Thankful
Today I am thankful for my children's health.
I went to the open house of the non-profit "Safe Passage" on Friday night.
They work within the garbage dump of Guatemala's poorest of the poor. These are people that live alongside a massive landfill and crowd around each day's trash delivery in search of food or scraps of material that they can sell to a recycling center.
I am beyond appalled. What prompted my interest though, was a dream, well better call that a nightmare. My husband and I were trapped in a foreign city, the walls of which were a landfill. The dream was more complex than that, but it made me get to my computer and start researching.
What I found makes me angry, sad, and sick. It is a cold cruel world out there for millions of people. We have so much to be thankful for.
When I was 23 I traveled to Haiti, another developing country. I am not sure why we call them that because they seem to be getting worse, not better.
I have seen the kind of desperation that exists in the third world. It changes you.
I opened the refrigerator and nearly broke down crying the other day. I was thinking about how easy I have it, and yet I still find something to complain about. I am not alone, the world always has something to complain about. If we aren't busy watching Brad and Angelina, or the latest with Ms. Spears, then we are probably busy consuming. That's exactly how we are kept asleep to the misery of the rest of the world.
I could go on and on. I just thank God that I was born into the life that is mine, because I am the same person as any other person, and so much depends on what card you get dealt in this lifetime.
I hope we each do our part. I made 16 pies for the Root Cellar, part of my Mother's group. Together we made 250 pies. Pies. Pies. That's how lucky we are, even our poor can have homemade Pumpkin pies on Thanksgiving.
If I could ship pies to Guatemala you know I would. I'd just keep on baking until everyone was fed.
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