Turning a corner: Capacity Building as Millenials Working for Change

Who are we called to be? We are the generation of 9-11, of Katrina, and of the worst depression since that big one in the 1930's. We are living amidst two wars, environmental decline, and an uncertainty almost never mentioned but always present.

We are the children of the internet. We have access to technology unimaginable a few years ago. What will we blog about? Will our tweets be about what we just ate or a tool to link us together with intellectual curiosity just beyond our otherwise limited reach? How will we use the social media network Facebook affords us?

Oscar Romero might have called us prophets of a future not our own and we stand on the edge of a world in need, and our response to this fierce urgency of this very moment will set a tone for generations to come.
This is our burden, this is our greatest responsibility. And if you’re like me, you react in accordance: at times anxious that you aren’t doing enough to reach your potential, to mange genuine and lasting change, no matter how big or small it may be. Other times you an embodiment of what I think is our reality- incredibly confident that we are indeed the leaders we have been waiting for. This much we know: the world isn’t waiting for us as individuals, and paradoxically, the world can’t wait any longer for us as a group of people to come together, “to get it” so to speak.

And so this blog is going to be “turning a corner” if you will. It’s time to shift the tone from one of self reflection to group reflection and capacity building. I hope, In my own small and humble way, to build upon my work with City Year in Boyle Heights and as a graduate admissions counselor with the University of Southern California. To build upon experience as a social entrepreneur with Magis and move the conversation forward on how to do good in this world. And to continue to to build upon experiences volunteering with the Holy Cross Associates and the Working Boys Center.

I know about the power of service, the potential connectivity and solidarity can have on the ways in which we choose to live our lives. And I know about education, the limitless potential good education provides and the vast shortfall of our society in meeting the curiosity and possibility of so many young people here and abroad.

So I hope you will join me on Twitter. I hope you will contribute your input here and suggest other blogs and arenas in which to read, to dialogue, and to learn and grow. And if you would like to discuss volunteerism, post-graduate service, working in the nonprofits, or the graduate school admission process, please don't hesitate to comment here or email me at pjfurlong at gmail dot com.

Living in the Moment

Living in the moment. I’m almost two years into this moment, and as I think of one of the things I am most ashamed of, it’s this: I’ve yet to master just living in the moment. It feels like for months now, I have been living in Ecuador with my eyes set on my future.

I heard a saying: if you wait for the future, it comes. If you don’t wait, it comes just the same. And so what is this obsession with my future that I can’t put on hold? I’m in one of those moments I truly should be alive and present to, and I can’t will myself to do it. When I’m not at school, not around the kids, my thoughts drift to the future, my legs wander to an internet café. First it was for job searches. Now with that out of the way, apartment searches and whatever else can shamelessly occupy my mind.

And the only thing that somewhat comforts and consoles is knowing I am not alone. Tension has risen amongst the house as uncertainty looms over us all. Exasperated stories that begin along the lines of “when this ends, I don’t know what happens next” are the norm. Some have jobs or school to return to, some know what city they will call home, and yet, all of us realize at some inherent level- we can only prepare so much for life post-Ecuador.

My obsession with the future persists as a means of external validation. On one hand, an obsession with the future allows us the security of knowing that we are always upward bound. Who wants to believe they have reached the peak and have nothing further to look forward to? Focusing on the future is a way of reassuring ourselves, comforting ourselves, that the best is always yet to come. But how much do we void ourselves of the pure joy the current moment is ready to offer by doing that?

Dare I say that after two years of this game, I have yet to master what I have always known it to be about? Just be, the rock on my desk says, and at times, I have done anything but that.

People back home will invariably ask the question that frustrates me most: “how was it?” They ask about your life experience, your year, as though it is nothing more than a meal or movie. The answer is so much more complicated and long winded then what the seeker truly wants to hear. But maybe despite it all, I will have an answer to give them, one that satisfies me with its depth and satisfies them with its brevity. How was it? Love and failure, that’s how it was.

It was two years: it was the best year of my life and the worst year of my life and it spanned across three countries. It was learning how to love and be loved, and it was the constant failure to do that and so much more as much as I would have liked. It was watching the poor stumble and seeing my own stumbles in theirs.

What did I learn? To see the humanity in every statistic, to see my own reflection, the best and the worst that is within me, in those who remain unseen. The struggling single mother, the ten year old shoeshine boy, the alcoholic father, the fifteen year old aspiring female doctor: all my students, and all my teachers. It was here a people with nothing more than their love and their failures taught me about how to rebound from my own failures, and how to truly utilize my love. And while I couldn’t always live in this moment, it is my hope that for the many moments ahead in my life, it is these moments that will shape me and ground me in that which I have always known it to be about: failure, and love in spite of it all.

Some Fears About Transition Back to the United States

Transitioning from South America to the USA these are some pressing concerns I have:

1. Costs. A liter of beer costs $0.80 here. I don’t want to think how much a 20 oz. bottle of beer costs back home. A gallon of gas in Ecuador- $1.50. No, I don’t have a car so this means nothing to me, but it will at least supply me righteous indignation when I do have a car and pay $4.00.

2. Food. Here, fruits and veggies that are cheap and junk food like KFC and McDonald's that’s expensive. The last time I bought a bushel of bananas in the United States- it didn’t cost $0.20. Prices are going to kill me!

3. English. The other day a crazed dog attempted to attack me. This is the second time in Latin America I have had to get physical when a dog attacks I might add. I was proud of myself when I began shouting Spanish obscenities at the pinche perro! It will be weird to speak English all the time and not have to worry if I am using the right “for”- an incredibly pressing concern in my day to day life here in Ecuador. Or, what happens that first time someone upsets me and I mumble something to the effect of “you’re such an idiot and I hope your store closes down” forgetting that everyone around me speaks English now too. Ooops.

4. Busses. Call me crazy, but I’ve taken rather fondly to the challenge of boarding and getting off busses. It slows down to about 5 MPH and you grab the sidebar, hop and pray for a successful landing INSIDE the bus. Getting off, it’s much the same. The bus slows down, you survey the ground to make sure there are no obstacles such as potholes, and you jump/run cartoon style off the bus. Also, bus fare is $0.25 and they will even give you change for a $20 should you need it. I realize about 99% of my readership has never taken public transpo in LA so they have no idea just how incredibly cool it is to get change on a bus fare, nor do you realize how affordable $0.25 is!

5. Celebrity status. If I return to LA, I’ll simply just be another one in twelve million. My life here is the closest I will get to being a celebrity. Everywhere I go on the C.M.T. campus, children shout my name, wave excitedly, and sprint from all directions to jump in my arms and hug me and ask me to throw them playfully in the air. I’ve even perfected a wave any red carpet walker would be envious of. All that ends, and I am back to average Joe status. Plus, let's face it. Here, I hug any kid I want. If I try and do that in the United States, I'll be that weird guy.

6. Pay. The other day I jokingly told Madre Miguel I felt underpaid. She responded that if I felt that way, she’d double my salary. Before you get too excited, remember I make $0. You do the math of what that is doubled. 0X2= I hope you can do this better than two of my students who tried the other day. Alex Rodriguez, star of the New York Yankees, made more money than the 33 man roster of the Florida Marlins- at least before the H. Ramirez deal. There is really no relevance between my pay and that of A-Rod other than it is a cool stat to spout out to whoever will listen and it does make me sick.

