Mango

This time of year we have an abundance of mangoes.  Every day now, many mangoes fall from our trees into the yards both where I live and at the orphanage.

During the three years that I was in the United States after my first experience in Haiti, I would occasionally purchase a mango, remembering how much I had enjoyed them in Haiti.  Since there were not an abundance of them, and typically they are relatively  expensive in the US, it was a special treat, although they were not as fresh and flavorful as the ones that grow here.  I would often offer pieces to the sisters I lived with wanting to share the experience.  Especially if nobody else was interested I would eat a small portion at a time keeping it refrigerated so that a single mango might last  three days.  Remembering that makes me smile since now it is common for me to eat three whole mangoes by myself in a single day, although not necessarily in a single sitting unless of course they are a small variety.

The children at the orphanage enjoy eating mangoes too.  When one falls to the ground children race to retrieve it. They have various methods of getting the high mangoes to fall so that they can eat them.  Sometimes they throw stones at the mangoes.  On occasion a thrown stone has missed the mango and landed loudly on the metal roof of the playroom, creating quite a noise and a distraction especially if I am in the midst of a session.I believe that I experience some unique challenges that most clinical social workers/play therapists in the US don't typically encounter.  (Another example of such a unique challenge was a live tarantula recently hiding in a box of puppets.)

Thank God for beautiful trees and delicious fresh fruit!  If you were here I'd gladly share a mango with you, or actually I'd give your own, maybe even several of your own. Bon Appetit!