We have this little friend that comes over to visit us a lot. Her name is Delmi. She’s Reyna’s 2-year-old little girl, and I have to admit, she’s as cute as a button. She has a best friend in the whole wide world, and that’s Emily. Just about every day, we hear her come toddling down the path to our house, singing Em-i-la, Em-i-la as she comes to our door. Then there’s a little knock, and her friend Emily opens it up and says “Okan-teq!” and she comes right in. Our house is like a big happy playplace for her: there are pretty books to read, a ball to roll around, bread to knead, and tasty snacks to eat from time to time. It’s a place filled with strange and wonderful colors and smells that can be found nowhere else in the valley, a place where the floor isn’t dirt and the shelves always hold something new. The other kids come and play sometimes too, but she sortof owns the place.

“You know, she’s going to not know what happened when we leave,” I told Emily today as they were making bread together.

“Yeah. One day everything will be normal, then the next day she’ll come knocking on the door and we won’t be here,” she replied.

I don’t really know why, but that thought made me terribly sad. “Em-i-la” is like Delmi’s best friend, and has been all her life. How can you just tear something like that away? The other sad thing is that as much as Delmi loves her Emily, by the time she’s 10, she won’t even remember her. That is pretty sad too. I’m not worried for Delmi; she has a caring family that loves her and takes really good care of her, which is more than can be said for too many kids here. It just makes me think about how fleeting and confusing life is.