Saturday, March 17, 2007
Teaching our Children well
We don't go to the city much but on occasion I must venture there. It seems when ever I do I get lost which makes me late and I can never find a parking space. So I was driving around hoping to find anything finally a space opened up and I pulled in. I jumped out of my car and started shuffling the children out and then realized maybe I had chosen a bad parking space. There was a bunch of unsightly people huddled around the heat coming from the bus station. I gathered my children close and said we are in the city stay close don't touch anything, don't talk to anyone. You know the kind of things a nervous mother says when she thinks someone bad is lurking about.
I hurried them along past the bus station to where I thought was a safer area. My son kept looking back at the homeless people. We had never seen such a thing. Then he asked me, "Why all those people were standing there?" So in my best motherly way I began to explain homelessness. I realized homelessness can not be sugar coated and at this point it was hard to explain why someone would be homeless. As I struggled to explain he looked at me and said "Mom, they all look so cold, why don't they go inside the bus station its warm in there?"
And that was even harder to explain. That we are afraid of homeless people. And when we are afraid we want it to go away. We are sure they have done something bad to become homeless.
Somewhere in my life I must have got lost and my son was bringing me back.
So I began to tell him and my other children that there are people who just don't have money. They may have lost their job or maybe there partner died or who knows but I'm sure each one has a story to tell.
Just imagine, I said, If you father had to go away and I was left with all of you. and I had to go to work everyday. I would have to pay someone to care for you and that would cost money probably as much money as I would get paid to go to work so then what should I do to pay the bills how would I buy food, clothes, coats to keep you warm. They all looked at me. I realized then that all the things we have talked about in our lives this was an important lesson. A lesson I hope to teach well.
It really got me thinking. What do we do to make a difference. Yes we recycle. We hang our laundry outside to dry in the summers. We raise up our own food and veggies. We try to be earth friendly. But what...what?
I called around to see if we could volunteer but what I found didn't really allow me to bring small children with me and I couldn't make a weekly commitment to the same time and place my schedule was to crazy. I didn't think volunteering would be so hard. I wanted to do something. I wanted to do good. I wanted to make a difference.
A few weeks had past and my daughter was complaining I never do anything special with her. So I thought we could try a craft of sort. I went on the Internet and started looking for something craft like when I came across http://www.warmupamerica.org/ there it was a simple craft that we could do. Better yet a chance to make a difference. Then I thought, hey I could show the children in Sunday school, I could get friends, I could get others many others. And so it was I called the newspaper they came and did a little story. I wrote to manufacturers for yarn. For the past three months we have been knitting and crocheting and so have many others. Thus far we have made 10 afghans, 3 pairs of mittens and 1 pair of booties. It feels good.
I think so far its been the people that want to help that are making this so amazing. They are for the most part older women who have felt left out of our community. They sit at home not able to drive for one reason or another, they depend on others for there daily needs yet they want to do good for others they want to be needed. And I need them. They sit in there homes knitting for hours a day knowing that with each stitch they are helping someone. A mother, a child, a man or women who has done nothing bad. They just needs a warm blanket to wrap up in. I talk to them on the phone some of them for hours. They are lonely and some how by helping me to make afghans I have given them purpose again. And they have given me so much more......
One day we walked by a bus station and it change our lives forever.
I hurried them along past the bus station to where I thought was a safer area. My son kept looking back at the homeless people. We had never seen such a thing. Then he asked me, "Why all those people were standing there?" So in my best motherly way I began to explain homelessness. I realized homelessness can not be sugar coated and at this point it was hard to explain why someone would be homeless. As I struggled to explain he looked at me and said "Mom, they all look so cold, why don't they go inside the bus station its warm in there?"
And that was even harder to explain. That we are afraid of homeless people. And when we are afraid we want it to go away. We are sure they have done something bad to become homeless.
Somewhere in my life I must have got lost and my son was bringing me back.
So I began to tell him and my other children that there are people who just don't have money. They may have lost their job or maybe there partner died or who knows but I'm sure each one has a story to tell.
Just imagine, I said, If you father had to go away and I was left with all of you. and I had to go to work everyday. I would have to pay someone to care for you and that would cost money probably as much money as I would get paid to go to work so then what should I do to pay the bills how would I buy food, clothes, coats to keep you warm. They all looked at me. I realized then that all the things we have talked about in our lives this was an important lesson. A lesson I hope to teach well.
It really got me thinking. What do we do to make a difference. Yes we recycle. We hang our laundry outside to dry in the summers. We raise up our own food and veggies. We try to be earth friendly. But what...what?
I called around to see if we could volunteer but what I found didn't really allow me to bring small children with me and I couldn't make a weekly commitment to the same time and place my schedule was to crazy. I didn't think volunteering would be so hard. I wanted to do something. I wanted to do good. I wanted to make a difference.
A few weeks had past and my daughter was complaining I never do anything special with her. So I thought we could try a craft of sort. I went on the Internet and started looking for something craft like when I came across http://www.warmupamerica.org/ there it was a simple craft that we could do. Better yet a chance to make a difference. Then I thought, hey I could show the children in Sunday school, I could get friends, I could get others many others. And so it was I called the newspaper they came and did a little story. I wrote to manufacturers for yarn. For the past three months we have been knitting and crocheting and so have many others. Thus far we have made 10 afghans, 3 pairs of mittens and 1 pair of booties. It feels good.
I think so far its been the people that want to help that are making this so amazing. They are for the most part older women who have felt left out of our community. They sit at home not able to drive for one reason or another, they depend on others for there daily needs yet they want to do good for others they want to be needed. And I need them. They sit in there homes knitting for hours a day knowing that with each stitch they are helping someone. A mother, a child, a man or women who has done nothing bad. They just needs a warm blanket to wrap up in. I talk to them on the phone some of them for hours. They are lonely and some how by helping me to make afghans I have given them purpose again. And they have given me so much more......
One day we walked by a bus station and it change our lives forever.
// posted by DME @ 4:56 AM 
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