The waiting room

Husband worked his arm in circles, wincing. “I probably have shoulder cancer.”

“Whatever.” I shook my head. “Stop joking and just get it checked out.”

After seven months of pain, he finally made a doctor’s appointment, which led to an MRI. We awaited the results, convincing ourselves of his diagnosis: a torn rotator cuff. But we were wrong.

“I have a bone lesion.” Husband dropped the words like a pair of dirty socks. “The doctor wants to do a bone scan tomorrow.”

I furrowed my brow. Bone lesion. I had heard the term before somewhere, and it carried darkness and questions. After Husband fell asleep that night, I gave in to a temptation I rarely indulged anymore: I searched the medical term online.

My computer screen lit up with link after link—none of them innocent. I held my breath and clicked on the first one. Cancer. I chose a different link. Cancer. I selected a third link. Cancer. My heart racing, I texted two friends. I confessed my online, late-night activities.

One of them, blunt and loving, came down on me. “Quit reading. Pray.”

“You’re right,” I texted back. But after I turned off my computer, my eyes stayed open in the dark for longer than usual.

On Thursday, Husband went in for his bone scan.

“We should hear the results by tomorrow,” he said when he returned home.

Friday arrived, delivering terrible news—but not about Husband.

“Have you heard what’s going on in France?” I asked him the second he stepped in the door. “Paris is under attack.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Wow.”

I poured out the bloody details of terrorists blasting their hatred on unsuspecting patrons in bars, restaurants, a sports stadium, and a concert hall.

The story garnered international attention and gave legs to the suspicions of some in our nation. Suicide bombers, masked gunmen, hostages, rumors of repeat terror coming to our own country. And we headed into life’s waiting room. What would come next?

The weekend arrived, delivering awful news—but not about Husband. A man in our neighborhood had assaulted a woman, and when he interfered with the paramedics who tended to her, the police had fatally shot him. By Monday evening, hundreds of protesters gathered in response to the shooting and walked out onto I-94, stopping traffic for almost three hours.

The story captured national attention and churned up the muck beneath the neighborhood’s waters. Arrests, threats, clashes with police, rumors of riots about to explode all over our part of the city. And we waited in life’s waiting room. What would happen now?

On Tuesday evening, the doctor called Husband.

“Several of us have looked at your results. We don’t think it’s cancer, but to be certain, we’ve sent the scan to an oncologist.”

Husband was unfazed, but my thoughts jarred me. I remembered my first mammogram that had necessitated an ultrasound. It happened again the next year—and the two years after that—prompting the doctor to at last perform a biopsy. But test results and doctors’ answers had never brought lasting peace. And I wondered what would happen to Husband.

I hunkered down in life’s waiting room. But instead of warm assurance, I heard my heartbeat and the ticking of the clock. I sat for three hours, feeling alone and forgotten. Could bloodthirsty terrorists dictate how our world would go? Could a rioting mob decide the fate of our neighborhood? Could a doctor tell us about Husband’s life—or my own?

The silence hurt my ears, and the question marks pricked me. Then I caught a glimpse of Him in the nagging uncertainties and unanswered mysteries.

He had been next to me in the waiting room all along.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

The alley kids

I looked out the kitchen window one day at the biggest attraction on our property: the basketball hoop. A bunch of kids—our neighbor T.J.’s three from across the alley and a few more—shot baskets. I headed outside to greet them. These were younger ones—a new batch of players. I missed the older ones who had grown up on our driveway and had ripped my heart out by vanishing from our lives—along with their basketballs—when they were about seventeen.

These new ones watched me approach the gate, and their faces split into smiles. I remembered the day three years earlier when T.J. had dropped them off—along with their pit bull Daisy—in our back yard and disappeared. Their faces had been wrapped in smiles that day too.

I stepped outside the chain link fence and clasped the gate shut. “Tell me your names again.”  

The smallest girl scuttled over to me. “I’m Laya.”

“I remember you. How old are you now?”

“Five.” Laya’s shirt—a couple of sizes too small—crept up above her plump belly, and she patted her bare skin and grinned.

As I listened to the other kids’ names, Laya stroked my hand.

“So you’re all related?”

A chunky older boy nodded. “Some of us are cousins.” He pointed at the duplex across the alley. “We all live over there.”

Ah, the mystery of the rental property across the alley. Husband had heard T.J.’s mother owned the building now and had loaded the place with family members. But although we had tried, we could never track how many adults lived there or figure out which kids belonged to whom.

“Well, I’m glad you’re here.” I turned to go back into the house, but Laya patted my hand, drawing me back.

I assessed the kids with their eager faces. All of them looked overfed. But they were starving.

The next time the kids came over to play, they left behind fuzzy pink slippers, a Barbie doll, several empty Funyuns bags, and candy wrappers. Husband called them back.

“You guys have to pick up your garbage, okay?” He indicated the receptacle by the garage. “All your trash goes in there.”

He oversaw the clean-up, and each time the kids dropped a piece of trash into the container, they peered at his face, their eyes shining.

A week later, the kids were back. But this time when they left, landscaping blocks—once stacked in a corner—were scattered. And some of the old, red bricks—from another pile—were broken, and chunks and shards littered the driveway.

Husband walked over to the duplex. Seven kids frolicked in the front yard, and he told them what he had found in the driveway. Then he had a talk with the adults.

“We enjoy having the kids come over to play, but they need to leave the blocks alone. There’s a mess out there now, and some bricks are broken.”

“How much do we owe you for the broken ones?” one of the women said.

“Nothing. The kids just need to help pick up and not mess around with them anymore.”

With a holler, one of the parents booted the kids back to our place, and Husband and Dicka helped them pick up and restack the blocks.  

I emerged from the house and surveyed the progress. “Nice work.”

The older kids’ eyes sparkled as if they were gathering gifts instead of bricks. And Laya scurried over to touch my hand.

I sat in church the next Sunday. The sermon was solid, inspiring. But my thoughts wandered off and meandered back to the neighborhood—and back to the kids from across the alley. And there was that familiar pang in my chest again. Was there something I could do?

Read to them.

Read to them? I imagined halting the basketball games, parking a lawn chair on the driveway, settling into it, and whipping out a book. No doubt the kids would huddle around me. But the trees were already naked, and winter whispered to me from around the corner. How long could my stories last before the biting winds drove the kids home for the dark months?

Invite them in.

Inside the house? But there were so many of them. Sometimes even eight, ranging from ages five to twelve. And they would tromp inside with great clods of snow on their boots and potato chip bags and no sense of time or boundaries. And if their parents allowed the reading sessions, they might view us as free childcare for whenever. I imagined the peace in my home taking wing and fluttering away.

It’s not your house.

I shifted in the pew and sighed. Those kids and their unfettered exuberance. A smile tugged at the corners of my mouth. I flicked my gaze at Husband. He looked back at me and furrowed his brow. I’ll tell you later, my eyes said.

I knew exactly which children’s book I'd choose first.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

The four days

After I tucked her into bed, five-year-old Tabitha pummeled the wall with her heels, and I knew she was missing her mama. I patted her back to soothe her, but she clamped her teeth onto my t-shirt and yanked her head back until the fabric tore. She released her bite and then cried until she almost threw up. At last, she fell asleep. Whimpering, her three-year-old sister lay on her back in bed next to her, staring at the ceiling. I hugged them both, left the lamp on—at their request—and tiptoed out of the room.

We had hosted Tabitha and Tia before. In fact, this was their fourth time at our house. The first time was when Tabitha was two and Tia was six months old. They knew us. And maybe this time—since the placement had been written up for a month and not just a long weekend—we could establish some consistency in their stormy lives.

Other host families had struggled with the two sisters. Some had said they’d take Tia but not Tabitha. She was too difficult.

“That’s not right.” Dicka furrowed her brow and shook her head when I told her about the girls’ track record. “If their mom needs help, she needs help with both of them.”

“You’re right.”

We fumbled through our days, managing behavior and redirecting when attitudes soured—which was often.

“I would act out too, if I were in their place,” I told Husband after the girls fell asleep one night.

“Maybe we should offer to keep them for more than a month, so they can have some stability,” he said. “Moving them around from one host family to another doesn’t make sense.”

Their mother—trying to recover from her own fractured childhood—had suffered a fissure that was now splitting her adult life. But was there a time frame for healing? Would even two months be enough?

I rubbed my temples. “Let’s see how this goes.”

That weekend, even though the little ones’ needs were louder than the rest of our household demands, writing deadlines still nipped at my heels.

“I’ll take the girls trick-or-treating so you can get your work done,” Husband said.