7. Speaking of Nicknames, A-Rod is cool but I think I’ve managed to one up even that. Everywhere I have been in South America, my name, Patrick is most commonly translated not to Patricio but to Pato, coincidentally the Spanish word for duck. As much as I hated it at first, I have grown rather fond of Pato and will have an incredibly difficult time not necessarily returning to Patrick, but returning to the most commonly used name, that which I loathe the most: Pat. Why do I hate Pat? Three words: Saturday Night Live. So cut a man a break: Patrick, Furlong, Pato, Patricio, even duck if you must, just no more Pat!

Who would have ever thought going back home after two years who be more difficult than leaving home in the first place? And yet, so as to not be totally depressing, I am excited about some really good things. I am really fired up about my new job with an organization called City Year, a job which I start immediately upon return. I am excited to have baseball replace soccer, a micro-brew replace a Pilsener. I’m excited to watch Scrubs season eight, sit on the beach, and run 10k’s at something less than 9,000 feet above sea level. And of course to see friends and family! So in a round about way, I’m so nervous, and so excited, and so confused as to why A Rod makes more than all the Marlins combined and doubling my salary still leaves me with a net income of zero.

A Lesson In Sharing

It confused me. After all, these are poverty stricken kids. I watch everyday as they dramatically duel over whether a goal was a goal and fight over who deserves to be first in line. And here they are with pizza, a rare treat. And they take a bite of it, make a comment about how good it is, and then wrap it up in napkins and put it in their backpacks.

Confused, I asked one kid why. With sincerity that only a child has, he told me his mom has never tasted pizza before. He was saving the slice so they might enjoy it together later. As the kids left I asked why they didn’t eat their pizza then and there. All told the same story but through different words: “I want my sister to try it” said one. “My brother and me will eat it when he gets out of class tonight,” said another. “My dad will miss dinner tonight and I want him to have food when he comes home,” said the last one as he smiled and left.

Just when you think you know it all, these kids do that to you. In one fleeting moment as my time here draws to an end, I saw what I guess I had always hoped I would always see working with people in poverty:

“When it was evening, the disciples approached Jesus and said, “This is a deserted place and it is already late; dismiss the crowds so that they can go to the villages and buy food for themselves.” Jesus said to them, “There is no need for them to go away: give them some food yourselves.” But they said to him, “Five loaves and two fish are all we have here.” Then he said, bring them here to me, and he ordered the crowds to sit down on the grass. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, and looking up to heaven, he said the blessing, broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples, who in turn gave them to the crowds. They all ate and were satisfied, and they picked up the fragments left over- twelve wicker baskets full.” Matthew 14: 15-20

Perhaps the modern day parable would go something like this. As another dark night fell upon the world’s poor, the naysayer’s cried out “you see, we give them this and that and still those Haitians (or Bolivians or Ecuadorians or Sudanese) have nothing to show for it. This land is barren, these people prone to poverty. Let’s stop the aid and have them buy their own food. They don’t need us, so send them on their way. Only then will they eat and be plentiful.

But Jesus saw the falsehood in this and ordered the people to sit before him. As the crowds swarmed around him, he took what food he had, and shared it. “Take what you have and share with others” he pleaded. 15 cents of every $100 isn’t enough for international aid, Mr. US of A. Meanwhile some poor street kids no more than nine years old, took what little they had of their rice and beans or empanadas and paticones, and shared them. And in this utopia, the rich watched with amazement, and instead of making excuses to account for the miraculous generosity they witnessed, they created their own miracle, and slowly began to share as well. Food was not used for E-85, and so corn prices went down. “How great it is this little child no longer has to die for the luxury of my Ford Expedition” cried with joy one soccer mom.

Food prices weren’t marked up for higher profits, and the fuel companies let go of their record breaking 2007 profits to see to it that people could come from all around to share what little they had. And they discovered this: there was enough food to feed everyone. There was no reason to hoard it.

Little poor kids with hungry stomachs took what little they had and saved it to share with precious loved ones. What a world this could be if we’d all follow their example. We can do better, we must do better. There’s some second graders in Ecuador sharing what might be their one slice of pizza all year long that are counting on us matching their generosity and love. Do we hear that story, imagine that moment, and still have the audacity to ignore a world in need? From underneath the 12^th street bridge to the ravaged fields of Haiti, the people are crying out. What are we to do? Matthew 14: 15-20

Dropping the S Word on You Today

The other day I was sick. Whether it is a bacterium from food or just another head cold passed through the millions of germs we come in contact with, we always seem to be ill down here. And so, I have become pretty chummy with the medical staff at the Center.

Visiting the doctor here is a pretty straight forward process: checking the charts, taking blood pressure, temp, weight, height (still about a quarter inch under six feet) and explaining the reason for the visit.

The major difference is the financial aspect. Never have I been asked to wait while they call my insurance provider. I’ve never been denied treatment or told to go to another hospital because my insurance doesn’t stack up. I have never had a letter delivered to my mail box that surprises me by saying I owe $500 for whatever lousy treatment they gave me (thanks Mr. Knee Doctor). And never once have I been outrageously overcharged for a simple procedure. In fact, several visits and counting, I’ve yet to pay a single penny to receive care or treatment. Brace yourself for the bad words about to come out my mouth: here at the center I work at, we have socialized medicine.

And today was no different. The doctor spoke with me, did the usual steps of checking my lungs, looking in my throat and ears and nose, and then diagnosed me. We sat at her desk as she wrote out my prescriptions and gave me the typical spiel about do’s and don’ts with the meds I’d receive. As we finished, she transferred me to the nurse who asked me to sign an acknowledgement I was being given the prescriptions and then she handed them to me on the spot.

In the United States I avoid the doctor’s office at all costs; knowing damn well that to enter one might redefine the expression “at all costs.” When it becomes time to return to the United States, the richest nation in the world, I know I will be overwhelmed by the penny pinching application form full of “pre-existing conditions” that insurance refuses to help out with followed by the list of when I will and will not be covered. A wonderful attempt to help make already rich men and women in the health industry that much more wealthy. Hell, even a $10 co-pay will feel like a rip off. And it feels that way, because, maybe in our heart of hearts, we know it is. What portion of my pay check each month will go towards assuring me that co-pay?

Paul Farmer says that “Clean water and health care and school and food and tin roofs and cement floors, all of these things should constitute a set of basics that people should have as birthrights.” From all the personal experiences I’ve compiled in South America, I’d have to agree. And call me a socialist or a communist or whatever else you can spit at me, but I’d venture to say that it’s about damn time every citizen in the United States can receive the type of treatment every one of my impoverished students and their family members receive at the Working Boys Center.

Watching a Bright Star Slowly Fade

Ruined for life. Solidarity with the poor. It’s phrases like these that become so common place in your vernacular at a Jesuit university. Hearing “ruined for life” is almost as frequent as “hey how ya doin?” “Solidarity with the poor” becomes as frequent place as “it sure is beautiful today” and like I say, before you know it, you cease to grasp the power of those phrases. Until something takes it out of the ivory halls and into your own little reality.

