Finding Treasures....

It is a chilly October afternoon. They sky is gray and a hint of rain hangs in the air. My office window faces a dirt pile that is perhaps 6 or 7 feet high – the product of recent construction on the adjacent lot. Two blonde haired boys, one still sporting his school uniform, have been playing on this pile for over an hour. One boy stands on top of the pile with a shovel, digging away – his little arms straining with effort. His friend labors just as heavily – trudging up and down the pile until his jeans are stained and brown, bringing scraps of wood from the construction site to be organized later. He finds promise in each piece and knows immediately how it will be used toward furthering the project. To a tired adult on his way home from work, the dirt pile will still be that – a castle of mud cluttered with trash, but to these boys, it is a work of love that represents all that is awesome in their world.

They remind me of my brothers – both younger than I – who spent hours and hours playing in a similar fashion. As I watched these boys, I thought of my brothers, now grown men, and myself and wondered at what point we lose that childhood imagination and zest for life. At what point do mud piles cease to be anything but mud piles? At what point do scrapes of trash no longer hold excitement or possibility? Why do we lose all that when we grow up? And then it occurred to me that sometimes we don’t. Some people hold on to what makes being young so great. They keep that excitement and energy and sense of possibility. One of those people is my brother, JT.

JT is still that little boy looking for adventure in unusual places and seeing treasure in trash. Currently, he lives in Awasa, Ethiopia. He has been in that country for over a year, and while I miss him greatly, I admire his passion for life and people. He believes people can achieve greatness, and he testifies that anything is possible to those willing to work hard enough to get it. He labors for little pay in a place of few luxuries so that he can make the world a better place for those who most need to see treasure in trash. And he does it all with a sense of excitement that is contagious and intoxicating. I love him, and I love the work he does. I’m so proud that he kept that little boy spirit that makes him forever my baby brother.