In a box of toys in the basement, I found furry, stuffed tails to clip onto the girls’ back sides and some headbands with ears. Husband took Tabitha and Tia—now cats—out to circle some nearby neighborhoods. Two hours later, they came back with their pumpkin buckets full.

I kissed Husband at the door. “You’re my hero.”

After the usual bedtime battles, the girls went to sleep. It would all get better in time. One day at a time. Soon, the weekend—having been pounded by temper tantrums—was over.

But on Monday morning, I was nervous. Tabitha’s school had arranged transportation to pick her up from our house. I sat with the two little girls on the front steps, and we waited.

A school van pulled up, and the driver hopped out, holding a piece of paper and looking around as he eyed the surrounding houses. I waved to him. But just then, Tabitha jumped up and dashed into the house. A second later, Tia scrambled down the steps to the sidewalk. I scooped her up first and then ran into the house after her sister. Dicka was still home, so she distracted Tia for me.

Tabitha crossed her arms and plopped into a living room chair.

“The van is going to take you to school, honey.” I pasted on my cheery face and held out my hand. “It’ll be fun.” She shook her head and grunted. My smile slipped away. “You need to come.”

She took my hand and stomped outside. Then she turned her limbs to jelly and dissolved onto the front steps. I shrugged at the driver and then turned back to her.

I still held her hand. “Let’s go, Tabitha.”

She splayed out on the steps. I pulled her to standing.

“No!” But a tiny smile played at the corners of her mouth.

“I’ll help you.” I picked her up—sixty-eight pounds of kicking and flailing—and deposited her into the van. I buckled her in, but she unclasped herself. I clasped her in again, and again she unbuckled. Finally, I slid the van door shut and apologized to the driver. My heart hammered as I waved good-bye.

Then I drove Tia to her pre-school. On the way, she kicked the back of my seat for several minutes, and I succumbed and let her play games on my cell phone. The traffic on the freeway crept along and then came to a stand-still.

“I have to go potty.”

“Hang in there, hon.” I massaged a knot in my neck. “We’ll be at your school soon.”

When I dropped her off in her classroom, I gave her a hug and then turned to go. Tia sobbed and clawed at the air for me to hold her, but the teacher intercepted. I slipped out.

Back in the car, I took in a deep breath and then exhaled. Why were we doing this again? We hadn’t expected it to be easy when we signed up to be a host family for Safe Families for Children. But this morning had cranked up my blood pressure. And my patience was still sitting back on our front steps.

My heart rate settled back into a normal range, and I returned home to face my work deadline.  At 10:00 a.m., the phone rang. The social worker from Tia’s school.

“Tia’s mom wants the girls back today. In fact, she’s coming to pick up Tia from school in an hour.”

The next phone call came from Safe Families for Children. They relayed the same information, and just like that, the placement was over. What I had thought would be a month or more commitment had shrunk to four days. Four chaotic days.

I threw a load of the girls’ laundry into the washing machine and collected things they had strewn around the house. While I packed, the guilt seeped in. Maybe I should’ve given up the van fight and let Tabitha stay home with me. Maybe I should have hugged Tia longer when I left her at pre-school. Maybe I should have cut out the busyness of our home over the weekend and kept our days quiet. I had hoped to get past the initial rough patch and move on to smoother waters as the weeks with the girls passed. But we had been given only four days. Four difficult days.

Like Tabitha’s feet kicking the bedroom wall, my thoughts pummeled me. The girls had struggled during their stay, we had stumbled through in flawed service, and what we had given didn’t seem to help their mother. In fact, she was annoyed the organization had stepped in when she was at her lowest point. And so the girls—still shattered—returned home, their time with us having disturbed their lives once again. Had the four days counted for anything? After the refining fire burned away my shortcomings and impatience, would there be any gold left?

“Life isn’t about us.” I had preached that mini-sermon to my girls countless times. But my desire for stability for Tabitha and Tia, for a satisfying performance for us, and for eternal gold for our efforts had all kinds of me written all over it.

I sought out a friend, hoping to grab onto her wisdom. I told her about our four days and my smashed intentions of returning healthier children to their mother. I told her they might even be worse off now with the disruption of the short time in our home. And I told her I was sure none of it would count for anything on the other side.

“You did the thing that was put in front of you; you were faithful. Now give away those days—the good, the bad, and the lacking. Lay it all down as a gift. He can turn it into gold.”

I went home and gathered up the four days. I wrapped up my exasperation at the girls’ behavior, my hopes for their tidy healing on my clock, and my good intentions that fell short. Then I walked into the living room to that familiar place in the middle of the rug that I always go to when I’m at the end of myself. And I laid that gift down.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Guns and gas

One day two weeks ago, I snatched October’s fading sunlight and bustled out to clean up some of the flower beds. My purple heirloom tomato plant had exploded into a messy bush when I wasn’t looking. Now I was tired of it tumbling everywhere—no cage strong enough to support it—so I decided to dig it up and pick its fruit before the frost stole everything. I discovered it had a two-inch-thick trunk, though, so I headed to the garage for the branch clipper and a shovel.

Just then, a police car crept through the alley. Another one followed. Then a third squad car rolled through and stopped next to our driveway. Two officers emerged—in no great hurry—and one of them pointed toward the north.

I sauntered back to my job of chopping down the tomato plant. Once I had hacked through its woody stalk, I sat on the ground and plucked all the green tomatoes; they could ripen later in the warmth of the house. When I was done digging up the plant’s stump, I dragged the load of branches to the fire pit, and then glanced over to the alley. The two police officers still stood near their car—making small talk, it seemed—their eyes trained on something north of us.

Finally, I strode through the gate toward them.

“Can I ask what’s going on?” I framed it more as a statement than a question.

One of the men nodded. “Just some kids with what we think is a pellet gun.”

“Okay. Thanks.” I turned to go.

The officer stepped onto our driveway. “So, how’s the neighborhood been for you?”

“It’s pretty exciting.” I smiled. “But we like it.”

“I used to have a place in south Minneapolis.” He hooked his thumbs on his belt. “But I had to wear a gun to mow the lawn, so I figured it was time to move the family out.”

“Good idea.”

A voice crackled out a message on his radio. He listened and then turned back to me. “Better take this. Have a good one.”

“You too.”

Driving the girls home from school the next day, I turned onto our street, but saw a fire truck barricading our block, barring access to our house. I put the car into park, hopped out, and approached a firefighter sitting high up in the driver’s seat, his window rolled down.

“What’s going on?” I shielded my eyes from the sun.

“There’s a gas leak on the block. You can’t drive through here.”

I told him my address. “Is it close to my house?”

“Sounds like it.” He rattled off the location of the leak. It was the place our neighbors Jeff and Mary were renovating—two doors down from us. “You can try the alley if it’s not taped off.”

I thanked him, climbed back into the vehicle, and turned into the alley. It was clear, so I parked in the back. Even in the open air, the atmosphere reeked of gas. My mind flitted back to the empty house that had once stood on the corner a block away. One night years earlier, I had been awakened by a loud WOOF. The windows of our house had shaken, and in the morning, we saw the abandoned house had been obliterated—an eyesore erased from the landscape in one fell swoop. Hopefully today would see a better conclusion.

Emergency crews from the fire department and the gas company meandered around the street in front of our house. I spotted Mary and headed over to her.

“We were digging around the foundation and nicked a gas line.” Mary’s voice was calm but worry etched her face. “We should’ve called first.”

“Scary.” I blew out a breath. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

“It’s been quite a week.” She let out a soft laugh and shook her head. “Today the fire department, and yesterday I called the police.”  

“Because of the pellet gun incident?”

Mary raked her fingers through her hair and nodded. “I saw two guys sitting on the hood of a car, holding guns that looked like assault rifles. They kept cocking them. I called 911 because I couldn’t tell they were pellet guns, you know? The police searched the car and found something that they put into a paper bag, and they ended up arresting the guys.”

A supervisor from the gas company approached us. He looked down at Mary’s feet and chuckled.

“You’re out here in stocking feet? Where did your shoes go?”

She grinned. “I left the house too fast.”

He jerked his thumb toward her place. “We were able to crimp the line. You should be good now.”

Then he wandered off and hovered near the other workers while they wrapped up their business.

“Here’s hoping I won’t have to call 911 tomorrow.” Mary sighed. “Twice in one week is enough.”

I recalled the episode in May when the fugitive fleeing from the sheriff’s department crashed his car at the end of our block and scrambled up onto someone’s roof for a three-hour stand-off with the police. I had visited with Mary that day too. And she had warmly invited me in and given me a tour of her house and a glimpse into her life.

“Sometime when we’re not busy with the police, we should have coffee.”