You aren’t supposed to have favorites as a teacher, but I’ve been pretty bad at that. Many of you saw the articles in America Magazine or on the Catholic News Service that featured my blog. The authors used a photo of me conversing with my favorite student- 11 year old Evelyn.

One week in October, Evelyn stopped coming to the center. For the weeks that followed, I hoped to run into her on the streets, to better understand what it was that made her family drop out of the center. And it wasn’t until February, I at last saw my favorite student. She was walking the streets, with a bag of candy in her hand. What you fear most usually happens: the candy wasn’t for her or her family. No, instead the ultimate symbol of childhood innocence came to symbolize another childhood destroyed by the cruelty of poverty. Eleven years old, an elementary school drop out whose life had brought her back to the streets, selling nickel candies to help the family get by. Suddenly ruined for life was neither cute nor cliché.

Not long after that day, another volunteer and I went and hung out with Evelyn, her seven brothers and sisters, and their mother. The entire family shares a one bedroom dwelling in a seedy part of Ecuador, so the family asked if we’d be able to meet at a park instead. We insisted it made no difference to us, but pride is a strong thing, and the family insisted we not see their living conditions. The day at the park was perfect. A rare sunny Day in Quito, shared with my favorite student and her trademark smile. But I couldn’t stop thinking about what the future held for her.

As my time slowly but surely draws to an end in South America poverty is no longer just a cause: it’s deeply personal. It’s plaguing people I love. It forced me to look into the eyes of an 11 year old child that was once my brightest student and not know if the future holds hope for her. Wrap your head around that for a moment. We come from a “pull yourself up by the bootstraps” society. Everyone can make something of themselves if they just try hard enough, or so goes the American fairy tale. What happens when you look into the eyes of someone who is poor, and you can’t paint that rosy possibility on their future? You become ruined for life, and again, it’s neither as cute or cliché as you once naively envisioned it to be.

I ask God why a child must be born into a sufferable living situation not at all their own making? What’s a child do to deserve that I asked myself? What did I do to deserve my lifestyle other than be born on the right longitude and latitude? What makes her mom different from my own? The answer to all those questions is simple enough: nothing. And yet that neither comforts nor pacifies the emotions I am feeling right now. I asked God, with a tinge of anger in my voice. And now I ask you, pleading that you understand what this journey is all about. What’s it means to get ruined for life? It’s to ask life’s hardest questions and fail to find an answer that satisfies or comforts. 11 years old, once my brightest student and now relegated to hustling candy on the streets of Quito. Why?

Evelyn, center.

Call Then Losers If You Want: What It Means To Be a Volunteer By Patrick Furlong

So this concludes my series on volunteer life. After reading all the guest authors entries, I just had to write one myself!

I always wanted to fight poverty. Sounds both weird and cheesy, I know. But while friends had weekend soccer matches, I was with my mom, walking around Central Ave. in Albuquerque passing out Egg McMuffins to the homeless. I don’t know if I ever knew how it was forming me, but slowly but surely, it was.

At LMU it felt like one ideal and cause after another, I was on the front lines. Poverty didn’t just move me, it angered me. Looking back, I suppose there were issues behind the surface motivating me as well. Poverty was something to be angry at for sure, but I think my unusually strong anger spoke to a personal spiritual poverty I had no idea how to tackle.

As graduation neared, loved ones dropped buzz words like law school, career and 401K, but all I could think about were the buzz words that had defined my college experience: poverty, Latin America, social justice. I’d browse the Peace Corps website and leaf through application packets from several domestic and international volunteer organizations. Networking, law school, and my 401K would have to wait.

I once read textbooks on poverty. I memorized facts and figures, using them in exams and conversations with like-minded “idealists” and skeptical “realists.” Today, in place of those stats are the names and stories of people I’ve come to know and love. And that makes reality all the more painful.

Those skeptical realists I battled with in college were right: I can’t save the world from poverty and injustice. When I leave South America, poverty and suffering will linger around, maybe even increase. Children I know and love deeply will still go to bed hungry and wake up forgotten. Poverty, in the lives of my Chilean neighbors, my Ecuadorian students, and my South American friends, and yes, even myself- will persist. It begs a rationale question I had long struggled to answer: why?

Until a little girl named Tamara broke her ankle the other day. A fellow volunteer and I tried to comfort her and calm her as we transported her from the park to the center, and then to the most depressing hospital I can imagine. But what most heartbreaking is what followed…

Tamara’s mom arrives. She has been crying for hours now, she's in intense pain. And her mom gets there and the first thing she asks is not "are you ok?" Instead, a curt "What the hell did you do?" is her first question to her daughter. I try and imagine being eight years old and knowing that the person that should be there to support you is instead ready to yell at you and possibly hit you when you return home.

This is what we are up against: a system that is depressing, and parents who know nothing about child care- despite our best efforts. The realists shake their heads and mumble: I told you so. In July, I return to their world, and I return with nothing to show for my time here except a depleted bank account, feelings about love that don’t mix with the societal race for success, and memories of kids that were poor when I arrived and poor when I left.

And yet, in being with Tamara, I realized why we still do this kind of work, even when the results remain elusive: I'm working with precious children who deserve better. We have no right to quit on them, in spite all that's stacked against them. Maybe someday when Tamara’s daughter gets injured and sent to a hospital, Tamara will run in and instead of being angry, be concerned. “Are you ok?” will be her first words. And maybe she will treat her own daughter better because when presented between options for how to care for children, she chose the route we teach in the center instead of the poverty stricken method her mother was raised with and raised her with.

Change is slow. Maybe we won't change these kids lives today, but maybe someday, some change somewhere can be credited to a couple gringos who cared more than most others thought was wise. This much I know, we have no right not to try. Paul Farmer, in Mountains Beyond Mountains speaks of fighting poverty as giving up our status of being on the winning team and instead uniting with the poor in fighting a long defeat. I think of his words, and I think of my life these past two years. To do service is to use every fiber of your being to tell the rest of the world, Call them losers if you want, but that makes me one too.'

In my classroom at our downtown center, La Marin.

While this concludes my series of guest entries on what volunteerism has meant to people, I would encourage you to submit a piece should you have the desire and it will be included. Thanks to all my guests writers and to all of you who have read the series. For any of you thinking of service work, I hope it helped!

What's Next for me?

I am having trouble getting photos for the next few posts in my series about making a decision to do post-graduate service. It should be straightened out by next week. Until then, here is a post about my future.

What’s next? I had been hearing people ask me what’s next since before I even departed for South America. And all along, I answered with ease, without hesitation. Well, I am hoping in August to relocate to Los Angeles, Chicago, or San Francisco. I would like to work for non-profit, preferably one that is working on behalf of immigrants or refugees. I am looking forward to a cold glass of Dr. Pepper, a colder glass of Sam Adam’s Summer Brew, and a dish of Italian Sausage Pizza, a Cubs game on TV, all in the company of people I love and miss so damn much!

