Therapeutic thoughts and theses from a Weaver of Dreams
Saturday, April 03, 2010
These Haitian Kids Play Too Much
The Haitian Chronicles, Chapter 3
there is a dented-up, broken down truck in the front yard. i'm sorry, in the front dirt and gravel space that constitutes a yard in this neighborhood. the front of the truck has a hood held in place by a hinge--no matter, it hasn't moved in God knows how long. the bed of the truck is covered by its original plastic liner, turned upside down, hoisted high above the roof line on its four corners by a welded scrap metal frame, providing a cover for the flatbed. benches made of recycled wood held in place by more rusted metal framing line the back of the truck. people once sat stacked one upon another in this rustbucket runabout during the days it was used as one of countless cabs that battle for room daily on these broken roads. nowadays, however, it serves a purpose:
playground.
yes, it's dangerous. there are jagged pieces of metal over the wheels; the after market steel transport frame protrudes from the missing tailgate at very sharp right angles just high enough to catch a knee, a thigh, a hip, a shoulder, an eye, and a forehead, depending on the age of its would-be master. a flattened front tire leaves the back end raised just enough to qualify it as a danger to fall from. in America, the Department of Codes Enforcement would have been worn out with calls on this heap by now. it would be littered with just enough neon-colored stickers to warrant leaving the gate open for an any-day pickup from the city tow truck.
junk.
well...junk to us. but to the kids of Gradec, the brown truck with a smashed back window and faded multi-colored letters that read "JESUS IS THE WAY OF THE LIFE COME" across the top of the windshield is more than junk; more than castaway; more than garbage.
to creative children, it is--remarkably--a field of dreams.
in the mornings, i see these children gather up on the back of the truck, from tallest to smallest, and sing songs. they then play games, the language of which i do not comprehend, but the Mime in me comes to at least roughly understand. i've seen versions of "House," "Tag," "Dodgeball," and goodness knows what else take place ,with great emotional and physical commitment, in and around that doggone truck. every little while, something happens: a cut leg, a busted lip, a fall or scraped knee. i'm surprised that hours pass between incidents of someone being hurt instead of mere seconds. looking at that truck from my perspective, all i see is one giant, central, frozen symbol of the phrase, "Accident Waiting To Happen."
the accidents do eventually come, but they do not deter these children from loving this truck and using it to love on one another. there will be no stitches for the cut leg; no parental threats of litigation for the busted lip; no prevention of the fall, and the dabbing of the scraped knee by the commodity of "Mr. jeff's baby wipes" is seen as more of a treat than a treatment.
these kids play too much.
eventually, they break into smaller groups, sometimes dividing according to gender. the girls pretend to be models, or take time playing patty cake. Dwayne and i had a ball playing with them, trading up the African-American slants for the Haitian ones on rhythmic hand patterns, from "Slide" to the old school game of "Slap" we played as adolescents, where the object was to either slap the other player's hands as they hovered above your own, or to make them flinch and get a free lick.
the boys play "football," what we call soccer, with a partially inflated ball in a space i cannot believe even one boy would try to kick in, much less 3-5 at any given time. they set a broken piece of cinder block at the gate and the end of a piece of wood under the back end of the truck as goals to protect, and they get right to it. the two fiercest players are both disabled, and in their legs of all places. but no one goes easy on them or treats them differently. they do not ask the others for special consideration or to slow down. they rollick like ordinary kids. check them out:
these kids play too much.
lunch arrives, courtesy of the women who come and go with smiles and pleasant demeanor. the children line up, girls on one side, boys on the other, say their blessing, and eat from a simple tin plate with a spoon. sweet drink is mixed in a pickle bucket and distributed with a ladle into their waiting cups. they make a game getting seconds on the punch. again, i understand without understanding a word. they make a respectful game of their simple meal:
i told you, these kids play too much.
i say they play too much because conventional wisdom is telling me that these kids should not be this happy. they should be moping around, complaining about their circumstances. they should be going off about not being able to walk to the refrigerator or the pantry and relieve themselves of snacks whenever they are hungry; they should be pointing blameful fingers at whoever caused their bruise and demanding justice, either from one of the surrogate parents or from whichever group of their peers they can convince to "gang up" on their side; they should be livid that they don't have a dvd stash to argue over, a remote control to break, or an X-box controller to fight over.
but they do not complain, even though i could not even fit my Honda Element into the space they have to sleep, eat, and play in most of the time; they don't even complain when it's time to bathe, outside, in a plastic tub, with cool water.
they....just...play.
they play so much they don't even realize that they have not been outside the gate of this small compound all day, or for that matter, since Dwayne and i have been here. aside from going to church, i doubt they get out much. there is no Chuck E. Cheese for these; no playing in the park until dark. No Ben & Jerry's to make them merry. No Dave or Buster, not an ounce of luster.
if they do have a toy, it's a bat made from a stick, a ball from a wad of paper, a kite constructed by coconut leaf stems and discarded plastic (which, incidentally, can be seen flying high all over the city, controlled by masterful little fellows not unlike these children). these children may never see a video game. but they have something that is so much better than a Wii...
