This huge mango tree that lives behind my apartment is more than meets the eye. It is immense and loaded with mango fruit. This mango tree is unique in that it is in fact a small grove of twelve trees growing in a very crowded space. Mango trees are evergreen trees native to Southeast Asia and India. They can grow up to 100 feet tall depending on variety. The mango in my back yard is over 100 feet tall. I don’t know it’s variety but it’s in season and produces a smallish green fruit that kids passing in the street try to knock off the trees with rocks and even other fallen mangos. Yesterday four kids came by in the afternoon and one shucked off his shoes and climbed up into the higher branches to shake the fruit down.

 Great day in the morning! When I walked onto the  construction site I was amazed at the progress made on the new home for the children of the Fundación Señor San José while I was in the States. The building is expected to be completed in six months. What a wonderful thing this is that is coming to fruition. I am so proud of Sister Edith and the patient, devoted tenacity that led her to reach the goal of her life. I am proud that I have been a small part of the effort.

One of my reasons for traveling to California this trip from Seattle was to visit my grandson in San Jose. Travis is resting amongst his father’s family who visit him every weekend. He is our American Fallen Hero. I lived in San Jose and San Francisco for several years and many of my own maternal family members have been laid to rest in the Bay Area over the generations. My days in the States this visit have been filled with bureaucratic snafus and MD appointments in Seattle, visits with family and friends in Seattle and California and consuming large quantities of Mexican food I cannot find in Honduras. A week from today I am scheduled to be on a  flight home to La Paz. That is if one lingering bureaucratic medical mixup doesn’t ruin and delay my travel plans. I am eager to jump into the new Hogar San Jose’s building construction activities.