In two to three sentences, what’s next? The reporters question brings me back from my day dream. I want to tell him how I once knew. How I have been dreaming of what’s next for 18 months, almost skipping over what’s here and now. I want to tell him how March 7^th a child got sick, and I carried her all the way back to our center. I want to tell him about the unexplainable impact it had on me. The tears that couldn’t stop flowing, even with everyone all around, watching me.

I want to tell him about this uncontainable love that I now experience in my life. A love I had sought before I had words for it. I want him to know what it feels like to come alive, to love with heartbreaking vulnerability, and laugh with mind breaking ease. My heart is pounding within to tell a story that my mind simply can not translate for my mouth to share.

I yearn to talk about seeing Evelyn, a former student now peddling chewing gum on the street for 25 cents and how it rips my heart wide open. I want to tell him about genuine smiles and deep belly laughs. I want to tell him how I found the path to the walk that goes along with the talk I’ve embodied for years- and how more than anything, I’m so afraid to become nothing more than just talk, no walk, all over again.

I wanted to tell him what I now need to tell you. I don’t know if I am ready to leave Ecuador just yet. You’d think two years in South America would have been enough. But, I find myself strongly considering spending one more year at the Working Boys Center. I’ve found the trail that leads towards the man I want to be. I love without abandon here, and I don’t know that you can understand what that means to me. More important still, I don’t know if I can continue it if I return to the States just yet.

What’s next? In the next month or two, through continued discernment, discussions with loved ones, and prayer, I’ll be able to tell you. Either way, the decision won’t be easy. But until then, pray for me, think about me, send good vibes my way, whatever you can, to help me make sure I make the right decision.

There’s so much more to explain. So much more that could be said. But this isn’t the place, this isn’t the time. And ultimately, this is between me and the man I used to be, trying to find the best version of the man I was, am, and in the final analysis, want to be.

“Do I contradict myself? Very well, then I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multitudes.” Walt Whitman Song of Myself

Stations of the Cross on Good Friday with Cindy rockin' my sunglasses and Jenny, the girl who got sick, holding my hand as we walk through the stations with the people from La Marin

Black History Month: In Ecuador of All Places!

“I have a dream” proclaimed Martin Luther King Jr.. This, being Black History Month, I have to ask, how many Americans can say exactly what he said his dream was? In other words, who can finish the quote?

Last Monday, my high school students stopped me in mid-lecture. “Tell us about the elections in the USA” Wendy said. With every ounce of my might, I tried to side step it: there were grammatical rules of English to be taught and learned. But they persisted. I became suspicious, wondering if they knew of my obsession with American politics. When they successfully named the three candidates in the race, I relented (is anyone really counting Huckabee anymore?). Our discussion of the candidates eventually took us into a history of America I feel too many young people my age don’t know enough about: black history. I tried in a short time frame to cover Martin Luther King Jr, Malcom X, Rosa Parks, Carter G. Woodson,Thurgood Marshall, the Black Panther, the Little Rock 9, Frederick Douglass, and more...

The questions flew from every direction. Everyone was engaged and voicing their opinion. I gave an impromptu lecture about race relations in the USA and moderated a conversation about relations between blacks, those of Spanish descent, and indigenous here in Ecuador.

I happened to have a mixed CD with the song “We Shall Overcome” on it. I played the song, roughly translating it. As class ended, no one moved. Eventually, one girl spoke up. The voice of the singer was sad she told the class. And it frustrated her that after these powerful messages of “walking hand in hand”, “living in peace” and “we shall overcome” were always followed by the same phrase: algun dia. Someday. It’s an issue of inequality, a universal issue these kids know well. Why not “now” she asked me and her classmates?

In America, more black young men will go to prison than college. Consider that “For every $1.00 earned by a man, the average woman receives only 77 cents, while African American women only get 67 cents and Latinas receive only 57 cents.” Hate crimes rose by 8% in 2006. “African Americans and Hispanics are more than twice as likely as whites to be searched, arrested, or subdued with force when stopped by police. Disparities in drug sentencing laws, like the differential treatment of crack as opposed to powder cocaine, are unfair.” *

There is a great columnist at the Miami Herald, Leonard Pitts Jr. Not too long ago, he wrote a piece entitled "When You're Right Beyond All Questions." I wish all white people could read it so they might understand me better when I say there is still so much to be done. Despite all the progress: the Civil Rights Act, affirmative action, a black man running for president with a viable shot at winning- we still have so far to go.

Oh, and as for what MLK said in that famous speech: "And so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today!."

I’m reading To America by historian Stephen E. Ambrose. He noted how Jefferson, despite the many great things he did for America, followed convenience over conviction by leaving the next generation of Revolutionaries to end slavery. It took until the 1860’s. It took another 100 years to push through Civil Rights thanks to brave men and women of all walks of life. Let’s not wait until 2060 to take that next step: that one day our children will not be judged by the color of their skin, but the content of their character.

* Obtained from Barack Obama’s Blue Print for Change on his website, www.barackobama.com

How I Became a Morning Person

I hate early wake ups. I talk to my alarm the way an abusive coach talks to his most undisciplined player. Curse words are thrown its way, it beeps back at me, I take a swing at it to shut it up and then… reluctantly, I get up.

A few minutes later I stumble downstairs, grab a cup of strong black tea and a bowl of cereal. Out the door and towards the bus by 6:55 AM, and proceed to try and sleep for the 50 minute trip through the congested, loud and polluted streets of Quito.

It doesn’t have to be this way ya know. The center operates three campuses: one next to our house, and two downtown. And somehow, 1/3 of us were selected to be on the early wake up crew. I prayed with every ounce of my being, expended all my capital with God- begging for the shift that would allow me to sleep in an hour later. No dice.

And yet, I have taken a special liking to my kids that I work with downtown in La Marin in the mornings. They are more urban- more edgy, spunky, and full of so much attitude. And there is something about that which makes me love them even more. Sincerely.

While the early morning clamor of the kids has the ability to devastate some, it somehow ignites a flame in me. That first moment I see some of my students, the whole morning does a brilliant 180 degree turn.

You have to picture it: the kids spot us entering, and all the cacophony ceases and a beautiful symphony begins: beautiful little voices screaming your name as they try and position themselves first in line for hugs. And I am not talking little hugs here. I am talking about the type where they run full sprint, fling themselves into your waiting arms and wrap their little hands around your neck and seem to never let go.

And as luck would have it, these kids are only there in the morning hours when we are. If I had the afternoon shift instead, our paths would never cross.

It’s 7:50 AM, there are hoards of screaming children, giant bear hugs, and some of the freshest cut sarcasm being dished my way from some of the tiniest children. This is my life, these are my mornings. An hour of extra sleep would be nice. But at the cost of missing this? No thanks.



Keely getting some of that early morning love from the kids.

Finding Your Post Graduate Service Placement: Domestic or Abroad

This blog is meant to be a service, an insight into the life of a volunteer “in the trenches” one might say. It is not a glossy advertisement or endorsement, but rather a true telling that would hopefully leave readers to decide for themselves if a step into the volunteer world after college is for them.

That said, I want to provide some resources to find volunteer programs, as well as make note of programs I am familiar with- either through personal experience or from word of mouth of others in the programs. Click the blue links to get to what I am talking about.

