America's Oldest Children

"My rose is that I love my mom. My thorn is that my dad got locked up." Jackson's eyes were filled with tears. Playing Roses and Thorns was a way to sometimes help the children talk about their feelings, which they rarely did. They usually took their situation - homelessness, missing fathers, addicted mothers, daily shootings in the neighborhood - for granted. Jackson is 7 years old and lives with his mother, who recently realized she was a lesbian, and four other brothers at a transitional housing program in South East D.C. The father, a homeless most of his life, is usually missing or in jail, and the few times I have seen him visit the children he would make it a point to call their mother a "dike" or to take the saved up pocket money from his sons (which usually added up to a few dollars). 

That was the most difficult part of volunteering with homeless children in South East DC, the helplessness of an outsider. Not being able to do something about the way Jackson's father talked about his mother because it was a family matter. Not being able to do anything about 9-year-old Mike's mother who was constantly drugged up on a mixture of pills she invented as a substitute for crack. Not knowing what to say when the kids called each other "nigger". I was and always would be a white privileged outsider and, despite the fact that many of the families overcame this, I am not sure I ever did. Privilege had crippled me. The thought of me proposing solutions to the problems of lives I had never come close to living began to terrify me. 

I decided to be a close friend but at the same time respect that the role of a friend, especially a child friend, is one of a listener, a distractor from daily troubles, a companion. We did many things together, from jumprope to homework. I let go of what I knew of as norms and finally began to see things with a clearer mind. My friends were children, who despite their unique lives, wanted to be treated as children - to be played with, read to, advised on girlfriend/boyfriend troubles. Many people may see this as an attempt to escape reality but no, my friends are not going anywhere, they are sitting right in the epicenter of America's problems. They are just not willing to escape their childhood because of it. 

Working with, serving and learning from DC's homeless children was the most rewarding experience in my life. They unearthed a part of me that nobody else could have. I learned to be positive and playful in all settings. I learned to use the child in me as a way of empowerment, a loll out to foolish obstacles.

The names mentioned in this blog entry are fictional based on real characters.