She bobbed her head and smiled. “I’d like that.”

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

The family holiday

“And we’re off.”

I sipped coffee from my travel mug and glanced over at Husband in the driver’s seat. The car’s back seats brimmed with luggage and kids. Ricka and Dicka flanked the car seat, and I tweaked ten-month-old Dontae’s pudgy foot to make him laugh. Safe Families for Children and Dontae’s mother had given us permission to take our little house guest with us on the six-hour road trip to Mom’s place in northern Minnesota. There we would visit my siblings and their families and bask in the magical time between Christmas and New Year’s when the agenda presented nothing more arduous than munching on cookies and frolicking in the snow.

When we arrived at Mom’s, my brother Fred, my youngest sister Flo, and their families wrapped us in hugs. My older sister Coco and her husband Ace pulled up in their fifteen-passenger van, and their eleven kids and one son-in-law streamed out. Even without my sister Olive and her family, the headcount was thirty-one. Each of our girls had a cousin her own age, and the kids scampered off together, shuffling Dontae amongst them. We adults discussed the menu for the upcoming days and each family’s meal responsibilities, and before bed, I prepped the next day’s breakfast.

“Do you have room in the fridge for this, Mom?” I pointed at the three pans of egg bake I had mixed up. “It’s supposed to refrigerate overnight. I’ll bake it in the morning.”

“Just stick it out on a shelf in the garage. It’s cold out there.”

I pulled tin foil over the pans. “But you have a heated garage, right, Mom?”

Mom waved away my concerns. “It’ll be fine.”

We awoke the next day to news about my sister Flo’s husband. He had vomited in the night, but not to worry; he was already feeling better. A couple of days earlier, a stomach bug had ripped through their household, Flo said, and he was the last to succumb.

The egg bake was a success, and we settled into our day. Dontae had been a champion sleeper; the new environment hadn’t thrown him off one bit. The kids smothered him with attention, and he beamed and pumped his chubby legs while they toted him around. The day flashed by with baby time, snowmobile rides, Bananagrams, and Hüsker Dü.

As we cleared away the dinner dishes that evening, one of Coco’s little ones curled up on the couch in the living room.

“My tummy hurts,” he said, his color ebbing away. Coco hustled him out of the room. Ten minutes later, she returned to the kitchen.

“Well, he threw up.”

“Poor thing,” said Mom.

Twenty minutes passed. Someone hollered, and Coco darted from the room again.

“Oh, boy.” She was back, her arms heaped with dirty laundry. “Another one just threw up. Do you have some old towels, Mom? And buckets?”

Mom rushed to the laundry room. Coco, Fred, Flo, and I followed.

“Help yourself to anything you need.” Mom pointed out the place where she stored pails and old towels. Then she stuffed soiled laundry into the washing machine.

Another one of Coco’s kids poked her head into the laundry room. “Mom, I think somebody else is throwing up right now.”

“Oh no.” Coco bolted from the room.

I flung looks at Mom, Fred, and Flo. “I don’t think this’ll end well.”

“Flo’s gonna hold back my hair when it’s my turn,” Fred said with a snigger.

“Yeah.” I smirked. “All your luscious, flowing hair.”

Dicka scrambled into the laundry room—her eyes wild—and tugged me aside. “Mama, I’m scared.” Her face twisted, and she burst into tears. “I don’t wanna throw up.”

“Oh, honey.” I bent down and gave her a squeeze. “You might not.”

Coco stuck her head into the room. “Another one’s down.”

Sobbing, Dicka ran off.

“I’m going to make a list.” I headed to the kitchen, and Flo joined me. I grabbed a notepad and pen off the counter and jotted a title—Vomit Fest 2012—and then the names of the four fallen ones with their approximate times of demise. “This could be fun.”

Then I ran upstairs and located Husband who was reading a book in our bedroom. I briefed him on the stomach flu situation.

“Yeah, I heard.” He raised his eyebrows and sighed. “I mean literally. I heard.”

I wrinkled my nose and gathered my hair into a ponytail. Then I pulled on a pair of tennis shoes. Husband watched me. “Getting ready to do the night shift with the sisters. I can run around faster this way.”

“Nice.” He shot me a half-smile. “Good luck with that.”

I jogged downstairs. Flicka and one of Coco’s girls lay facing each other—and chatting—on two parallel couches in the living room, a bucket stationed by each of them.  

I put my hands on my hips. “Are you guys okay?”

“We’re ready,” Flicka said, and her cousin laughed.

I headed back into the kitchen for an update.

“Two more down.” Flo scrawled the names on my list. “Do you have enough buckets for this, Mom?”

Mom scrubbed her hands at the sink. “Each bedroom has a garbage can, and I have more pails and old ice cream buckets out in the garage. We should be fine. And we’ll keep the washing machine running all night if we have to.”

A thought punched me in the stomach. “Do you think it was the egg bake? The garage didn’t seem cold enough.” I frowned, nibbling my lower lip. “I bet it was the egg bake.”

Mom vigorously shook her head. “It wasn’t your egg bake. Not everyone ate it.” Then she picked up her cell phone, a twinkle in her eye. “Hey, let’s text Olive.” She read aloud as she keyed in a message to my sister—safe and far away in Minneapolis. “‘Wish you were here.’”

I snorted. “We know she doesn’t.” 

As the evening hours passed, the body count rose, and the growing list of names threatened to trail off the page. We sisters scurried around the house and tended to the puking and listless ones. Flo, a nurse in real life too, wore rubber gloves and disinfected toilets and buckets between heaving patients. On my midnight rounds, I found her assisting Fred’s daughter who had stumbled into the upstairs bathroom.

“Fred’s whole family is sick now too.” Flo lifted the toilet seat, and the little girl emptied her stomach into the bowl. “Hand me that towel, would you?”

I pulled a towel off the rack and approached Flo at the toilet. But when I saw my niece’s hair matted with vomit, I gagged.

Flo wrinkled her brow. “Really?”

“I’m sorry. Weird.” I waved away my weakness. “I’ve been looking at vomit all night.”

I backed out of the bathroom and ventured into our family’s room—one of five bedrooms on the second floor of Mom’s house. Ricka had made a bed for herself on the floor, and she snuggled next to a bucket. She was on the verge, she said. Husband slept with a garbage can parked on the end table near his head. The baby snored in his Pack-n-Play. Curled up in her sleeping bag, Dicka wept quietly in a corner of the room, an old ice cream pail poised next to her. 

“Have you gotten sick yet?” I whispered, stroking her hair.

She clutched her pillow, her chin quivering. “No. But I’m afraid.”

“You might be okay.”

She grabbed onto my sleeve. “Would you pray that I don’t throw up?”

“Sure, honey.” I bowed my head. But my stomach roiled, churning dread along with my dinner. “Uh oh.”

The room swirled around me, and I was vaguely aware of the passing hours. Clutch my stomach. Writhe in pain. Dangle my head over a bucket. Repeat. What time was it? Did I have a fever too? I imagined I heard the baby fuss, but someone plucked him from his bed and tiptoed out of our room with him. Someone else handed me a cold can of ginger ale and a bottle of water before I slipped from consciousness. Hours passed. Or maybe days…

I needed to visit the bathroom, so I slithered out of bed and dragged myself out of the room. The mission was grueling but once accomplished, I headed on all fours—in the dark—back to bed. On the way, I bumped into Ricka, creeping along the floor in a low crawl on her way to the bathroom.

Back in bed, I listened to the sounds of the night. In contrast to Ricka’s nearly soundless style, my brother-in-law Ace’s retching pierced the darkness, trumpeting his agony throughout the cavernous upstairs with its vaulted ceiling and wood floors. As if put to a challenge, Husband rivaled Ace’s volume with his own technique. I heard others sputtering out their last remains too. How many of us were left standing? Would we all die? Did it matter? What was the baby’s name again?  

The next morning, nineteen of us were strewn about the house like used dishrags. Wan and stripped of joie de vivre, we sipped water through straws and kept the noise level down. What had happened? Had we traveled hundreds of miles simply to throw up together? Now having blown our allotted vacation days, it was time to plod home.

We gathered our things and carried our weak selves out to the car. We blew bland kisses to all and drove off. I loved the big group of people we had left behind, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to see them all again at the holidays. Under one roof. Sharing the same egg bake—or Norovirus germs. It all left a bad taste in my mouth.

But as we regained strength, I noted a few positives. All of Dicka’s crying had helped; she had somehow escaped the scourge. The girls learned to do a decent impression of Uncle Ace’s vomiting. And we all learned “in sickness and in health” should be reserved for marriages and not family holidays.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Stolen

Husband entered the house, his mouth a straight line. “The garage door must not have closed before we left. It was standing open just now.”

