"in China"...

 "In China, we eat from black bowls and black drink bowls.  Hao min {noodles}.  Breakfast.  Lunch.  No dinner."


"In China, I have mommy.  She has long, black pony tail.  She very nice." 


"In China, little girl cry at night when it is a big thunder and rain.  I help little girl"

And so Emma begins to share of her life there.  In China.

Her stories leak out.  Here and there.

The first one, about the black bowls, came as we walked by a display of small cafe au lait ceramic bowls in a store.  They were brightly colored and Emma's fingers ran along them slowly as she recounted her bowls in China.

There are many about sleeping and night.  She tells us she slept between a "little girl" and a "big girl".  And Emma stars as the comforting, helping girl in many of them.  Her memories are of care-taking emotionally the littler boys and girls.  Kissing hurt arms from falling out of bed.  Telling other kids to leave the little ones alone.  A defender of the weak, is what I hear in her stories.

She does recall playing chase with her friends.  And pretending monsters.  Emma has a stark fear of a lion.  Or lions in general.  We pray the lions away at bedtime each night.  Somehow they are connected to China...or a China fear.  Nighttime scares.

Emma's memories are mostly about daily life.  And since we know her day to day life was in the orphanage and the walls of the grounds outside the orphanage, it makes sense that she doesn't much recall things like birds, grass, trees, etc.  These are, of course, the recollections of a little girl sharing her memories of home There.

For her it was home.

And her recollections vary from sweet and endearing to sad.  And heartbreaking.

We've heard about playing basketball and a little boy falling off his chair at dinnertime.  Singing songs at school and singing songs to herself to go to sleep.  Her little wooden bed, and the way they showered up.

Emma has shared of playing, laughing, learning, growing and the ways in which she wants to tell us of her life there.

It is her narrative.

They are her China stories.  So I've only shared some tidbits here.  It is such an honor that she is willing to let us into her life lived There.

The woman she refers to as her mom in China?  After many questions and all the photos we have looked through, it is who I thought she meant.  Who I knew she meant.

She thinks of her mom in China as her dear, beautiful teacher who we know as "Miss Susie".

Just seeing these pictures brings the hugest lump to my throat.  It was such a beautiful meeting that God orchestrated.

We met Miss Susie in our hotel in Fuzhou.  I wrote about it here.

I hope Miss Susie knows, in some capacity, this side of eternity her legacy of love and care.  She lavishes her little ones with warmth and goodness.  And it shows.  Emma loves her, and regards her as her China mom in her heart.  The one Emma holds as the one who cared and loved.  A lot.  What a beautiful thing.

The unfolding of these memories and stories is so precious to us.  Even the hard ones.  They are part of our Emma's story.  And we hold them as part of our family's story, because she is one of us, and we are hers.