Again, I had to go into the day knowing that goodbye was in a couple of hours. Instead I tried to focus on the fact that we were making these kids a dinner that they would never forget. We paid for chicken, corn, vegetables, sauce, dessert, the whole meal. Then the crew at CPO prepared it. Each kid got to have two full pieces of chicken, a full cob of corn and a handful of vegetables. Most of them have never had chicken before, and if they had, it was only a scrap. By the end, most of them were full which I don't think has ever happened to any of those kids. Then we brought out dessert which was a bowl of Twinkies, covered in chocolate sauce. Most of them could not finish because they were full from dinner but they all loved it. And the party began.
I have never really been a big dancer and I would not say that I am good at all. But I danced harder than ever, I dance for 2 hours straight trying to dance with every kid and trying to get every kid to dance. It was incredibly hot having 50 people on one small stage dancing like there was no tomorrow (because there was no tomorrow) It was 110% worth every second.
I had a glance at my watch and saw 7:45 it took me a couple seconds to realize that that meant 15 minutes, I broke the news to everyone and the next 15 minutes of dancing were incredible. Everyone in the the group gave it their all. Then like it felt like only a few seconds and the music stopped.
Only a few kids had started to cry, I don't think that everyone had registered what was happening. I started to hug some kids when everyone caught on. I had two kids hugging me bawling into my shirt when one looked up at me with his eyes full of tears and said with a sound of desperation "Please come back" and that wasn't the worst part. I could not say I will. I had the amazing opportunity of coming once, Then an unthinkable of coming twice, I don't know if three will be possible. Last year was easier, all I had to say was "I will come back" this year was "I will try".
For the first time in my life I saw a 25 year old bawl his eyes out. His name is Roy he is the oldest of 9 kids and completely healthy. For once in his life he did not have to worry about his family, because we were doing it for him. We gave his family a break and made them happy. He knew that it was back to before. I think his cries were more as a thank you to us and a little of the goodbye. He hugged me soaking my shirt for a solid ten minutes. The room was filled with the worst sound that a human can make, sheer cries of desperation, from kids and adults like Roy.
At one point I had about 8 kids all hugging me at once, and all soaking my shirt with their tears. It took all of my power to not cry for as long as I could but it only lasted me about 5 minutes. The whole night all I could say was "I will try"and "maybe" to the question of "Will you come back next year". This was harder than last year and I was not expecting this one to be so hard. But we did it, we accomplished our mission! Thank you everyone for your help and support, because it helped change the orphans, and our lives.
That night I received a letter from my dad that included this quote that I feel worked really well.
"Don't weep because it is over,
Smile because it happened"
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