“Really?” I tossed aside the stack of mail I had been flipping through. We had been gone for hours, and all the while, our garage had hosted a free rummage sale for the neighborhood. “Any of your tools missing?”

“No. But two bikes are gone.”

Ricka flew down the stairs from her bedroom. “Whose bikes, Dad?”

“Your sisters’. Yours is still there.”

“Hm.” Dicka shrugged. “I needed a new one anyway.”

Flicka sighed, her shoulders collapsing. “I kinda liked mine.”

Husband nodded toward a foreign bike, ditched in our driveway. “And they left their old one behind.”

I squinted out the window and shook my head. “Lovely.”

Weeks later as I trimmed the grass behind the garage, I thought of the bikes and also the red and yellow solar lanterns that had disappeared a day earlier from the plant hanger in our front yard. Just then, my neighbor Vincent drove through the alley. He waved at me, stopped, and then rolled down his car window. As usual, we tossed a few neighborhood stories back and forth, and I mentioned my missing lights.

“I can check the security cameras,” he said. “Maybe whoever took them passed by my place. It’s a long shot, but who knows?”

Years earlier, Vincent had installed six cheap security cameras from Best Buy and programmed them to cover every inch of his property. To help him narrow his search, I estimated the time of the lanterns’ disappearance.

“I’ll check tonight.” Then shaking his head, he clicked his tongue. “It’s too much, the stuff going on around here. At one point the other day, I looked out at my back yard. I had a hanging flower pot out there—you know, the kind that’s already blooming. Paid $25.00 for it. Anyway, an hour later it was gone. I went back on my cameras’ footage and saw a guy going through the alley like our backyards were a shopping center. He was picking up whatever little things he wanted from anyone’s yards. I saw him take my flowers.”

“No kidding.” I swiped my arm across my forehead.

“I drove around the alleys near here, and sure enough, there was my flower pot in a back yard. So I went to the house, and when the guy answered the door, I said, ‘I saw you on my video camera.’ He didn’t say anything, and so I took my flowers home with me.”

Later that day, Vincent told me he had buzzed through three hours of footage looking for my lanterns, but his searches came up empty.

Another day, returning home from an outing, Husband pulled the car up to the curb in front of our house, and my gaze flitted to our front yard hosta garden.

“Seriously?” I narrowed my eyes, zeroing in on an empty spot. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“What?”

I climbed out of the car and walked to the garden. Someone had removed a plant, patted the soil back into place, and spread the wood chip mulch over its absence. Only the tag—like a tiny grave marker—remained, its text needling me with three facts: my Ligularia ‘Little Rocket’ was really gone; I had purchased it at my beloved Bachman’s; and yes, I had paid the full price of $9.99 for it too early in the season to qualify for any discounts.

This wasn’t the act of a squirrel. I had seen the city rodents’ messy heists before. They scattered crumbs and clues everywhere. Whoever swiped my perennial knew a thing or two about plants. Maybe they had noticed it was different from the rest—the only kid “doing his own thing” amongst a choir of hostas. Maybe they had admired its jagged, dark green leaves and golden blooms like I had. And maybe they had strolled by several times before finally uprooting it and taking it home.

For a while, dark thoughts bruised my upbeat opinion of the neighborhood. But our stories were trivial compared to the neighbors’. On Christmas Day one year, someone trashed Dallas’ back door and lifted his TV from the living room. Another time, a thief slithered in through Glenda’s porch window and absconded with her laptop, digital camera, a diamond bracelet, and both her mother’s and great-grandmother’s wedding rings. No one had snatched our electronics or heirlooms. We had lost only some small things—bikes, lanterns, and a plant—that make life sunny and threaten to sour our attitudes when they’re taken away.

I tried to force the neighborhood thefts into a lesson for the girls. They shouldn’t take things that weren’t theirs, but they already knew that. What else could I tell them? “Don’t steal someone’s joy. Give compliments when they’re due”? Or, “Don’t steal someone’s time. Be punctual”? But those loftier lessons didn’t apply. Instead, I spoke to my audience of three, pinpointing one of life’s simple, hard facts: “Some people steal things.”

For a while, the memories of missing stuff robbed my thoughts, but eventually, louder truths broke in: no lives on our block had been stolen; the decent ones in the neighborhood far outnumbered the thieves; and we shared our corner of the city with good people—and their security cameras and empathy.

We tried to hold our possessions more loosely. But we also learned to make sure the garage door stayed shut when we left the house and to transfer the pretty things out of the front yard. Because sometimes removing temptation helps.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Roots

One day in late summer, I drove Ricka to one of Lake Calhoun’s beaches for a high school volleyball event. Instead of scurrying off for errands, I decided to savor the lake until she was done. The wait coaxed me into smell-the-roses mode, so I set out to log some steps on my pedometer.

I strode at a brisk clip, rounding the east side of Lake Calhoun. The promise of school had leaked into summer, staining its last weeks with a melancholy wash of responsibility and duty. Late August’s slanted light pierced the day; the wind had gotten the memo too, and hinted at September as it fluttered me along.

The trees lining the path around the lake reminded me of Dad, a conservationist, who during his lifetime planted over 50,000 trees in northern Minnesota. But Lake Calhoun’s trees were old, sturdy pillars—far from the tender poles I had watched Dad plant when I was young.

As I spanned the north side of the lake, one tree captured my attention. Something had eroded its base, wearing away its dirt and exposing its roots. But the tree—still stout and strong—stood its ground, drawing its nourishment from somewhere deep.

Living life with the roots showing.

My octogenarian neighbor Charlie had known hardship in life—and in the neighborhood. On several occasions, someone stole his car, and each time, his staid response rattled me.

“Those people don’t know any better.” His body was worn, and compassion seeped through his words.

I scowled and shook my head. “Shame on them for making your life hard, Charlie.”

“Bless your heart.” Then his pointer finger wobbled in the air. “But it’ll be okay.”

Not satisfied, I crossed my arms. “I hope the cops find them. Horrible people.”

But no leaves of malice grew on Charlie’s tree, and little by little, his roots began to show.

Dad’s cancer years washed away the superficial dirt of his busy life. And damaged bone marrow eroded his obsession with punctuality and precision, performance and productivity.

“You can’t ask for better kids.” Decision shored up Dad’s words. He adjusted himself in the hospital bed, the yellowed whites of his eyes another sign of the deterioration at work in his body. “They’re just right, those girls of yours.”

“I know, Dad,” I said, still striving, because life hadn’t swept away my soil yet.

Patience mottled the leaves on Dad’s tree, and his now visible roots reached deeper.

For years, I watched from a distance as my friend Evie’s marriage eroded. Her husband chipped away at her sanity, persuading her she was incompetent. At last, she learned she lived in a house of secrets, and her skin erupted in hives. Worry for her children’s safety pummeled her peace. The miles between us sickened me, but I couldn’t have fixed her life even if she had lived next door.

During our frequent phone calls, I paced the living room.

“Prison would be too good for him,” I said, clenching the phone in my hand. I kept my voice low; my own little ones played in the other room.

“There’s a lesson for us in this somehow.” Evie’s voice quavered on the other end of the line. “I’m just waiting to find out what.”

Before her marriage dissolved, one crisis after another crashed in like waves, wearing Evie away. I thought she would disappear altogether, but then I saw her roots, and they twisted—strong and resilient—down deep.

Battered by racism, crime, and finally illness, Charlie’s roots grounded him and showed the rest of us the anchored life. As Dad stood at the end of his days, the mundane sloshed away, and his roots pointed to the Source. And Evie’s life—running deeper than her circumstances—tapped into the Living Water, and she stood firm.

He is like a tree

planted by streams of water

that yields its fruit in its season,

and its leaf does not wither.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Newport Trail

“Have you heard of the Newport guy?” a friend asked me as we visited at a neighborhood garage sale. “He takes pictures of empty Newport cigarette packages he finds on the ground and turns them into art. You should blog about him sometime.”

I nodded. “That’s a good idea.”

The Newport guy had posted his work on the north Minneapolis Facebook pages to raise awareness about littering. His real name was Paul Tietjen, and his camera lens captured apathy crumpled up in the wayward cigarette wrappers he photographed. I contacted him to find out more.

“Bring your husband and come over to our harvest party,” he said. “I’ll show you my work.”

On the evening of the party, Husband and I drove the five blocks to Paul Tietjen’s house. He and his wife Danielle slipped away from their guests and swept us into a gracious welcome.

“Have some homemade kombucha.” Danielle indicated bottles on a small table, and then she gestured across the yard. “And there’s the food. Please make yourselves comfortable.”