First, the website links…

Notre Dame University’s Center for Social Concern has a great website that lists categories: domestic, international, teaching, and secular. It is an awesome resource for anyone, not just ND students.

Response is a publication by the Catholic Volunteer Network that is comprehensive for faith based programs. It provides a search engine that will allow you to fill parameters such as where and for how long you would like to volunteer among other issues. If you are looking for a faith based volunteer program, this is a great place to use a search engine to discover options that meet certain criteria you may have.

Connections 2008, a search engine hosted by Saint Vincent Pallotti Center is another great search engine. The website of Pallotti is also a great resource for those pondering volunteer work, as well as current and former volunteers. I personally find this website to be incredibly useful and resourceful.

Aside from that, my opinions on other programs that I am familiar with... Keep in mind, these are only my opinions based upon my personal experience or second hand knoweldge from people who have done them.

First, The Working Boys Center. The Center itself is an incredible mechanism. Providing education, technical training, medical care, three meals a day, as well as microcredit, childcare and a host of other needed responses to poverty, it´s hard to find a place more wholistic in its battle against poverty. I love the participants and the employees of the center and am very satisfied with my decision. A downside might be community insofar as we are not really a community so much as we are a group of people living together and working together. No binding decisions need to be made as a group and many elements of community living as I experienced with the Holy Cross Associates are missing. And depending how you feel about your service, a call towards simple living is largely absent. All that said, I would not hesitate to recommend the program. I am in love with the place! The work here is a one year commitment with an option for two. The Spanish skills of volunteers vary.

Next would be JVI and JVC. I hear strong things about JVI and I visited a JVI community in Bolivia and was impressed. They seem to have a healthy mix of life giving work that benefits both the community and the volunteer while at the same time doing a great job with simple living, community, spirituality. Most of all, I have heard great things about the support staff and retreats and the like. As for JVC, the reviews remain a little more mixed (not as much support and stability) but as far as I have heard from people in Domestic programs, they fare better than most.

Rostro de Cristo, based in Southern Ecuador is a program I visited for a week my junior year and for a few days this past year while living in Quito. If you can look past the heat and humidity, I would say I love this program. It’s a one year program that requires good Spanish skills. It’s a program on the rise as volunteer programs go: it is divided amongst two houses in neighborhoods about a 15 minute walk apart and has a large volunteer corps who works on a variety of issues usually splitting time between a job in the morning and one in the afternoon. It’s also got an awesome English speaking library- a huge plus when living abroad. Downsides might be that the work is somewhat more fluid than say a JVI or Working Boys Center, but some might enjoy the flexability and variety of working at two diferent places each day.

The Inner City Teaching Corps is a program based out of Chicago. A smaller program as far as teaching programs go, I have heard nothing but good thing from participants who have served two years. A master degree is included in the mix. Emphasizes simple living, unlike some other volunteer teaching programs.

Place Corps- based out of LA is also another program I am familiar with. Simple living is not a tenant but teachers work as teachers in Catholic Schools in inner city Los Angeles and receive a Master’s Degree as well as a pretty generous stipend and if my friends are telling the truth- brand new Mac Laptops to each teacher. Needless to say, simple living is not a tenant.


Holy Cross Associates, my former program in Chile, is, as far as I know, closed down for 2007-2008. But should it re-open as planned, it was a pretty good program. The biggest thing it lacked on internationally was solid work placement but most people in the Domestic version of the program seemed to enjoy. I wouldn´t put it above a JVC, but if you are looking for other options and moving away from the Jesuits but still being with a big Catholic order of priests- this might be the place.

Peace Corps, most people are familiar with. 27 month program that emphasizes “flexibility is the greatest asset” of their volunteers. Run through the government, the awards and incentives for life after Peace Corps are pretty big. Also helps in that placements are world wide. If there are complaints, it is usually based on disorganization or volunteers being placed in job placements that require a certain expertise or experience they lack. But most Peace Corps volunteers I know and have encountered on my own journey are happy and have a range of diverse experiences despite the occasional and long lasting bursts of frustration with support and placement.

So there you have it. I also have on my sidebar links to blogs of people I know doing service. As well, should you search on google for something like ¨blog volunteer¨ or ¨post graduate service blog¨ you will be amazed at the number of blogs that show up from anyone from a Peace Corps guy in the Dominican Republic to a volunteer in Tanzania.

Lastly, research and investigate programs. Think of things you want, things you don’t want, and when interviewing, remember, you’re not JUST trying to market yourself to them- they too are trying to market themselves to you. So don’t be afraid to be honest and ask the right questions, rather than try and solely impress them and telling them what you think they want to hear. You rather get rejected from a program they know you wouldn´t fit into then manipulate your way in and find yourself unhappy and unsatisifed for one year, maybe two! Nothing is worse than a mismatched program and volunteer.

Updates to My Working Boys Center Blog

You might notice that after months of absence, I am beginning to update the photos in the photo bar. Take a peak if you like.

You will also notice the blue bar of ads above head along with the Google Search Bar. Why, the cheesy add ons you may ask? The more money I generate, the more I can do with these kids. Simple enough.

I have added some new blog links which are really great. Dave Muccino, a fellow volunteer writes some great stuff. Where I am the dreamy optimist trying to play Shakespeare, Dave has a very straight to the point way of reporting things. Aaron Hendrickson is our resident comedian and his blog gives you true insight to the comedy that is our lives as volunteers.

Also, Angelo DeGuzman. Though not a full time volunteer, Angelo is a friend from back in LA who is in Magis as well as working on a host of other things. Angelo is one of the most insightful and driven men I know, and I felt that reading his blog could be beneficial for others to discover as well.

I've also made public my support of Barack Obama for president in my sidebar. I write on the tail of the New Hampshire primary but still strongly believe in that which Senator Obama stands for. It's a time for telling Americans what they need to hear, not what they want to hear is something I have heard him say a lot. It's a time to rise above the fray of party politics and once again, hope for greater things. It's a time, for a movement like his, a movement no other candidate can match. Watch the videos below from and tell me you don't want to believe. The top video is 1 minute, the second, longer but worth it.

So check out the blogs, watch the Youtube video, and forgive me for the tacky blue bar!

Why?

Christmas was hard. It’s supposed to be- being thousands of miles away from your friends and family, from the snow and eggnog and pasole, etc… But it was for a different reason. In the middle class lives we lead, Christmas is looked upon as, at best, utopia, at worst, a reprieve from whatever struggles we are fighting off. But walking the downtown streets of Quito on Christmas Eve, I saw no utopia, nor felt any reprieve. I found mothers with babies in tow, begging for change. I saw little kids in tattered clothes, working like they would, any other day of the year. I walked aimlessly through these sad streets, my mind attacking my senses from time to time with only one preoccupation, one seemingly little question: why?

It all started on December 22nd as I stood in a crowded cafeteria overlooking a crowd of poor families waiting anxiously for potato sacks of used clothes and a second-hand toy or two. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great gesture from the center to its participants. But there is something indescribably sad about watching people get excited about a potato sack of what is, if we are to be honest, nothing more than some other person’s junk. I thought about my own family and the Christmas they had given me for years. The seemingly limitless presents, of which only a few would manage to entertain for more than a few days before becoming considered “junk.” Again, I could only wonder: why?

