This Past Year

This past year has been the “Year of Kids” in my life. I spent a lot of hours at the local Boy’s and Girl’s club, settling arguments and trying to keep kids from killing each other with wild antics. I loved the kids. I enjoyed getting to know them and taking care of them.

But, this morning I got to thinking of how much time I spent hugging and rocking kids because their lives were coming apart. Here is a list of the situations I heard from all different kids (not all at the Boy’s and Girl’s club):

Her father lived in Jonesboro – or was it Jackson? – and she hasn’t seen him since she was two.

She didn’t really know her mother and now she was going to live with her for the first time since she was a baby.

His parents are both on drugs so he’s moved several states away to live his aunt – the only one in the family that would take him.

Her mother is on drugs.

She didn’t have a good relationship with her dad. Now she’s a teen and she’s going to spend the summer with him for the first time since she was in third grade.

His mother doesn’t work – but mom says he’s too much trouble to keep at home.

Their stepmom neglects them.

Her mother only feeds her one meal a day – if that.

His mother’s boyfriend just moved in and suddenly he has a new brother his own age whom he never knew before now.

She is the one raising her little sister when they stay with her mom.

She trying to run away because she wanted to get away from her foster home and go to her real mom.

His stepfather was arrested last night for drug dealing.

Her father shot her mother right in front of her.

He lives with his grandmother. His sisters (each with a different last name) are farmed out to other relatives in Texas.

Her father was just diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.

His father is in prison.

Her father has a restraining order against him to keep him away from her.

She just tried this morning to call her father who she hasn’t seen in months. He told her never to call him again.

His stepfather died a month ago in a car wreck.

She stays with friends because her mother is an alcoholic.

I don’t know how many times I’ve held and rocked a child who can’t understand why her Dad isn’t home. It’s been more times than I’ve kissed a boo-boo this year. Why does our country not put any value on fatherhood? How can they not realize what it’s doing to their children? Just last Wednesday, I took a girl out of the Bible class because she kept crying. “What’s wrong?” I asked her.

“I want my dad. I haven’t seen him in weeks and my mom said I couldn’t call him. I love my dad, why can’t I see him?”

What do I say? I never was in her place. How can I tell her it’s going to be ok? They would be empty words. So I sit down in a rocking chair and rock her, crying with her. What do I say when her world is falling to pieces? I point her to Jesus. He knows. He can hold her together. That’s all I can give her – but it’s the best there is.

The White Flower

Night phone calls are rarely good news, and tonight was no exception. “Martha, you know the corner of Bushwick and Eighth?”

“Uh,” I tried to wake my mind into map gear, “Yeah.”

“The gangs have been fighting over it again. Esmeralda was walking home from the bus stop and – and she was hit by a stray bullet.”

I was suddenly wide awake, “What? Is she – is she dead?”

“Her heart stopped about an hour ago at the ER. They’ve already taken her to the funeral home. Her mom isn’t doing well, can you go see her?”

“Of course.”

I hung up and rolled over to look at the clock. It was three in the morning. I would have to wait for daylight to come before I could leave. In Bushwick, you don’t leave your house before the sun comes over the horizon unless you have armed bodyguards along.

I had taken Esmeralda on my Sunday School Bus Route a year ago. Every week on Saturdays she had waited, dancing with excitement, with three other kids for my ancient bus to groan around the corner and stop with the brakes screeching loud enough to be heard in Manhattan. She would jump aboard with a cheerful smile and “Hi Miss Martha!” and give me quick kiss before running to her seat near the back. Every Friday, I would climb the broken stairs to her tenement house on the fourth floor and visit her home and pray with her and her family. Now she was gone, leaving a grieving family and a hole in my heart.

The grey walls of the apartment building rose in front of me that morning, meeting the grey autumn sky ten stories above me. Graffiti of all shades covered the walls for about twenty feet, and then tapered off. I pushed open the swinging door and entered the dark hallway, the foul odor of urine making my nose smart. “SOLID” proclaimed the wall in front of me in stylized script— meaningless to the outsiders, to the residents it clearly proclaimed the presence of the Four Corner Hustler Gang. Over it, the picture of a bunny and the words “The Dark Side” showed the presence of the rival Gangster Two-Six. So those were the two who had been fighting, I thought as I picked my way over a shockingly thin man strung out on Meth. Nine flights up, I came to the fourth floor and knocked on the door to the right. It opened a crack and a frightened face peered out, then it swung wide and I saw Esmeralda’s mother. Her eyes were red-rimmed and empty. I stepped in and shut the door behind me. “I heard early this morning.”

The windows were grey with soot and the once-white walls were streaked with water stains. I took the woman in front of me into my arms as she burst into tears again. “It’s so senseless!” She wailed. “Where is God in this?”

A tear rolled down my cheek, “Talk to us, God.” I said softly. “What’s on your mind? Was this all in your plan?” My eye fell on a cup of dirt on the windowsill. A wilted flower hung limply over the side, trailing on the gray, chipped concrete.

Then, a picture rose in my mind of Esmeralda as I had seen her three weeks before. Sunlight struggled through the grimy windowpane and lightly touched her impish grin as she stood with her elbows leaning on the counter. The cup of dirt in her hands held a living plant then. “The seed package said the flowers would be red. Look, this bud is starting to open.”

“It looks to me like they’re going to be white. I wonder why.” I answered absently.

“Yeah, I asked God about that.”

This was getting interesting, “Yeah? Did he answer you?”

Esmeralda smiled and looked out the window thoughtfully. “Because, it’s the color of heaven. White – all clean, not like everything around here.”

I leaned down to look her in the eye, “Why did he change the flower to the color of heaven do you think?”

“Because,” She answered, her face brightening with another smile, “I’m going there soon. Ain’t always gonna live in the ghetto you know, it’s a whole lot better place there.” She set the flower in front of the glass where the light was brightest. The pure white showed up starkly against the grime of the dark world around it.