The back yard dripped with strung lights, a velvet couch and soft chairs formed a visiting space near the garage, and candles speckled the long rustic table—set up along the fence—that beckoned the guests to rest and savor the food harvested from the community garden that snuggled up next to their lot.

Paul told us about their thirteen years in the neighborhood and then whisked us inside the house to the living room where his art resided.

“Each collage is called Newport Trail, but the whole series is named #YesIPickedUp, because people always ask me that.” He tossed out a light laugh, then brought out some collages of photos and propped them up against a coffee table. Each frame contained sixteen snapshots of empty—and sometimes rumpled and dirty—Newport packs.

I crouched to examine the photos. “How did you come up with this idea?”  

“I started to see garbage on the streets and sidewalks on my way to work each day, and I noticed one thing over and over: empty Newport cigarette packs. So, I decided to go for a walk, photograph a Newport package whenever I saw one on the ground, pick it up, throw it away, and at the end of the walk, make a collage of the pictures.” More frames with photos leaned against another wall. “That first walk turned into more. And I decided to create photo collages over the course of ten walks.”

No matter which direction in north Minneapolis he strolled, Paul could collect at least sixteen discarded Newport packs within thirty minutes. And each time was the same: he’d take a snapshot, scoop up the empty pack, throw it away, and keep going.

“There’s a lot of littering going on.” I raised my eyebrows. “And smoking.”

Paul nodded. “And it brings up a lot of questions. If you’re a smoker, you have a place on you—like a pocket—for your pack of cigarettes. And you carry it around until you’re done with it. Why throw it on the ground? Why not carry the empty package until you’re near a garbage can at the place where you’ll buy your next pack?”

Over a number of months, Paul had posted his photos online, and his work sparked interest in the neighborhood. Soon others chronicled their own Newport garbage findings. And when they hunted for the littered cigarette packages, they noticed other trash too, and it became impossible for them to leave it on the ground. But while many people in north Minneapolis awakened to the reality of the trash around them, not everyone cared.

While driving him to work one day, Paul’s wife Danielle stopped at a red light. Together they watched an old man with a cane cross the street in front of them.

“An empty soda bottle blocked the old man’s path, and so he shoved it along with his cane to the other side of the street, even though it was a big effort for him,” Paul said. “A garbage can sat at the end of the crosswalk, near a bus stop.”

“So, he picked up the bottle and threw it away?” I asked.

“He pushed it up the curb with his cane and then poked it into some bushes next to the garbage can.”

“Wow,” said Husband.  

“Why would a community be so apathetic about living with garbage instead of picking it up? What does that say about human nature?” Paul fixed his gaze on us. “And what garbage do we put up with in our own lives?”

I stared at the photos of trash he had caught under glass. Garbage in our own lives.

Later, on our drive home, the streetlights highlighted the remnants of other people’s lives dotting the road, and I saw it: dissatisfaction wadded up in burger wrappers, brokenness brimming from fast food bags, and soul sickness stuffed inside old beer cans. A trail of need scattered out onto the street.

Paul’s art holds up a magnifying glass for some; for others, a hand mirror. He reflects the truth about life and trash for those who dare to look and do something about it. The beginnings of transformation. Because when real change comes, the garbage goes away.

*Paul Tietjen’s Newport Trail photo collection was featured at the State of the Garbage Compost Summit hosted in north Minneapolis on August 18, 2015. He also hopes to submit his collection to local art shows, businesses, and community centers around north Minneapolis.

The tooth fairy

“The tooth fairy forgot to come last night. Again.” Six-year-old Dicka frowned as she delivered the news to me in the kitchen one morning.

“Oh no. And she was late last time too.” I shot a look at Husband who made a beeline for the coffee pot. “But I’m not surprised. She’s pretty spacey.”

A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “Sure, Mama.”

“I’ll call and remind her.” I stirred cream into my coffee. “She’s busy, though. You might have to leave her a note tonight.”

With her tablet and pen, Dicka nestled into a living room chair and drafted a letter. Looking over her shoulder, I skimmed the note. After a brusque salutation, Dicka had chided the tooth fairy for her oversight and then ended the stern letter with a list of questions.

“Good.” I patted her shoulder. “Now you’ll get your answers.”

Dicka flicked me a skeptical look. “I hope she writes back.”

The next morning, she clambered downstairs with a grin and a piece of paper she shoved into my hands. The tooth fairy had replied, responding to each of Dicka’s questions in flowery penmanship. The letters were so decorative even the serifs had serifs—and curls. Calligraphy on steroids.

Dear Dicka,

Sorry for the delay. I just had a baby girl two days ago. Her name is Crystalina. She weighs 3 ounces.

Love,

Tooth Fairy

“I’m gonna write her another letter.” Beaming, Dicka scampered off with her note pad.

“You better leave it out somewhere obvious, so she doesn’t forget again,” I called after her.

The next morning, Dicka zipped downstairs to the kitchen to show me the tooth fairy’s latest correspondence.

I glanced at the note while I fried eggs. “Nice.”

In the letter, the tooth fairy said her real name was Graciella and her husband’s name was Crispin. But the sparse information wasn’t enough for Dicka, so she hustled off to write yet another letter. After some days, though, the notes trickled off as other distractions swept away Dicka’s interest in her magical pen pal. Then another tooth loosened, and her fascination was reignited.

“What does the tooth fairy look like?” Dicka tugged at her newest loose tooth.

“She has frizzy blonde hair, big round glasses, wings, of course. And she always wears denim overalls for some reason.” I shrugged and then cupped my hand to my mouth in a stage whisper. “And truth be told, she’s a little crazy.”

“She’s a nut job,” Husband added from the other room.

Dicka twisted her tooth. “How does she get into the house?”

“She tells me when she’s coming, and I let her in.”

“Through a window?”

I tipped Dicka’s head back to peer into her mouth. “Sure. Because she’s small, you know.”

“How small?”

“Like this.” I held my hands a foot apart.

With a jerk, Dicka plucked her tooth free, her eyes bright with success. “I’m gonna go and write her a note now.” She dashed from the room.

But the next morning, we all discovered the awful truth: once again, the tooth fairy had forgotten.

“Shame on her.” I shook my head and planted my hands on my hips. “I guess you have to leave the note in a more visible place. She’s scatterbrained.”

Dicka tilted her head, sizing me up. “Mom, I know it’s you.”

“Me?” I splayed my hand on my chest.

“You’re the tooth fairy.” But uncertainty played at the edges of her words.

Ricka jumped into the conversation. “Remember when I lost a tooth in Mexico? El Raton brought me two pesos.”

“That’s ‘rat’ in Spanish.” Flicka snickered. “A rat brings you money.”

Dicka frowned. “Why couldn’t our tooth fairy bring the money to Mexico?” 

“It wasn’t in her jurisdiction,” I said. “Kind of like when police officers have to cover just one part of a city. El Raton works down there. Ours works up here.”

“Oh.” Dicka nodded, bunching her lips to one side.

Early one morning, I bolted out of bed, shaken awake by the memory of the tooth eleven-year-old Dicka had planted under her pillow the night before. Within minutes, I would have to awaken her for school. By now, the tooth fairy’s forgetful reputation in our house was well-established. But even though her shoddy performance was expected, it was still inexcusable. I devised a plan, grabbed some change, and crept up the stairs to Dicka’s bedroom.

In one seamless move, I slid my hand under her pillow, deposited the coins, and doled out a wake-up hug. “Good morning, honey.”

Shrewd as ever, Dicka dug under her pillow and then flashed me a half-smile. “Ha! It’s you.”

“Okay, okay. I confess.” I sat on the edge of her bed and sighed. “The tooth fairy called me last night. She couldn’t make it in the rain, so I told her I’d deliver the money. You caught me doing her a favor.”

Dicka laughed and shook her head. “Oh, Mom.”

The tooth fairy doesn’t come often anymore. But when she does have business at our house, she knocks on the kitchen window, I open it, and she bumbles her way in, usually scuffing her wings on the refrigerator as she adjusts her glasses and gets her bearings.

And when she forgets or has other obligations, I’m happy to help. Because that’s what moms do.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Happy first birthday, My Blonde Life!

It's my blog's first birthday, so today we're celebrating! Enjoy some pictures from the neighborhood taken this past year. (Almost all of the photos are connected with a blog entry. You can find the title and publication date in parentheses under each photo. Blog entries by date here.) Subscribers: If you have trouble viewing these images, click here.

Some views of the cinder block wall. ("Foundation", August 20, 2015.)

Our pit bull. She's stubborn, but she's spoiled. ("Lala", February 5, 2015.)

