The Pretty Reckless, Take Me Down
When you work with communities, you need to have room for disappointment and heartbreak or you'd better do something else.
Today I got a call from the daughter, whose man we were going to build a house for in Morelos. Between sobs, and a bad cell phone signal, she told me her father already had material and money to build a house, yet he wanted to take advantage of the situation.
She also told me about the kind of man he really was and asked me to please not mention anything to him about her call because he was also violent when it came to women in his household.
Her needed intervention, happened when I sent him all the efforts we had developed so far towards his cause and showed it to them. That's when both, his wife and daughter, told him it was not right to receive this aid because he already had it.
Two hours later, another woman was on the phone, asking to speak to me. It was this man's wife who in sobs, also told me what I have heard so many times in communities, he is violent and mean, he also hits me, but mainly: he's lying to you people. She also pleaded me to keep this information between us, which I reassured I would.
After I hung up, offering her any additional aid for her pregnant daughter whom I spoke earlier, I told everyone on the building team the deal was off. My voice cracked and to my surprise I was sobbing too.
Mexican reality is too sad to try to understand it sometimes. These women who have nowhere to go, nor where to live, risked telling me this information because it was the right thing to do. Because that's what God would like, and because this man had to accomplish building something.
I keep forgetting people are not suspended in thin air, they are always weighed down by context. After almost two years of community work, this gets shored every time. Still, I have to believe that aside these incidents, some of these efforts will fructify somehow. Everyone of us are partly to blame, but even more, governments that have "educated" less fortunate people to act this way when aid is on their way: Just sign here, vote for me and I will give you food pantries, just sign here and I will give you money on a card though Solidarity programs. Just sign there, said the Devil...
Today I got a call from the daughter, whose man we were going to build a house for in Morelos. Between sobs, and a bad cell phone signal, she told me her father already had material and money to build a house, yet he wanted to take advantage of the situation.
She also told me about the kind of man he really was and asked me to please not mention anything to him about her call because he was also violent when it came to women in his household.
Her needed intervention, happened when I sent him all the efforts we had developed so far towards his cause and showed it to them. That's when both, his wife and daughter, told him it was not right to receive this aid because he already had it.
Two hours later, another woman was on the phone, asking to speak to me. It was this man's wife who in sobs, also told me what I have heard so many times in communities, he is violent and mean, he also hits me, but mainly: he's lying to you people. She also pleaded me to keep this information between us, which I reassured I would.
After I hung up, offering her any additional aid for her pregnant daughter whom I spoke earlier, I told everyone on the building team the deal was off. My voice cracked and to my surprise I was sobbing too.
Mexican reality is too sad to try to understand it sometimes. These women who have nowhere to go, nor where to live, risked telling me this information because it was the right thing to do. Because that's what God would like, and because this man had to accomplish building something.
I keep forgetting people are not suspended in thin air, they are always weighed down by context. After almost two years of community work, this gets shored every time. Still, I have to believe that aside these incidents, some of these efforts will fructify somehow. Everyone of us are partly to blame, but even more, governments that have "educated" less fortunate people to act this way when aid is on their way: Just sign here, vote for me and I will give you food pantries, just sign here and I will give you money on a card though Solidarity programs. Just sign there, said the Devil...
Comments
Post a Comment