With all that on my conscious, late on Christmas Eve., I loaded into a bus of festive volunteers reveling in a “Joy to the World” like holiday cheer I felt so distant from. The world was suffering on Christmas Eve just like it did the day before and just like it would continue to do the day after and the day after that. It seemed preposterous to even pretend like I could partake in the same old Christmas jingles and cheers as we snaked our way into a wealthy expatriate area community. It was “Gringo Mass” and it was there I thought I might find resolution to my questions.

Forgive me for saying this, but the Mass just stunk. You’d think being around people who were foreigners living abroad or hearing Mass in your own language for the first time in over a year would be great. But instead, I felt nervous, uncomfortable and horribly out of place. There were no upbeat Latino Church songs with off beat clapping. No chorus of little voices shouting Amen after each prayer. I tried to concentrate on the Mass and the songs, convince myself again and again that I should feel at peace- this was after all my culture and my language. How was it all that different from Masses I used to enjoy at LMU? But something wasn’t right, and again and again the voice haunted me with a question that seemed to symbolize so much: why?

And so I left the church and sat outside on the steps. Just beyond the guarded fence of the chapel grounds, two indigenous elderly women, small children swaddled up in their arms, waited in the cold for the opportunity to beg the Gringos for a bit of change. I sat in the darkness and locked eyes with one women. “A bit of change” she seemed to beg with silently pleading eyes.” I came here with the goal to do just that,” my eyes pleaded back, “and look how far it’s gotten the both of us.” Again, the question surfaced: why?

I’m fighting this losing battle day after tired day, not because I’m convinced I’m gonna beat poverty anymore. That part of me seems to have died a long time ago. The ideals and the causes are gone, and all I have left to lean on is conviction. Anymore, I am doing what I am doing, because it feels right and like it NEEDS to be done, not because I really see myself as an agent of change anymore.

Saint Catherine of Siena supposedly said “If you are what you should be, you will set the whole world ablaze.” I don’t really believe that anymore. But from somewhere deep within, a voice I hardly recognize anymore instinctually rises to plead with me: why the hell not?

But then there is this, "Letter to a Young Activist" which more and more, provides great consolation in this work that I have undertaken.

"Do not depend on the hope of results. When you are doing the sort of work you have taken on, essentially an apostolic work, you may have to face the fact that your work will be apparently worthless and achieve no result at all, if not perhaps results opposite to what you expect. As you get used to this idea, you start more and more to concentrate not on the results but on the value, the truth of the work itself. And there, too, a great deal has to be gone through, as gradually as you struggle less and less for an idea, and more and more for specific people." READ THE REST HERE OF THIS WONDERFUL QUOTE HERE

Love and Loneliness

I have never been much of a romantic but I must say, as of late- love is all around. In every song I see, in every park I pass, there seems to be some sign of romance. And movies- movies kill me. I can’t watch anything which has an even somewhat romantic theme- and that’s 99% of movies. Even Transformers (car robots blowin’ crap up) had a love theme to it, and please, don’t ask how I know. It seems love in full bloom everywhere- everywhere but here.

Don't get me wrong- I love my life here. I love these kids and feel like at this moment, that’s who should receive every ounce of my energy and care. But ya know, something happened in Chile and continues on in Ecuador that is making me want to organize my life not around success anymore- but love.

I know what you might be thinking among other things (he’s gone crazy). But the answer is no- both to the craziness part, and what I think many might be thinking … I won’t find someone in Ecuador. There’s something to being alone, cursing it, and then grudgingly bearing it. Born into a generation desperate for quick fix diets and the like, it appears we rarely understand the need to experience loneliness in order to truthfully understand love. Call it what you will, judge it as you see fit- but I don’t want a quick fix. And so, the long loneliness ensues.

You wanna do service abroad? All the good stuff the brochures and recruiters say- it’s all true. But there’s another side to this that no one seems to mention. It can be lonely and it can be difficult. And ironically enough, a lot of that is what makes it worth it in the end. You have the opportunity to discover brokenness in your service that completes you. It unites you in solidarity with those you work amongst. It is that brokenness that will teach you how to embrace love.

And so I think this much is certain in the life of an international volunteer: a juxtapose of overwhelming genuine love and incredible loneliness.

I made a choice that changed my life in ways I never planned. And ya know, I don’t regret any of it, because it’s making me who I’ve always wanted to be. As Christmas looms on the horizon, it’s hard not to get a lil’ sad and feel a bit lonely. But I’m reminded of another quote I found while studying in Dublin: “Home isn’t where you’re from; it’s where they know you the best.” The past two years have changed me in such a way that I can say- I’m at home this Christmas. At home amongst the kids I have grown to love, at home with the love and loneliness that are present in my life… at home amongst myself.

I pondered whether or not to publish this reflection. It’s personal, very easily misunderstood and let’s be honest- pretty damn cheesy. But in the end, I heard lyrics from a John Mayer song “Say” that made me realize what to do. “You better know that in the end, it’s better to say too much, then to never have to say what you need to say again…do it with a heart wide open and say what you need to say.”

Happy Holidays from me and the kids at The Working Boys Center!

The Art of Sitting

Sitting. I realized the other day how complex it really is. I had the opportunity to visit the wonderful volunteer community of Rostro de Cristo this past weekend. It’s a community in Southern Ecuador, in a town called Duran. Coincidentally, I visited this community 2.5 years ago and it was there I realized my call to do service in Latin America.

And so going back to Duran was moving. I saw some of the same sights and met with some of the same people that moved me to move to Latin America. And in the process, I did a lot of sitting. Entering people’s houses and over the course of hours, just talking. It’s a common theme of almost any international volunteer experience. And it’s the part I struggle with most.

But this past weekend in Duran I sat like a true champ. I looked at photos of a family and volunteers I didn’t know and as they shared their story with me I shared mine with them. I soaked in sweat and gulfed down some of the best Arroz con Pollo I’ve ever had. I played dominos with a group of elderly, outcast lepers for hours on end. And in all three situations- I shared in the quiet, sometimes awkward solitude of companionship. I learned to just “be.”

In many ways, we are called less to be servants and more to be present to people. It shouldn’t excuse us from working where we are called, even needed, but rather it should permeate in our work in such a way that we never lose sight of what, or that is to say- who, we are working for.

You can only fight so much for a cause you don’t intimately know. If you want to learn about poverty, if you want to learn about love, reading Jeff Sachs poverty book isn’t enough. You have to meet the people that embody the experience. You have to embrace who they are in such a way where both their unjust suffering and their inexplicable joy infiltrate your defenses so you connect with them. And you’d want to do anything to eradicate the injustice that victimizes them.

And so, bringing this back home, I have a simple challenge this holiday season. May we all can try and see the world less through the marketing of “presents” and more through the challenge of giving all of ourselves through “presence” to those we love, and even those we don’t know. Sit with people and learn their stories. And in the process of sharing your own story, you might even learn a little more about who you really are. Happy Holiday’s Y’all.