Oh, the adventures in the evidence room! ("Terrance Donaldson: Part 2", April 16, 2015.)

Some sweet graffiti. Wish I had snapped a picture before starting to scrub away the heart on the right. ("Garbage", March 19, 2015.)

Carrying the baby. No corresponding blog; just a beautiful scene on the Northside.

My painting entitled "Welcome", 1' x 3' ("Rachelle", October 30, 2014.)

Spending time with our little house guests at an art event. And a blurry time was had by all. ("The littles", April 2, 2015.)

Moe, our hair stylist, working her magic on Flicka. ("Missing", May 21, 2015.)

An interesting find in our garbage can one day. But the story that came before...

With Husband in Quebec City, Quebec, 2015.

Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka selling lefse before KARE 11 showed up. ("The lefse stand", August 6, 2015.)

Oh, that ice cream truck and its Christmas music! Ricka and Dicka buying a treat in 2015. ("The corner stores", December 11, 2014.)

The driveway art. We've learned spray paint lasts longer than chalk. ("Boundary lines", April 30, 2015.)

Kay G Wilson's street ministry. ("Bullies: Part 3", September 10, 2015.)

Bullies: Part 3

Kay G abandoned the home he had known for three months—the bench in Loring Park—and set out to fight for the Twin Cities. He resurrected Hope Ministries, a street outreach he had first started in Chicago. He ventured out to circulate among the roughest neighborhoods in Minneapolis and St. Paul, stretching out his arms to pray over street corners and people.

“Give the drugs a break and come over here,” Kay G called through a bullhorn to the drug dealers, pimps, and prostitutes milling about on Franklin Avenue in south Minneapolis. “I know where you’re coming from.”

But they had seen him before, and so they ran away. Because sometimes love is frightening.

The locals eyed Kay G’s work. “He’s turning the dope spot into a hope spot.”

And law enforcement watched him blasting out words of healing on some of the worst corners in town.

“If we ever needed you, God, we need you now,” Kay G cried out into the streets as traffic whizzed by.

The officers saw him performing vigils and memorials for victims of violent crimes in the inner city; they showered him with accolades. And he counted the police as his best friends.

But one day in 2007, Kay G’s heart nudged him to return to Chicago—his home and the birthplace of Hope Ministries. So, in his apartment, while his seven-year-old daughter played in the bedroom, he packed his bags, and then strode to the living room to watch TV. He settled into a chair and flipped on the news.

“When four young men were turned away from a house party on 33rd and Humboldt Avenue in north Minneapolis, they shot at least a dozen times, accidentally killing fourteen-year-old Charez Jones…”

Kay G lowered his head. He had heard violent news stories all too often and followed them into the homes of the victims’ loved ones where he prayed with them. But this time, a father in Minneapolis had lost his daughter. Tears washed away Kay G’s plans for Chicago. The thought of his own girl—alive and breathing in the next room—pierced his heart. He stood up and went to her.

“What, Daddy?” She studied his face, her eyes wide. 

Kay G brushed away his tears, picked her up, and carried her to the living room. He sat down with her. "A young girl was shot and killed. They just said it on TV." He cupped her face in his hands. “Baby, you have to help Daddy unpack. I’m not going anywhere.”

After that, Kay G visited Guy Jones, Charez’ father, and stuck with him day after day, propping up the grieving man when he couldn’t stand by himself. In those early days, Guy started a foundation in his daughter’s name, but it was birthed out of pain, and his daily tears blurred his vision. Kay G took up the load and carried the foundation for Guy, and a visit to Charez’ grave each year bolstered his mission to keep preaching on the city's street corners.

On a summer day in 2011, fourteen-year-old Quantrell Braxton was found shot in a north Minneapolis street. Days later, Kay G and three dozen men, women, and children from various churches gathered on the four corners of Broadway and Lyndale in north Minneapolis to remember Quantrell and to pray for a death to violence.

Always on guard for bullies, Kay G scanned the area. Yards away, he spied some teenagers—a guy and three girls—hanging out together at a nearby gas station. At each passing city bus, the guy threw up gang signs.

Kay G shook his head. “That kid needs prayer.”

He motioned for the boy to join them, but the teen ignored him. After a while, the sun sank, and Kay G frowned at the fading daylight. Concerned for the safety of the group, he called for the prayer warriors to come from their spots and gather all together on the bus stop corner.

“Let’s all pull in close and lock arms while we pray,” one man said.

Expand the circle!

“No,” Kay G told the group. “We should hold hands and make the circle bigger.”

The group did as Kay G said. Then he looked over at the teen at the gas station as the kid made another gang sign—this time at a passing car. The boy’s face shifted, though, and his cocky expression morphed into a look of fear. The three girls with him made a beeline for the bus stop where Kay G and his people stood. The boy darted looks around him as he followed them. Soon, the four teenagers hovered near the prayer group. Kay G lowered his head to pray, and in that second, a young man—with a gun—sped by on a bike.

POP! POP! POP! Eight close range gunshots blasted through their circle, and everyone dropped to the ground—except for Kay G. A scream shredded the air. One of the girls from the gas station collapsed into his arms. Unscathed, the gang sign guy sprinted off.

“I’m gonna die!” The girl wailed, blood soaking her clothes. “They shot me! I’m gonna die!”

“No, you’re not.” Kay G carried her to his car, begging God for her life with every step. He yelled back to the group. “Call an ambulance. Now!”

A bullet had grazed one of the men in the prayer group, and the girl—wounded by a gunshot to her hip—later had surgery and recovered. But the rest of the men, women, and children were unharmed. The bullets had zinged between them—through their widened circle—and they were saved.

Over the years, Kay G developed a herniated disc, and in early 2014, the condition stole his ability to walk. The searing pain landed him in the hospital, and there he awaited surgery. But thoughts of his ministry called to him, and so he phoned his boss to come and drive him home. The man did as he said and carried Kay G from the car up to his second-floor apartment.

But minutes later, after his boss had left, someone called, alerting him to the news: A duplex fire had claimed the lives of five children belonging to a single father in north Minneapolis.

"Lord, I have to get to him." Kay G crawled to his walker, pain tearing through his body. He struggled down to the first floor and drove his truck through snowy streets to the man's house for the vigil. In the freezing cold, he prayed for the father who had lost so much. 

Every day in the city, Kay G ministers to those who are empty and mourning. No guns, knives, or bulletproof vests. He doesn’t have money either—or a big church with a beautiful choir. But with the authority of God, he speaks Truth over the bullies of homelessness, prostitution, drugs, gangs, and violence. And he brings his church—and hope—wherever he goes.

The Star Tribune's documentary of Kay G's ministry: https://www.facebook.com/hatin2krazy/videos/224214997630105/?pnref=story 

"The Message from the Park Bench": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVWmiD6hzzU&feature=share

Follow Kay G on these two Facebook pages: Kay G Wilson and ALL LIVES MATTER MPLS, MN. 2015

*Kay G Wilson is a friend to north Minneapolis, mentor/international peace activist, founder and president of Hope Ministries, spokesman for the Charez Jones Foundation, co-facilitator of Criminals and Gangs Anonymous (CGA) Minneapolis, founder of 500 Man Peace March Minneapolis, spokesman for United in Peace, Inc., Minnesota, and humble servant of Jesus Christ.  

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Bullies: Part 2

Kay G’s weak legs carried him into the center of the circle. He shot a look around him. The students hollered. Were they cheering for him? He spied Charmaine, tucked into the throng of onlookers. His breath caught. He had liked the girl for years—had admired her from a distance—and now she watched him back.

BAM! Tuffy delivered a kick to Kay G’s stomach, and he bunched over in pain. He had to keep his eye on the bully—not the crowd pressing in around him. Focus. Focus! He straightened to his full height, his fists now pulled up to his face. He recalled his foster brother’s instructions: Put him in a headlock and don’t let go!

As Kay G faced his enemy, the truth seeped in: he cared more about others than he did about himself. And this fight wasn’t only about him. He would battle for all the bullied and abused ones who were too weak to protect themselves. This new purpose washed fresh courage over Kay G. He lowered his gaze, zeroing in on his mission.

Narrowing his eyes, Tuffy stared back, twisting his face while he bounced from one foot to the other. Then he threw a jab at Kay G’s face and caught him on the side of the head. The sting of impact injected Kay G with a surge of energy, and he thought of the jeering biblical bully taking on a small shepherd boy. No matter how much he had grown over the summer, he was still the little guy facing his own giant—and the giant of them all.

