From the notes in my memo pad

“And your boyfriend?” is a question that I am asked I’d say about once a week, and Luis receives inquiries about his girlfriend as well. Sometimes the question is asked by mistake, just a child forgetting that Luis is my husband and truly wondering where he is if they don’t see him with me. Many other times, though, we are asked even while we’re together, or when we’re already talking about each other with a child. We had a meeting last week with Maria del Mar, the sister here who is in charge of everything related to our specific jobs. She was explaining to us in more detail about one of the most important aspects of our job here—to provide the children with an example of a loving and respectful married couple who are faithful to each other. I know I have mentioned this on our blog earlier, but sitting there in the office, listening to the stories about some of the home situations these children have come from really seemed to sink in this time. Many of the kids here have parents who are openly “with” people other than their spouse, and I can tell you from checking the kids in on Sundays and seeing their name cards, that a good portion of these siblings have different last names. [There are also countless stories of kids who were abandoned or removed from their home as a result of drugs, violence, alcoholism, poverty, or health problems. I seem to repeatedly forget all of this when I allow myself to get really frustrated here.] The commitment that Luis and I were fortunate to have experienced in our own families growing up is not common among Raramuri families, those who come from the Sierras. Most of our kids here are Raramuri. This gives me a great sense of responsibility as we are the only married couple working here at La Granja, and we live here, so there isn’t really much room to hide. She also spoke with us about how important it is to just be with the kids. I was told the same when we first got here, but I didn’t really understand what that meant. On Sunday nights, our most difficult nights, what is really needed from us is to sit with the kids and chat. Chat! I couldn’t believe it because despite my somewhat un-amazing Spanish skills, this is something I can do. Getting forty or so wound-up little boys to shower, put their dirty clothes away, stop fighting with the sheets as weapons, and go to bed has not particularly been one of my best skills, and I usually leave their dorm feeling mean and horrible and just everything but sweet, warm, and welcoming. Maria del Mar said she’s going to try to make sure that we aren’t solely responsible for a dorm so that we can walk around and talk with the kids and just try to ask about their weekends, how they are doing, and provide a bit of the warmth that they need as they transition back into life at La Granja after a weekend that may or may not have been a positive experience for them. This, hopefully, I can do.

If you check out our pictures (link to the right on this webpage) in the album dated 10.6.08, you will see a bunch of pictures from one of the mornings that we took the youngest kids from the kindergarten over to the farm to help Raul. They were thrilled to help, as you can see in their faces. One of the reasons the farm is here is to provide an opportunity to teach the kids here how to care for life. It’s amazing to see how excited they are to see the animals and with what great care they show them when they are holding brand new baby chicks, for example. One of my most challenging students in the afternoon in the first and second grade room is Salvador. The first week that I did check-in on a Sunday I had to leave the desk for a while to go back to the house and change my clothes. I had blood on my shirt and jeans and was still shaking from breaking up a fight in which I’d had to use all my force to hold down a bloody-nosed Salvador. It was pretty freaky for me and when I was finally alone in the house to calm down, I realized just how upset and terrified I was. I had never seen a fight with blood between kids that young—thank you Villa Grove Elementary. The point of this is that Salvador was a real challenge for his first few weeks, new to La Granja, and I had no clue what to do with him or how to handle his aggression. Now, though, I am happy to say I have only witnessed one outburst in the last month. What has changed? He has a deal. He and Karen (who is in charge of his classroom) agreed that he can help Raul at the farm every day after he finishes his homework, if Raul is there and invites him to help (which is pretty much every day, thankfully). It’s amazing. From what I have seen, Salvador takes pride in working on the farm and his time there allows him to get rid of energy in a positive way, as well as spend time with an outstanding adult male role model. If we didn’t have the farm, I don’t even want to imagine what every day would be like with Salvador in our classroom.

In overall news, things are going pretty well for us here. Sometimes I get frustrated because I don’t feel like I am doing enough with my time here, but change is slow and I try to just keep thinking of ideas here and there and hope that my presence is enough to make an impact. We are enjoying the transition into fall weather with cooler mornings and continued sunshine. I receive a lot of warning about how cold winter will be, but it’s difficult for me to really understand between all the differences due to using the Celsius scale to measure exact temperature in addition to the different way cold will feel here in buildings without central heat and few portable heaters. We’ll just have to wait and see.

For now, though, I hope that you are all healthy and happy. Enjoy pumpkin carving season and the annoyance of Christmas decorations already flooding store aisles. Rest assured, they are here as well. We aren’t as far as you may think.
Love, Janiene