I had one prenatal appointment at Nyankunde with Ruth Dix, the missionary doctor. She told me to return 2 weeks from my delivery date. Your dad flew me there, and she was gone on vacation. Another English doctor examined me. He said, ”You will be early and you are too small so it may be difficult”. He was right. I was ten days early. I spent labor in the African hospital with your dad guarding the door. Other women were screaming in other rooms. No epidural, no monitors, no nurses and no medications. 

Labor failed to progress. So I stayed there all night. The next morning they started the generator and Doc did a spinal and a C-Section. Amazingly, you were perfect. No head squished or red-monkey look for you. They took us to Ruth’s house (she was still on vacation). You were an excellent baby then…you nursed, pooped, and slept a lot like you were supposed to. Your dad flew us to Rethy and my mom helped me for a short time. I had no clue even how to fold a cloth diaper for a boy. I did discover boys pee on you when you change diapers. I never even babysat when I was a teenager. No child checkups, professional counsel on child-rearing or even books to read. 

We flew back to Bukavu. First thing I got was mastitis. The doctor from Nyankunde told your dad to give me a shot of penicillin. The syringe was full, the needle huge, and I had to talk him through it. Thankfully it did the trick. Your grandmother watched you until I was able to nurse you again. She gave you powdered milk with cerelac in it (some powdered cereal thing for infants). She told me I didn’t have enough milk, you cried because you were hungry. Yikes. What a start for a new mom. The Africans lived in thatched huts with mud floors, no doctors or help and knew how to take care of babies better than I did. 

Sven (a Swedish missionary) went on a furlough, and offered us his home for a year, so we moved into his big home a mile from the airport.  It was beautiful. We could now afford to hire someone to help around the house. An older Tsutsi man named Paulo applied to work. He had a card (written in English) recommending him.  He told us he had a shaking problem, which I finally realized was epilepsy. Your dad explained to him it was like a disconnected circuit in his brain, not demonic, and we could help him. I got him some dilantin from the pharmacy in Nairobi, and taught him how to take it.  I would not have survived without Paulo. He taught me Swahili, how to bake bread, wash clothes and sew, cook, and how to manage you. Africans love children. You adored Paulo. You would get a rag and “help” him clean the cement floors. You were heaps of fun to take care of and easy to entertain. You were a handful as you walked and talked early. Once you choked on a hard candy. He hollered, I picked you up by the feet and whacked you on the back. The candy flew across the room, and you started screaming and turning pink again. Hooray for instincts. I didn’t know about the Heimlick maneuver then. 

I spent time flight-following on the short wave radio when the pilots were flying. It meant calling the missionaries on the radio, checking the weather, and marking the checkpoints on the map as the pilot flew over them. There were no paved airstrips, no tower control, no wind socks, no refueling facilities or radar. Some missionaries would be overly optimistic reporting the weather, only to find it clouded over by the time the pilot got there. Pilots could not fly in the clouds, our mountains were too high. Jungle trees are over 200 feet tall and mud roads infrequent. so there were few options for emergency landings. The grass strips were not well maintained and often had goats grazing on them. The flight following was essential or no one would know where you crashed. A missionary bush pilot is not a profession for the faint-hearted. 

I have been in the plane with you when things went wrong: landing gear would not come down, daylight ran out and missionaries had to line ends of the strip with car lights on, or the engine quit. That one was the most terrifying. Your dad was ferrying the plane from Bukavu to Nairobi to the mechanics as it had not been running well. We were flying over the jungle, and hadn't quite made it over Lake Victoria yet. The single engine sputtered, then stopped. I could hear the wind on the wings. You were awake, babbling happily, sitting on my lap.  I put a pillow between you and the dash,  and kept my mouth shut, praying with my eyes on the trees below. We got so close I could see individual leaves before the engine restarted. God had his hand on your life and it was not your time to die. You were not even two yet.