Put him in a headlock! He threw an arm around Tuffy’s neck, but the bully slithered out of his grasp. He barreled toward Tuffy and slung an arm around him again. This time, Kay G seized him. The crowd screamed—and so did the memory of his brother’s words: Don’t let go! Kay G squeezed the boy’s head between his forearm and shoulder. Tuffy flailed, but like a mouse caught in a trap, he was stuck fast. Kay G tightened his grip. Then his gaze darted to his favorite spot in the crowd. But what was that look on Charmaine’s face? Disgust? Disappointment?

Kay G bore down until his arm was slick with his opponent’s saliva, tears, and mucus, and his thrashing had subsided. He at last released the boy with a shove, and the bully stumbled, coughing and sputtering. Breaking through the ring of students, Tuffy skulked off. The crowd hooted and cheered. Kay G’s arms flew up into the air, and a smile split his face.

His victory that day on the playground in sixth grade reset his course, and after that, Kay G became the protector of all the kids.

Back in his foster home, though, Kay G’s adversaries didn’t recognize his new titles of either victor or protector, and life trudged forward, each season offering the same things it always had. Twice a year—on his birthday and at Christmas time—hope plagued him, and his foster mom allowed him to enter the normally forbidden front room with its plastic-covered furniture. He perched on the sofa before the vast picture window and stared out onto the street as cars zipped by. Maybe one of them would bring what he wanted more than anything else in the world.

Kay G’s foster mom bustled into the room like she did every year—with her notepad and pen—and approached him at his post.

“Now remember, you can’t get what you always ask for.” Poising her pen above the paper, she crushed his dreams with her eyes. “But you can get toys and games. What’ll it be this year?”

He stared out the window. “I want my mom to come and get me.”

Even a victor wants his mother, and Kay G forgave her, even though she had thrown him away, choosing drugs over him and leaving a pit in his life. When he had collided with Jesus at church as a small boy, he had thought God would fill up that hole in his heart, but the space remained. And the emptiness cried out.

One day, after the boys in the foster home had punched him and bloodied his nose, Kay G ran away. Alone on the streets of Chicago, he spotted a group of guys in blue, smoking, talking, and laughing together like brothers. Why were they so happy? He watched their banter and then at last approached them.

“Can I be in your family too?”

The guys zinged looks back and forth between them. One of them took a drag on his cigarette, exhaled, and shrugged.

“Yeah, little man.”

Kay G had always clung to the ideas of Martin Luther King, Jr. and his dream of becoming a preacher. But his new family that day—the Black Disciples—showed him how to hurt people. And his heart twisted him in two directions. He ached for his real mother and for a future as a preacher with a beautiful choir. He fought for the innocents at school, but in the gang, he became the bully. The gang told him he was a part of something, and they showed him the bottle. And the alcohol blurred his memories and dulled his pain, but it didn’t mute the reality of his infected life. And the drinks and drugs didn’t quell his suffering—or his desire to be a preacher.

Years passed, and after being used up by the bullies of alcohol, drugs, and gangs, twenty-four-year-old Kay G remembered the calling he had heard on the playground in sixth grade: he would be a protector of those too weak to protect themselves. Facing his giants, Kay G started Hope Ministries, a street outreach for prostitutes, drug users, and gangbangers in Chicago, and he poured himself into the endless work.

But life’s path trips us when we look down at our feet.

Distracted and again lost in the dark, Kay G fumbled to the end of himself. When God didn’t answer his prayers to let him die, Kay G tried to be his own answer. But he survived himself and kept breathing anyway. Finally, his burdens dragged him out for one last walk and dropped him onto a bench in Minneapolis’ Loring Park.

“God, let me die.” The same cry that had come from the closet in his childhood home to the same God who had kept him alive.

After three months on that park bench, Kay G had melded with nature, and the squirrels used him as their landing pad.

“God, let me die.” Kay G breathed and slept. Slept and breathed. Finally, jarred awake by the unseen One, he looked up at the clouds. “How did I get here?”

You took your mind off Me.

He rolled over, weak with hunger. “Why me?”

You were chosen yesterday for today.

Kay G’s eyes brimmed with tears. “If You give me the strength to get off this bench, I promise I’ll serve You till the day I die.”

Strength rippled through his body, and he sat up. He would stay alive now, because there was work to do.

*Tune in next week for the conclusion of the story about the life of Kay G Wilson, friend to north Minneapolis, mentor/international peace activist, founder and president of Hope Ministries, spokesman for the Charez Jones Foundation, co-facilitator of Criminals and Gangs Anonymous (CGA) Minneapolis, founder of 500 Man Peace March Minneapolis, spokesman for United in Peace, Inc., Minnesota, and humble servant of Jesus Christ.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Bullies: Part 1

“You’re the ugliest child I’ve ever seen.” She assessed the boy with narrowed eyes, slicing the air with her words. “I see why your mom didn’t want you.”

Of all eleven boys in the foster home in Chicago, Kay G was the youngest. And the ugliest too. Or at least that’s what his foster mom said. While she sold wigs and costume jewelry in the shop each day and his foster dad worked his job at the post office, little Kay G was left at home with the ten older boys. They hated him. He was only five years old when his brothers punched him in the face for the first time and locked him in a closet.

“God, let me die.” He groaned the prayer in that dark, small space.

The next time the brothers dragged him to the closet, they dumped a jar of bugs onto his head first, before shutting him up in the dark with the crawly creatures.

Again, his prayer punctuated the darkness. “God, let me die.”

Another time, they tied him to a pole in the basement and beat him.

“Take me to work with you,” he begged his foster dad. “I’ll be quiet and even sit in the truck all day.”

“You’re okay.” The man looked at Kay G with soft eyes, patting him with a tender hand. But since he didn’t know what lurked in his own house, he left the little boy home again with his older brothers.

Each night, Kay G’s foster mom made him kneel by the bed and recite his prayers.

“Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.” Then the boy scrambled into his bed and pulled up the covers. When the woman left the room, he tossed the blankets aside and slid out of bed, again sinking to his knees on the floor.

“God, this is my real prayer this time.” He squeezed his eyes shut, but tears leaked out anyway. “Don’t let me wake up.”

When Kay G took a bath, the world outside the bathroom door melted away. He positioned his friends—Mr. Bubble and Mr. Potato Head—near him on the bathtub’s ledge.

He rearranged Mr. Potato Head’s features again and again. “There’s no way he’s ugly to me.”

Then he lined up his green Army men—his protectors—in formation on the side of the tub. Their guns were aimed at the door.

One day, Kay G dressed up and went with his foster family to a place called church. Everyone smiled there—even his foster mom and brothers. A powerful man wearing robes stood behind a big box and spoke. As little Kay G listened, peace floated down and settled on him. And in that instant, he knew he was born for it: he was born for love. And more than anything, he wanted to be a preacher with a beautiful choir, and he wanted to heal people.

After the service, smiling women pressed in around Kay G, the new foster kid. “Well, isn’t he the cutest thing?”

But he darted past them and ran as fast as he could to the pastor. He grabbed onto one of the man’s legs and wouldn’t let go.

“Well, hello, little guy.” The man leaned down and patted him on the head. His foster mother scurried over and after yanking on the child, she finally pried him loose.

“What’s wrong with him?” said the preacher, his voice low.

She smoothed her hair and waved away his question with a gloved hand. “That’s how they all act.”

After that day at church, Kay G loved Jesus until his heart hurt. He played preacher back at the house, but everyone hated him even more. And on the school’s playground he had “Foster Kid Disease.” No one came near him. And so he perched on his own slide to watch the other kids play. Sometimes an errant ball flew his way, and he snagged it from the air and kept it. If he had touched it, no one would’ve wanted it back anyway.

In third grade, a kid named Tuffy rose to the top of the bully ranks. Everyone was afraid of him, but he set his sights on Kay G. Tuffy kicked him, punched him, stole his lunch, and grew more demanding each day.

“I don’t like this. I want an apple fruit pie.” His face twisted into a grimace, and he spit out some profanity. “Bring me an apple fruit pie tomorrow.”

The bullying kept on for three years. But during the summer before sixth grade, Kay G became friends with one of his foster brothers and confided in him. His brother gave him a solution: he taught him how to wrestle.

“You gotta stand up to him,” his brother said, his eyes intense.

And when school started again in the fall, that’s what Kay G did.

“Gimme your lunch,” Tuffy said, contorting his face. Just like old times.

“No.” Kay G, now much taller and bigger than Tuffy, pulled his lunch bag to his chest, crossing his arms over it.

The bully’s eyes turned to slits. “What did you say?”

“No.”

“Then we’re fighting out back after school.” He sneered. “You better be there.”