Volunteering: The Big Reality Break

(This is a journal entry written in July while I was volunteering in Chile. I thought it was a pertinent response to something I have heard one too many volunteers relate to. I have edited it a bit to mix experiences both from Chile and Ecuador.)

Taking a break from the real world. “A year or two off from reality” seems to be the catch phrase many people have used to explain my decision to commit two years of my life after college to international volunteer work. And I’m here to tell you- what a break it’s been!

What’s my life like as a volunteer in a foreign country? First, live and communicate in a foreign language. Move away from everything you love and feel secure in, everything that validates you. Leave all that false security to come to a foreign land and have your day to day experience be radically changed into nothing more than a humbling attempt to get up after you have fallen again and again. But unlike other trying moments in your life before, there are no friends around that can help you out. No night out for happy hour or anything like that. There is a cold house that leaks when it rains, and is freezing in the coldest of weather and a sauna on the hottest of days. It is there, in that excuse of a shelter you will find out what you’re made of, you will find out who you are.

Then you have to look beyond yourself and open your eyes to a horribly depressing story called poverty that plays out day to day. I teach a group of kids that often times are the principle bread winners of their family. Do you have any idea what it feels like to look into the weary eyes of a 7 year old child whose hands are blackened after hours of shining shoes? It is neither glorified nor cute. It just is what it is: someone else’s cold, hard reality. And you, you’re a helpless witness to a tragedy you can only do so much to change.

You still want to talk about reality?

I didn’t take any break from reality when I graduated college. I’d say the 22 years of life I lived up until my time in South America was the true break from reality as the majority of the world knows it. No disrespect to anyone in continuing education or working the day to day in the United States. I do not discount the trials and tribulations that pass through your life.

So for God sakes, give me a break and, at the very least, recognize that what I have chosen to do with my life is the furthest thing from a vacation or play time. I am an eyewitness to the grace of God at her best, and the power of humanity at our worst. I see and live intimately in both extremes. And I pay the full price of my ticket, every damn day.

So until you have seen injustice at its worst and had the ugliest and weakest of yourself revealed in it, you have no right to merely “glance” at what I am doing- and without an ounce of experience in it, demean it as something that is only cutesy and idealistic.

I guess I just need to know this: if encountering and battling poverty manifested in one’s own personal identity and the world at large isn’t reality…then what in God’s name is your definition of reality?

A Blast From the Past, A Fear For the Future

The decision to do service abroad is the result of the accumulation of several events over my life. But it was a trip to Southern Ecuador with the Alternative Spring Break program at LMU that I must credit with giving me that final push. I had just seen poverty at its ugliest the day before. I felt worthless and utterly hopeless in the face of it, and for the first time in my life, began to buy into that pessimistic view that nothing can be done to battle the poverty epidemic. And in walked Pat.

I never got her last name or fully understood exactly what she did. But what I will remember is the talk she gave to my group that day, and the way it made me feel. “Having just seen what you all have seen” she said, “you have a moral obligation to do something about it.” She concluded by telling us that, in the face of such devastation of innocent life, “we have no right to fail.” There was a certain confidence that emanated from her in the face of such dire conditions, and it was allergic. We don’t have many moments in our lives that we can point to and say “there, that was when I decided to make a life changing decision.” But this was one of those moments. There is a bracelet I received that day, a bracelet I have not once taken off in over 2.5 years in order to always remind myself why it is I needed to come back to Latin America.

Over the last year, I had tried many times to write a letter to thank her. I had always wanted to do service but was so afraid. She gave me the courage to take a leap of faith that to this day still surprises and amazes me. And when I decided to leave Chile and return to Ecuador I couldn’t help but think about that life changing moment. I couldn’t help but wonder about Pat.

The other day, at a Mass at The Working Boys Center, a good 12 hours from Duran, I saw Pat. I knew she didn’t remember me, but still, I felt I had to say something. I walked over and, avoiding any attempts at poise and tact, said “Hi. You don’t really know me. But you gave a talk to a college group one day in Duran and well, you’re the reason I’m here doing what I am doing.” I babbled a few more incoherent words, and then just said, “you probably never realized it, but your talk that day made a big difference in my life. I just want to thank you for how you inspired me and gave me the courage to be here.”

Seeing Pat made me realize just how happy I am with this decision to do post-grad service. It has made me genuine and permitted me to love and be loved like I never allowed. And so, seeing Pat also made me realize something else. Though it may be many, many months away, I’m so incredibly scared to return to the United States. I have changed so much since I left. And frankly, I don’t know if who I am here can survive the daily ritual of life in the States. The priority to do all things out of love and with love seems to get lost. My two weeks home taught me that as much as I wanted to hear everyone else’s story, not many people, save but a few really good friends, cared to hear mine. “How was it?” was the question of the day it seemed no one truly wanted an answer to. And you know, before my time down here, I was that otherwise well intentioned but not truly caring guy as well. I don’t want to become him again, and I’m so afraid when I go back to the United States I might lose the courage to stay true to what I have learned here.

And perhaps my next moral obligation as Pat might say is finding how to take who I am and what I do here and bring it back home. In a new twist on an old theme, seeing Pat 2.5 years later reminded me that, here or there, I have no right to fail.

My Biggest Mistake Yet

For the last few weeks I have been heading to school with the weight of the world on my shoulders. I wish it was an exaggeration, but I’m here to tell you that a devastating mistake I made some five weeks ago created unbelievable repercussions on my happiness for sometime now.

It all happened when I thought I heard one of my students call me a maricon. It was already building into a long day, and as I’ve come to learn, the quickest lapse of sound judgment can be the most dangerous.

I snapped. I ripped her apart, berating her about the lack of respect. I went on and on, demanding accountability for her actions. She denied any wrongdoing, refusing to admit she called me what I was so sure she called me. And you know, playing the moment over and over in my head again, a bit of doubt has began to creep in, questioning me to wonder if I really did hear her wrong.

Anyway, on I went, humiliating this poor girl in front of the rest of the class until I finally forced her to break down- sobbing and embarrassed. I stood there in front of the class, just having humiliated one of my poor students into tears. Mr. Tough guy, just like I felt I had to be- feeling like the biggest and most worthless jackass in the world.

Two days later I was in a bind. I couldn’t shake the guilt of my actions like the Patrick Furlong before South America might have been able to so easily have done. It became a moment in my young teaching career where the supposed mistake of the student paled in comparison to my mistake, that of the educator. And so, I made one of my most difficult but altogether important decisions: I humbled myself and apologized to this young girl. Throughout it all, she never once looked me in the eye or even acknowledged what I was saying to her.

Five weeks had crawled by and she still wouldn’t speak to me or even look at me. Racked with an incredible guilt that wasn’t disappearing anytime soon, I did everything I could to reverse the situation: all to no avail. A child was entrusted into my care, and I violated that trust. And she had every right to feel and act the way she did. She even got her little friends to ignore me as well. I was once like a saint to these children, and now I was nothing more than a jerk whose existence was acknowledged with a silent eye roll (and these kids give killer eye rolls). And so what once was my personal heaven, the downtown center in “La Marin”- quickly became my nightmare.

