Sometimes it amazes me how much happens in a week, how many emotions can be experienced, and how much life can change and grow.
For one, the little basil plant that my parents sent me seeds for is really looking like it’s starting to thrive and the parsley has finally sprouted! We haven’t planted anything else in our garden yet, but we’ve got the seeds for all sorts of cold weather foods that aren’t root vegetables (mostly greens…we can’t do root vegetables because we couldn’t loosen the soil deep enough for them). Today we’re hopefully going to get a hose too, so that will make watering everything a lot easier.
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Last Saturday night, after posting last week’s blog, we hurried off to dinner in preparation for the vigil at Fort Huachuca, which was at Southside Presbyterian. For those of you unfamiliar with Southside, you might have heard of it because the Sanctuary Movement originated there in the ‘80s. When we got there we were created by some people we didn’t know yet, and others we recognized from our Wednesday night dinners at Casa Mariposa (an ecumenical community, similar in many ways to a Catholic Worker, that has open dinners on Wednesday nights). It is so nice as we get more situated, to recognize people when we go places…it makes me feel more settled and peaceful. The night included lot’s of singing (hence the title of this entry), some speaking (John from Casa Mariposa invited us to read a short piece by Walter Wink on the true meaning of non-violence), and some tai-chi (to bring peace to our bodies). When we left I felt very alive…I think the music especially connected with me, something about sitting in that room singing songs with mostly people I didn’t even know but that spoke to our shared beliefs. As we were singing I felt like I let go a little bit of some of the stress I’d been holding onto, questions about where to live next year, questions about what jobs to pursue, questions about my vocation…questions that don’t need answers with any urgency.
When we got to the protest/vigil/demonstration, I was kind of surprised- it was tiny! Only maybe 100 people were there and maybe 30-40 counter-protesters right across the street. I thought a lot over the afternoon about why I was there, and what I had hoped to accomplish in being there. I think in a lot of ways I was there for myself, to participate in a nonviolent action that I believed in, to continue being a part of the Tucson community and understanding the Tucsonan-imagination (another way of saying, the unspoken cultural/philosophical context that informs the energy and actions of a place or people) . I was also there to speak out against torture—and this is the point the counter protestors seemed to miss—against all torture. I was not there to not support the troops, I was not there to shame any individuals, as Walter Wink well articulates, “As we stop dividing the world into 'us' and 'them,'” we can begin to see that the enemy is not monolithic”. I think that is something I learned well going to the Teach-in/SOA vigil in years past, and meeting teachers at the school. Individuals are quite simply that, and it is important not to confuse them with something greater, not to forget they have their own story. While that may be the case, that does not mean that people should not raise their voice against wrongs out of fear of harming the individual, rather that one should be intentional and thoughtful about the way they raise their voice. Nonetheless, on Sunday I kept feeling as though my time would have been better spent trying to speak with people about why I was standing there. As the counter protesters told us to “shut up” (even though we were in silence for the most part), or “go to Afghanistan” or said “maybe they don’t understand us, say it in Spanish” (a few of many things shouted at us)…I couldn’t help but feel that some where between our sidewalk and theirs the message was lost and if the message couldn’t even make it that far, what was I doing?
That night for Spirituality night, Kaitlyn taught us how to make paper cranes and shared with us the story of Sadako Sasaki. So we each first decorated/wrote of the paper messages and prayers of peace, then folded them and now plan to hang them somewhere in our house.
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Then began a whirlwind of a week…or rather, as Jen and I decided, a week of Mondays. As usual, my schedule over the course of the week was Monday/Wednesday/Thursday spent at Works (a day labor/employment center), Tuesday at Casa Paloma (a drop in center for unaccompanied women where they can get a hot breakfast, shower, do laundry, get clothes, get hygiene products, and relax…more commonly called Casa P), and Friday at HIP (homeless intervention and prevention, a drop in center for anyone and everyone where they can also get mail delivered and receive phone messages.
Maybe it’s the full moon, or maybe it’s because the end of the month is nearing (and along with people’s money running out so too their patience), but the week was just crazy. When I’m at Works I am a Case Manager, which in my interview was explained to me as “accompaniment”…and though I definitely believe that, over the past 3 months I’ve started to figure out what that means on a daily basis.
- For me, it means that people think I know more than I do (a few weeks ago a woman at Casa P told me she had been peeing blood for two days, took out all of her medications and said that she didn’t want to go to a hospital because she doesn’t like them, but instead of would like for me to tell her which medications to stop taking)
- It means that people sometimes take advantage of our presence, in that they are rude to you because there is no one else in their life onto whom they can take out their frustration
- It means you connect people with resources, when they say they need a drug test you help them figure out where to go and how to pay for it…when someone says they haven’t received their food stamps yet, you help them navigate DES...etc
- It means you help people write resumes and cover letters and navigate applying for a job with felony convictions
- It means telling people they need to go to AA or another kind of meetings, even if they think that 1 month of sobriety means they’re all set
- It means that you listen…to job search experiences, to frustrations with the other services they’re getting in the city, to problems they’re having with their families, to the frustrations of living in a shelter with 99 other men, to whatever they want to share—the good and the bad
It’s the listening that makes the job worthwhile for me, and also the part the drains me. It’s the part that is breaking my heart, as my heart was broken in El Salvador.
I am regularly astounded by how humble the men I meet with can be, how vulnerable they can be in an office environment with a person half their age from across the country that has never lived on the street. I am also often frustrated that our meetings are yet another hoop these men have to jump through and balance...they need to get to a thousand meetings, and job search, all on a 2 rider bus pass. When do they get time to be themselves? When do they get time to simply be?
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Then, one final part of the week I want to acknowledge in this blog post is that November 16th was the 21st anniversary of the deaths of the Jesuit UCA martyrs, including our house’s namesake—Ignacio Ellacuría. During my time in El Salvador nearly 2 years ago, the martyrs were a part of daily life…and I went from frustration with how much people discussed them, because I thought it meant that the countless others that were killed during the war were being forgotten…to beginning to understand how deep a role they truly play in the Salvadoran imagination.
We watched the YouTube video of Fr. Mark Ravizza’s “Hope of the UCA Martyrs” talk at Fordham in the Bronx last fall, and I was again reminded of so much…of the impact of the violent poverty and humble grace experienced by so many Salvadorans…of the real hope the martyrs bring to Salvadorans today, the strength that is drawn from their memory…of what the martyrs have taught me, and what El Salvador taught me…about myself and about the world, about living one’s values. Listening to Mark talk, I thought about what it means to be truly present to others, and considered if I am doing that both in my job and at home…what it means to be fully myself, to allow myself to be open to the mystery of life, to let go of attempts at control, to let others in…to be quiet and listen to others, to the world, to myself.
We also finally bought some ceramic pots for our herbs, so hopefully basil will make it a little longer... and a clothes line so we can start taking full advantage of the dry air!