The slow march of the clock on normal school days sped up that day for Kay G. Too soon, the final bell rang, reverberating throughout the neighborhood, announcing the fight to the world. The students stampeded outside in one great herd for the coming attraction and formed a large circle on the playground. In the center of the circle was Tuffy, kicking and chopping at the air, practicing his warm-ups. Back in the classroom, Kay G hovered near his teacher.

“Why are you still here?” She peered at him while squaring a stack of papers into a neat pile.

He snatched some scraps of paper from the floor and threw them into the trash. “I thought I could help you clean up today.”

She furrowed her brow and then glanced out the window at the playground. “What—?” She scuttled closer to the glass and squinted at the scene outside. “Ah, I see.” She turned to Kay G. “You don’t want to fight, do you?”

He shook his head.

She planted her hands on her hips, her eyes wide. “Well, you better deal with him. He won’t quit if you walk away.”

As Kay G plodded the path to the playground, his legs turned soft and his knees wobbled.

“No one’s on my side,” he whispered, swallowing hard.

All eyes were fixed on him. When he at last neared the gathering, the circle of students broke open for him to enter.

*Tune in next week for the continuing story about the life of Kay G Wilson, friend to north Minneapolis, mentor/international peace activist, founder and president of Hope Ministries, spokesman for the Charez Jones Foundation, co-facilitator of Criminals and Gangs Anonymous (CGA) Minneapolis, founder of 500 Man Peace March Minneapolis, spokesman for United in Peace, Inc., Minnesota, and humble servant of Jesus Christ.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Foundation

One day while wandering through the magical world of Pinterest, I saw it: the best retaining wall in the world. I had never seen anything like it. It was constructed of cinder blocks, with some of the blocks turned now and then—jutting out of the wall—for use as planters. The unique idea was us. If we made this wall in our yard, no one would own one quite like it or like it enough to want one. But Husband and I had never been accused of fitting in, and I had long ago lost the taste for it anyway.  

“Check this out.” I showed him images of the cinder block wall. “Isn’t it cool?”

He nodded. “I could do that.”

We proposed the idea to Dallas and Glenda, our neighbors on each side. After all, it would be their wall too. We explained that they wouldn’t have to worry: we would build it but still keep intact the existing chain link fences that separated us. Both neighbors gave their approval, and Dallas even jumped in with both feet, inviting us to go ahead and tear out the chain link between his yard and ours.

The next summer, we ordered the cinder blocks—600 of them—and they were delivered on pallets by semi-truck to the cement slab by our garage. I eyed the stacks of fifty-pound blocks, and hopelessness crept in. Each block would need to be lifted and then transferred—a few at a time—by wheelbarrow as far as sixty feet into our yard.

Husband began the painstaking work of building the wall. He dug an eight-inch trench by hand around our back yard, and after that, shoveled in a layer of sand. Then he laid the first course of blocks, pounding them down with a rubber mallet and checking his work every few minutes with a level. The pace was grueling, the task arduous. As I watched him, I remembered our beginnings. His slow, meticulous work habits had both initially attracted me to him and later shown me my humanity with all of its glaring flaws. Impatience again thrummed inside of me.

After weeks of work, Husband completed the wall—sixty feet long and four feet high—on one side of the yard. At the end, however, he discovered it had gotten out of whack somewhere along the way, and the corner pieces wouldn’t fit properly. He dismantled it all—block by block—and started over. I breathed in slowly through my nose and out through my mouth, forcing my thoughts away from the ordeal in the yard. In the grand scheme of things, did it matter that our project would now span months instead of weeks?

For half the summer, the pallets of cinder blocks obstructed our driveway basketball court, and the neighborhood kids grew antsy.

“I can help you move these into the yard.” Keyondra pointed at the stacks of blocks.

“Sure.” Husband handed her a pair of work gloves, and she dug into the task. Peanut joined in too until the two basketball players had cleared enough space by the garage to once again shoot hoops.

Before Husband was done, the winter snows blustered in and covered the wall. And so we waited. The second summer, he finished the construction on all sides of the yard, each block having been secured with concrete adhesive. Then, he drove rebar down through the blocks’ holes every six feet and reinforced it with cement. Last of all, he topped off the wall with concrete capstones.  

We then hired steel artist Andrew MacGuffie—whose work adorned the Northrup King Building’s landscaping—to install curved steel borders for raised gardens next to our wall. But the snow flew in once more and drifted over our work. And so we waited again. By the third summer, we hauled in dirt and finally planted our gardens, the flowers softening the steel and concrete with their explosive blooms and beauty.

I stood back with my soil-covered hands—unable to peel the smile from my face—and surveyed the sight. Blossoms spilled from the wall’s block planters, and green vines trailed over the edges of the steel borders. Near me, Husband puttered around in the dirt. Three summers of blistering work was his gift to me—simply because I had one day admired some pictures on Pinterest.

I contemplated the man behind the project. Husband lived life like he built that wall: level and grounded with a sturdy foundation, unyielding to the elements, and able to bear a crushing load without crumbling.

“Come here,” I said. He straightened up from potting a celosia and strode toward me. I looped my arm around his waist as we gazed at our land together. “Thank you. It’s perfect.”

I recalled his soil-stained hours and sweat-soaked shirts. Countless loads of blocks, sand, dirt, and trips to Home Depot. Mistakes that cost him weeks. The painful mission of a solid foundation.

He tossed me a half-smile, his eyes soft at the edges. “Hey, no problem.”

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.

Ashes

Over our backyard fence one day in the summer of 2013, my next door neighbor Glenda told me about the tragedy. Gloom shadowed her face.

“Someone set fire to my church last night.” 

The previous night, a couple members of Community Covenant Church—a church of two-hundred people in north Minneapolis—had gone to search for a lost key in a nearby field. Suddenly, they spotted smoke pluming from their place of worship, and they phoned for help.

After the fire was extinguished, the emergency crews discovered arsonists had broken in through a window, doused an accelerant on the beloved grand piano and torched it, leaving it in ashes. The blaze had melted the electronic equipment, damaged the pews, chairs, and altar, and soot blackened the walls. The water the firefighters had sprayed to drown the flames flooded the first floor. The congregants—seventy percent of whom were African American—also found vulgar racial epithets scrawled in spray paint on the building.

Twenty years earlier, the congregation had worked hard to raise the money to refurbish the piano. And the altar, having been found in an alley and rescued from the trash heap, had its own story. Both had been reclaimed—like the lives of the people who attended Community Covenant Church.

I grieved for Glenda—a new member—and for my friends Lynnea, Ivory, and Danielle whose voices rang out in song each Sunday in that house of God. The kids’ Vacation Bible School wrapped up their week the day after the fire, the leaders explaining to the children why they would now have to meet outside on the field next to the church. Lynnea, a Zumba instructor, relocated the church basement’s Saturday morning fitness classes to the Phyllis Wheatley Community Center across the street. And on the same field the VBS kids had used, the congregation gathered for worship the following Sunday.

“A church is not a building,” Pastor Luke Swanson of Community Covenant Church later told news sources. “A church is people.”

Five weeks after the tragedy, Minnehaha Academy hosted the Fire Relief Benefit Concert for the church. Our family sat in the auditorium with Glenda, savoring the choir’s music. Though small in number, its voices were as big as The Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir.

“No matter what the test, whatever comes our way,” the choir trumpeted through song, “with Jesus on our side, we’re gonna make it.”

Pastor Luke stepped up to the mic, his hands rising along with his voice. “We serve a living God. And what I’m told is, He’s pretty good with ashes.”

Swept along by a holy fire, tears stung my eyes.

An outpouring of support raged for the small, inner-city church in a low-income Minneapolis neighborhood. A college preparatory school down the street loaned their building to the homeless parishioners, workers repaired the sanctuary, and someone donated a new piano.

Beauty from ashes.

Two years later, I remembered the fire, along with my friends.

“What was meant for harm, God intended for good,” Danielle told me.

Passion ignited Lynnea’s words. “God’s not tied to a building or our stuff. He’s sewn into our hearts.”

Then Ivory added, her eyes bright, “We were shaken, but our mission is still the same.”

Arsonists had tried to char the church’s message in the 1960s too.

“They didn’t like our congregation then, and there are people who don’t like it now,” Pastor Luke said.

But five decades earlier, evil hadn’t won either. Because like that day in 2013, there’s a Consuming Fire, and an arsonist’s flame is no match for His.

*Miss an installment of the blog? Or want to catch the story from the beginning? Visit http://www.tamarajorell.com/blog-entries-by-date

*Names in this blog have been changed to protect my family, neighbors, and friends in the neighborhood, and in a nod of appreciation to the beloved Swedish author Maj Lindman, I’ve renamed my three blondies Flicka, Ricka, and Dicka.