Though you have made me see troubles, many and bitter, you will restore my life again; from the depths of the earth you will again bring me up.  You will increase my honor and comfort me once again. Psalm 71:20,21 (NIV)

This is the first childhood story I’ve posted in four weeks, due in part to the fact I’m in the Land of the Scots for a month, and it took monumental preparations to get here, including packing an apothecary bag of herbs and supplements required for the various ailments that plague me.

For the past few years, my husband and I have traveled annually to the country of his birth, to visit family and friends in Glasgow and Edinburgh and take a wee vacation in the highlands. Even though Chris would prefer to experience new places, we rent the same little cottage near Loch Ness each year, since familiarity helps me feel secure and at home.

Indeed, many aspects of Scotland feel like home. As a child living with my missionary parents in Nigeria, a British colony, I was surrounded by many British influences. We learned to call a truck a lorry, the hood a bonnet, and the trunk a boot. We spelled tire – tyre, color – colour, and accepted that the correct pronunciation of schedule is with an “sh” sound.

Best of all were the British chocolates: Cadbury’s Fruit & Nut Bars, Mars Bars, and special chocolate Smarties. I even learned to enjoy that quintessential British staple, Marmite, which tastes like blackened drippings scraped from a baking pan of over-done roast beef.

A Bit of Scotland Next Door

Missionaries from many countries of the world resided on our station at Egbe, a large village in the southern savannah-region of Nigeria. Our neighbors, the Finlaysons, hailed from Edinburgh and were obviously proud of their Scottish heritage, telling frequent tales about the beauty and history of their fair land.

Uncle Ian–we fondly called all the missionaries “Aunt” and “Uncle”–taught at Titcombe College with my mom and dad. On the other side of our mission station stood a hospital complex, the only medical facility serving the Nigerian community for a hundred miles, and there Aunt Sheila utilized her nursing skills. For hours each day, my brothers and the Finlayson boys drove Matchbox® cars over makeshift roads in our sandy driveway and explored the compound riding their trusty bicycles.

One humid, sunny morning when I was six, Uncle Ian peddled his bike down the rutted, dirt road past our house to teach his mathematics classes. When he spied me standing under the shade of the flame tree in our front yard, he paused and boomed out a cheerful greeting, “Ach Lassie! It’s a bonnie morning!”

I placed my baby in her buggy and waved a silent greeting.

“That’s a lovely wee pram for your dolly.” Uncle Ian rolled the R in pram as if there were three or four, not just one.

Many afternoons the kids all had tea at our house after rest hour, despite the tropical West African humidity. Of course, we sipped on black, loose-leafed tea, in the British manner—with milk and sugar.

Adversity along with Adventure

For me, the most difficult part of that life was having to live at boarding school for eight or nine months of the year. Additional challenges included dealing with the transitions to and from school, navigating periodic visits back to California, and undergoing recurrent losses as friends moved away.

When their second missionary term ended, the Finlayson clan flew back to their beloved homeland. At the same time, my parents accepted a new teaching position in the tiny, out-of-the-way town of Shao (rhymes with now). We were the only expatriate family there, and our solitary house stood on its own compound a mile outside the village. I had just turned thirteen.

At that tender age, friendships and social contacts were vital, but I felt displaced on our isolated mission station. The Finlaysons never returned to Nigeria, and that farewell marked the end of an idyllic era for me.

A decade later, after moving to California for college, I fell in love with a handsome young man who had immigrated to the San Francisco area from Scotland with his family as a five-year-old. On our honeymoon, and every few years thereafter, Chris and I flew into Edinburgh to visit his relatives, and I wondered if I would sometime bump into my childhood chums while walking down the street. 

When my dad passed away in 2015, I posted the news on Facebook and received lovely messages of condolence and remembrance from friends around the world. My eyes opened wide as an owl’s when I spied a sweet message from Derek, the oldest of the Finlayson lads. He had found us through mutual friends, and I promised to look him up the following spring.

The Power of Reconnecting

When the wheels of the British Airways jet touched down on Scottish soil, my stomach filled with butterfly-flutters of anticipation. On this trip, I’ll finally see my old friends! As we taxied toward the terminal, I pestered my patient husband with anxious questions. “What do I really expect from reconnecting with people I haven’t seen since I was a kid?” I said. “Will we have anything in common? Will they think I’m boring?” Chris just smiled and shook his head.

After that gap of forty years, it was fantastic to see the Finlayson men again, although, sadly, Aunt Sheila had passed away. We reminisced for hours over lunch. Derek’s memories of boarding school were predominantly lonely ones, but as we talked together, he came to a new appreciation of his time in Nigeria.

When I returned to California, Derek emailed, saying, “One of the most disappointing aspects of KA and Egbe for me is that in all the time I was in Nigeria, I never made a single close friend, not even with you or Mark.

“I guess the truth is that many of us were struggling to come to terms with a different culture and a lifestyle that involved many changes and far too many hellos and goodbyes. Every time we left for school for example.

“Many of those hello/goodbyes were really quite painful experiences, weren’t they? So, your getting in touch with me is like healing an old wound in some way.”

What a wonderful reason to reconnect after all those years.

Looking Back

As I sit at the kitchen table in the cottage at Drumnadrochit near Loch Ness, a cold brook babbles past the side garden, and anticipation of our annual reunion next week make me smile.

The unresolved grief Derek expressed had lingered in both his memory and mine, long after the partings. When first formed, ours was a tenuous bond of friendship, joined together merely by childhood circumstances. We’ve re-forged the severed connection, and today it feels as strong as steel, now that we are adults, choosing to be friends once again.

As my loving Heavenly Father shows me how to use those long-ago events for present-day wisdom, I’m grateful for the opportunity to bring closure to my past.

Link It to Your Life

What childhood memory would you like to revisit in order to bring closure? Is there perhaps a friendship you’ve lost and wish you could regain? How could you reach out to help you both heal?

Prayer

Father, thank you that you restore my life, no matter how much trouble I’ve seen. I’m grateful you guided me to reach out and become a catalyst for healing a friend. Help me to trust that you will bring honor and comfort, even in hard times.