Wednesday, July 29, 2009

injured kids

Tuesday, June 30
I was working on vocabulary with Eileen when I heard Benjamin holler. He came limping toward me with blood flowing from his foot, so I helped him begin the ascent to our house, and Eileen's husband David carried Benjamin the rest of the way. Benjamin had cut the base of his big toe on a shell, and he bled all up the steps! Aaron began to patch him up, and I headed back down to Eileen's where I had left Katherine. I got settled in, picked up my notebook, and began to ask Eileen another question, when I heard Olivia scream.

Those of you who know Olivia are well aware of her tendencies to be dramatic when it come to pain. My back was to her, and when I turned around, I saw my blond beauty with blood streaming down her face. I handed Katherine to Eileen and began to trek back up the hill with another bleeding child after sending Sarah up the hill quickly to warn Aaron to get the first aid supplies back out. Olivia and I made it up the hill, and her screaming quickly gathered a crowd of curious onlookers.

As we washed her face, we quickly found that she had several cuts on the right side of her face. She had been playing in the hammock ("ila" - also the word for net) with other kids when she fell and slammed into the coral beach. We cleaned her up, applied antibiotic ointment, and assured all of the neighbors that she would be okay. Looks like she will have a black eye and a sore face for a while. God was protecting her, though, because the deepest cut was just under her eye and another cut grazed her eyebrow.

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