I submitted myself to my own trials of humiliation when day after day I would attempt conversation with her and day after day, she ignored me. And so imagine my surprise the other day when at last, she responded to me. It was nothing major, a short conversation about something or other at school, but the look in her eyes moved me profoundly. There are times, I am convinced, where God DIRECTLY communicates with you through another human being. It was as though the lesson of a lifetime was conveyed through her cautious eyes.

I went to a little hidden nook in the center after that little conversation and shed a few tears of relief and ultimately, of sincere thanks. In the end, 6th grade Diana taught me a think or two about forgiveness. And through her forgiveness, I’d like to think I learned more in that one shameful downfall then I might throughout the rest of the year about what kind of teacher, what kind of person I not only should be, but desire to be as well.

I have learned a lot about vulnerability over the last 15 months and would like to propose it is perhaps the most misunderstood adjective in our language. Perhaps it conjures images of susceptibility or weakness. But to me, vulnerability is having the courage to declare we are broken, and as a result, incredibly blessed. It’s looking at the world with the walls of our defense down. It’s allowing the human condition which seeks to permeate through our being to do just that. Ours is a life of co-dependency. To be vulnerable therefore is nothing more than to love without limits.

It’s taken a bunch of street kids and some lonely and challenging moments to teacher me the greatest lesson of my short life. Call it cheesy or call it cliché, but the only thing worth a damn in this life is finding a way to open ourselves freely to love in a way in which we live fully in the consequences: the sadness and the pain, the joy and euphoria. We all make grand mistakes, but perhaps the biggest of all would be to allow our pride to blind us in such a way that we see vulnerability as a weakness rather than our most admirable strength.

(Oh, and an update since I wrote this journal entry. Things with Diana are going great. She is talking to me again, joking and laughing, and even gave me a hug as I left work the other day.)

When a Student Drops Out

I lost a student the other day. I walked into class and was told that Jose Luis won’t be coming back to the center. He apparently just up and left. I’m told it’s a common occurrence at the center. But I got so into my routine I guess I just kinda forgot it might happen. The problem with my routine however, is that the more I got into it, the more I cared about the well being of each of my students. You develop a relationship that I really think sustains you through the monotony of doing simple math and reading exercises over and over again. If you don’t love these kids, you can’t do that shit again and again, because to be perfectly honest, I hate teaching and yet, I love my job. Why? Because I love my students. And so losing my first one, has really been a personal blow, and I am still reeling.

Those of you who have been keeping in touch with me have no doubt been subject to my relentless conversations about Jose Luis, my 17 year old student who bravely began attending school for the first time ever this year. When I first got him, he couldn’t write his own name, count past 10, or even recite the first 5 letters of the alphabet.

But over time, we began to see progress. The last class I had with him, we were doing simple addition and subtraction, counting to 100, and reading small and basic sentences. Everyday was at once frustrating and enlivening. For so long, I struggled with him, but near the end, it was like something clicked. You work with a kid long enough and you learn how he learns. I learned about Jose Luis, and began teaching to how he learns. And as we began to see progress, there was this sense of excitement about what was going on. A life was changing, he was learning and it was having a tremendous impact on every aspect of his life. And I was in the front row, blessed to witness it all!

I go to bed tonight and I wonder where this kid is. You can’t over dramatize what it is we do, because in the end, we are nothing but a tiny peg in the system. But with this kid, my role was bigger. I really had an opportunity to do something substantial. To teach a kid to count his bus fare, to read. Really, it was beginning to see a future for a kid that once had none.

One of our last days of class, timid Jose came in and started giving me lip. I was so taken aback that it took me a while to realize what he was fussing about. He was holding up a book his cousin lent him, demanding me to account for why he couldn’t read it. Teach me more, teach me faster. Professor, please, push me more, he told me. And just like that, the motivation my student had found deep within himself lit a spark of my own. Quiet Jose, demanding to learn more. I had planned this week to try and squeeze in more hours one on one, so we could move him along more rapidly. I had all these grand visions of what we’d do. For Christ sake, I had a kid begging to learn, begging for homework, begging for more class time!

And none of that will happen. I lost a student and I’m losing sleep on it. He’ll never learn again, I know he won’t. I hate to be so cynical, but every core of my body knows this to be true. There is no fairy tail ending, no life lesson learned. At this moment there is me, in this room, looking at the lesson plans I had created just for him that are now wasted. Jose Luis is gone, and with him went an opportunity to get educated, an opportunity to break out of poverty. Why? Life isn’t fair, but damn it, sometimes it should be.

The Choices We Have To Live With

Punishment is a tricky thing here at the center. The basic facts of the matter are that kids are kids no matter what part of the world you find them in. And being in the position of a teacher now, that also means inevitably my priorities (that they learn something) are going to clash with one of their most frequent priorities (that they get away with doing something they should not be doing). That said I always hated hearing that classic teacher’s diatribe about how “this is not a democracy and blah blah blah”…and wouldn’t you know I used it the other night.

Make rules and keep them consistent. Establish your classroom management. The advice was all there, and it all seemed so easy. And yet, I’ve learned in my brief time here, as a teacher, if there is anything that is my responsibility, it’s less about sticking with the rules I made and more about seeing these kids and situations through loving and logical eyes. For if kids are a tricky thing, so too are parents.

I confiscated a cell phone the other day. RULE= Items that have nothing to do with my class become mine for a week. And so, when a 10 year old was text messaging under her desk (something I did countless times as a student) I seized the phone. The girl stayed after class and begged for her phone. My response was simple. No. After my next class, she was there again, begging even more. No. Tears were almost in here eyes. But rules are rules, and I insisted, no.

And then near the end of the day, I started to process just why she was so desperate. It was nagging me, something about the way she looked at me. You get to know your students in a way where an unusual reaction stands out. Not exactly one of the teacher’s pets, this girl had already had her fair share of runs in and punishment with me, and never flinched before. So why now? I spoke with a colleague who put it into perspective. “Some of the parents here are still learning good parenting. And so, her mom might hit her if she comes home without a phone tonight.” There it was, clear as day, and complicated as all hell. Keep the phone and drive home my point of classroom management. But at what possible cost? It was my call.

Follow through seemed less and less viable but I didn’t want to let the girl walk off free of punishment for breaking a rule. And as the day came to a close, out of time and without an answer, I pulled the student aside from a class to speak to her. Maybe I am a sucker and maybe it will come back to bite me, but I gave her the phone back with nothing more than a talk about respect and a huge assignment: writing lines. I told her she was a great student but I needed her to be more attentive. Next time I wouldn’t be so lenient, but I told her I was hoping there would not be a next time.

I left school that day, failing at the one thing every expert told me was a must win situation: class room management. But I can tell you this. I slept a little easier knowing that in the everyday struggle to size up as a teacher, I at least had the common sense to look at the student first, the rules I created before I knew what I was doing, second. Would she have gotten hit by her parent? I don’t know, but I at least learned a little something about myself that day. Simply enough, whether she would get hit or not wasn’t a gamble I was willing to take over a stupid cell phone. That said, tomorrow it’s back to the routine rhetoric of “this is not a democracy… this is a pure and simple dictatorship.” (= Just kiddin, I don’t really say that… at least not the dictator part.