Everything here is worth it when I make a kid laugh

We were five Americans playing baseball on an abandoned soccer field across the road from a church holding mass in a village about 5 km from the Benin-Togo border. It was impossible that we would remain undiscovered very long. After the third pitch, I looked toward the road. They had found us. They were wandering sneakily outside the church and then running as fast as possible across the street.

The kids were coming.

There are days when I wonder why I’m still here. There are times when all I want to do is lock my door and watch the West Wing the entire day. There are times when I want to start drinking at noon because there was a fistfight in my English class that day.

It all disappears the moment I make one of my students laugh, when I push my neighbor around the courtyard on my bike or when my neighbor’s daughter giggles as I dance with her around my house. The kids might be my best friends in my village, but I’m ok with that.

One of my friends said it best: “There is no feeling like the feeling when a kid runs up to hug you.”