a sense of WE.
these kids realize that they are all in this life together. the people who run this place realized they are all connected. they love on these kids and the kids love on each other. they help each other set up the door on blocks that is their table, help each other bathe and groom themselves daily, and take responsibility for one another. That is a sense of WE so many of us are missing.
so, although they play too much for the average tastes of those of us who feel they should wallow in self-pity and shame and long for those creature comforts we take for granted, they don't play too much for me. they just remind me, continually, of something i tend to forget.
maybe I don't play enough.
i cannot remember the last time i had no resources to play with except my imagination. sure, Amun Ra has not the material resources to spend thousands of dollars on productions like of some of our peers in professional theater. we get it done based on the philosophy of "making chicken salad out of chicken feathers" i learned from W. Dury Cox at Tennessee State University. but these kids take it to another level. you throw away a bottle, you look up a few minutes later and it's a musical instrument; you decide to tie the tent to cinder blocks, and you hear poly-rhythms emanating from a corner near the wall, as the discarded metal tent stakes become sticks to a core of drummers who have seized them and employed them to make the empty buckets that hold the bathing water now sing with their musical creations.
darkness falls, and they still don't stop. now, when i say darkness falls, i mean, darkness. we walked to the barbershop so that Dwayne could get a haircut. he's been asked to preach at church tomorrow, so he wanted to look sharp, plus we wanted to walk through the neighborhood and see the people. we saw a few before it got black dark.
when we returned, they were gathered in the truck, singing. they greeted us with hugs (we rushed to them because i didn't want them piling off the truck that fast in a place where you could barely see a foot in front of you). we laughed, and talked, and reminisced about another playful thing we did: animal puppets with the flashlight against the earthquake damaged stone wall. God, when was the last time i played that game, even with my own kids?
i love these kids. and yes, what we're doing is important. but in all the ways we may ever try to help them, from sending something down on the regular to one day contribute to building them a new home, i hope to God that we don't--in the effort to "bring them out" of their current circumstances--rob them of the very things they have that will ensure them success in life: the ability to love unconditionally, to laugh, to sing, to learn, and yes, to create. to tap into their subconscious and not look around and see a glass half empty, but one running over with opportunities.
for i could care less about the heat, how many rocks i shoveled today, how much water we bought, how many tents we've constructed and/or given away. i feel as if i have stolen from these good people and these wonderful children. i have stolen the gift of a pure and loving heart, the debt of which i could not re-pay if i worked the rest of my life just to ensure this small group of souls had a good chance at personal and collective success. even though they freely gave it to me, i feel as if i owe.
so the way i figure i can give restitution is by loving, by sharing, and yes, by playing a little more in my own life. by not dulling my own imagination and creativity by majoring in minor thoughts; by seeing a vision even larger than i thought i had seen before, and by joining with others who also believe in the same things, so that together, one day, we'll bask in the joyfulness that comes along with a new acceptance of the accusation we used to fear having leveled on us in church, in class, and in social settings:
"They play too much."
* * * Why i love Skype
this morning, we were able to get a strong enough internet signal through our borrowed modem to get Skype to fire up consistently. so you know the first thing i had to do was call my wife, because i haven't seen my family. so i rang them up, and there they were.
one or two of the Gradec kids were standing around, so i showed them how to wave in the camera. that was it. soon, the tent was full of kids and they were talking back and forth with my family. even my baby girl was in on the action. after a while, i had to go outside and work on our spur-of-the-moment renovation project (details to follow), so i decided to just let them play online for a while with the camera. a few minutes later, i returned to the tent, and wouldn't you know, my wife and family were singing songs with the kids, learning and teaching, teaching and learning.
what a cultural exchange.
* * * A New Facility. Well. Almost.
as you know, we ran out of space for tents. the only area that was open on the gravel yard was a steep slope of broken rocks and cinder blocks. we figured one of the giant tents would be perfect for the kids to move their mattress and pads into, if only we had the space, Dwayne and i lamented in the morning sun.
Then it hit us, why not just cut into the pile and create a landing of rock, covered with dirt, large enough for us to pitch one of the heavy duty tents (thanks FB Friends!!)? it would take some labor and skill, but heck, Dwayne is a trained Construction Engineer and a master builder, and me? i may not be the sharpest tool in the shed, but i can handle the rest of them pretty durned good.
starting to sketch out the plan, another idea struck: why not help out the local economy and get some community buy-in at the same time. remember the donation the kind stranger on the plane made with the charge to "make a difference?" well, we used it to hire a local construction laborer to help institute the plan. after some haggling back and forth, he got to work, with us joining in here and there. hours later, after a lunch break and some pick-ax work and leveling, we had a new space to pitch a big tent, and that's exactly what we did.
the kids are playing, my fingers are worn, and i'm probably going to have to bed down soon. church starts at 7 am! talk about "Eaaaaaarly...Sundaymornin'!" (Missionary Baptists, share the humor please) so i can only imagine how early we're all going to have to get up. whew.
thanks to all for keeping up with me.
what do you think? could we all stand to play a little more?
