At all.

We closed the Pre-Albegra book and put down the dry erase markers.

“Talk to me” I said.  “Tell me why you feel so strongly about this.”  Her reply came in gushes.

“I don’t even like sailing and I don’t know these people and they get mad at me because I don’t know what I’m doing and it’s not even fun and I’d rather do nothing at all than take sailing lessons and I miss my friends in St. Cloud and do you think we will ever move back there again and I just don’t want to go so why are you making me.”

To borrow a classic Minnesota word: Ufda.

I had no idea how much of this was legitimate concerns I needed to address, and how much of it was just some hormonal girl early teenage thing. I repeated the actions of last Thursday and gave her a hug, and then I launched into a very father-esque monolog.

I talked about the importance of being the kind of person who doesn’t quit. I talked about having enough depth of character to not give up on something after trying it only once.  I talked about the Marine’s motto: When the going gets tough, the tough get going.  I talked about how important it was to learn these kinds of things now, in her youth, and how even though she was having a hard time now that the day would come when she would appreciate all the things she is learning now.

She listened attentively, and when I was done monologing she said simply, “I understand all that, but why does it have to be sailing.  I don’t LIKE sailing.”

I explained that there is no possible way she can know if she likes sailing after only trying it once under less than ideal circumstances.  I talked about how incredibly lucky she was to have the chance to learn how to sail in a place like St. Martin, and how sailing is such a splendid skill that she will be able to use for the rest of her life.  I told her about my sister Emily and her family who paid a small mountain of money to take a crash course in sailing, and how now for their family vacation every year they rent a large sail boat and sail around the Bahamas.  I told her that I would love to be in her place and to be learning this incredible skill at such a young age and how learning to sail now can open up a whole world of possibilities for her.

I could tell she was listening, and I could see in her eyes that new ideas were opening up to her. The frustration slowly gave away to curiosity, and when I was done with my sales pitch, she wiped her eyes, squared her shoulders and said, “Ok, I’ll keep trying it.”

Second Sailing Lesson:

When I dropped her off at the dock later that day her spirits had improved tremendously from earlier in the morning.  She seemed to be almost looking forward to it.  Almost.  The lessons officially end at 6 pm, but she had asked me to be back early because last week they had finished early.  I’m glad she said that because it gave me chance to see her interacting with the other kids at the end of the lesson as they cleaned up the boats and put them away.  There were a lot more kids this time than there had been the previous week, almost three times as many.  I still didn’t have my camera but another mom was there talking photos, so I gave her my email and asked her to send me copies.

On the way home this time her report was entirely different.  She had truly enjoyed herself and was looking forward to going back again next week!

Andi and her classmates washing gear and putting it away. Gosh, was I glad to see her smiling.	Watching and learning. That's Nina in the blue hat.
They were having fun squirting each other with that hose.	The boats they sail in are brand new, and everyone seems excited to have them.

What a relief.  I think this sailing thing just might work.

We have a ways to go, I think, before she’ll be over feeling homesick.  But I also think this week was a breakthrough week for her.

Good job Andi.  I’m proud of you.

Next Week’s Blog Post:

Tanner, baseball, culture shock, and how my heart is aching for this eleven year old kid who I love so much.