She wriggled through the small mob of children around me and wedged herself between my knees and the pew in front of me. I pushed my back against the wood, making room for her to slip by. But she didn’t want to slip by. Instead, she stretched her arms wide and proceeded to dangle from the back of the pew. She wanted her picture taken. So I raised my camera.

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This morning, not ten minutes ago, half my family—Marlboro Man and our two daughters—left the house to board a plane for the Dominican Republic for a five-day trip with Compassion, International, a child sponsorship and advocacy organization for children around the world. It’s an interesting series of events that resulted in Marlboro Man and the girls going on this journey together, and now that it’s upon us, all I can do is hope they’ll remember not to let any tap water touch their lips…and wonder with growing anticipation what kinds of extraordinary experiences are in store for them in the coming week.

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I didn’t expect this to happen, but the entire time Marlboro Man and the girls were gone, I obsessively followed along not only with his and the girls’ various accounts of the trip, but also those of the other travelers in their group. I looked at photos, read everyone’s different stories and experiences, presumably in an effort to feel as connected as I could to what was going on with my family in this whole other country. Before the trip, I expected to revel in the free time, catch up on my to-do list, and do my own thing. Instead, I sat and read and followed. It’s been a wonderful “trip” for me, too.

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After we visited another Compassion project yesterday, we went to the market since it was our last day and we all wanted to pick up a few souvenirs to take home.

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One of the things that I feared as I prepared for this Compassion trip is that my previous exposure to poverty in Ethiopia would make me feel less for the children in the Dominican Republic. I was afraid I would be jaded. If you’ve seen one tin shack, you’ve seen them all, right? I mentioned this to my cousin Dave, a thoughtful man, and he said, “Well, maybe you’ll be less overwhelmed than some people. Maybe that will let you write better.”

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