Fingerprints All Over My Heart
Day 34 (this is long one folks..)
One thing that many people don’t know about me is that I can feel a bit ashamed of my lack of education, my redneck heritage, and my poor white trash status that WILL follow me around despite the hundred pairs of shoes in my closet. Maybe I have that many shoes to fend off the pain I feel from those who look askance at me and my dirty car, or the mess in the garage, or the not so nice house….. whatever! Or maybe I just love shoes! They were collected over many years and most came from clearance racks and thrift stores… and wait a minute! Why the hell should I feel guilty over my shoes for crying out loud? So anyway… leave me alone about the shoes.
I can also carry a lot of pain over the caste system in America… oh, wait? You thought there wasn’t one? Wrong. Try starting to clean houses at the age of 18, and using the sensitive person you are to really love and care for the families that you serve. Try taking care of elderly ladies and being the only one they talk to for hours, days or weeks on end… and then have them dismiss you as “the Housekeeper” or “the Maid” whenever they finally receive a visitor. It is hard to carry the weight of that through a lifetime. But this job gave me a better income than if I had worked as a waitress or some other laborer position and it allowed me to be there for my kids and to pursue midwifery. There has been some true pain there, and some moments of humiliation. For me it can be a difficult part of my story and there are days when I think I will scream if I have to clean another house! Still, being an efficient hard worker is nothing to be ashamed of, nor is being from the south (actually I am damned proud of being from the south so if you don't like rednecks you can kiss my grits!). I am an intelligent woman, I have a strong work ethic and am honest to a fault! And I build deep caring relationships with everyone I work with. I can hold my head up high for the lifetime of work I have produced, and know that along the way I eased someone’s burdens.
Ahhh….. but now….
Meet my friend Beth. She has the most electrifyingly beautiful smile that goes all the way to her eyes. She is friendly, laughs a lot and is always kind and faithful in all her work. I do not know her entire story, but I know that she was sold into human trafficking as a child. She was luckier than some for her owners taught her the skill of being a very good cleaning woman, and a laundress. Beth eases my burdens. She washes my clothes for me. This makes me feel a bit ashamed because I am used to doing my own work (uh, yeah… that is to say that I am used to my washing machine doing my work). She also cleans the birth home several times a week. The floors always shine, and there is not a “dust kitty” to be found in any of the corners… they wouldn’t dare with Beth around! My clothes are always perfectly clean and stain free. I love to carry them back to my apartment and hug them to myself and inhale their fragrance. Maybe you don’t see why that is amazing? She washes them in a bucket out back! She hangs them on a line, and then she lovingly folds them for me just so. My sheets are crisp and smell like sunshine and something indefinable… perhaps it is love. I am always careful to never, ever take her presence in the birth home for granted, or to treat her like she is “less than” because she is a domestic. I am a domestic! When I watched the movie The Help, I couldn’t help but relate to the maids in the story although I am not a black woman, but I have been treated badly because of my lack of education and my redneck status. I have felt at times that there is no way I will ever fight my way out of poverty. Then I came here and learned that I am a rich woman. I am rich even if sometimes I can’t buy my kids shoes, so we get them second hand. I am rich even if I have to clip coupons to make ends meet. I am rich because I know that we have plenty of food in the cupboard and work coming in. Beth lives in a home that is over a city sewer and yet she comes to work everyday looking beautiful with her hair up in a bright clip that matches her blouse. She often has earrings on and she is lovely, clean and fresh. She lives in the poorest conditions and yet like any woman she needs to surround herself with beautiful things, and feel good about herself. I adore her and always greet her with a smile. I often give her a little tentative hug even though I am not sure she is comfortable with such western displays of affection. I am so glad I got to meet her.
Today in the birth room I was the assistant. It was a fast birth and one of the other interns was primary. The mother was young… only 25. She had gone into labor at 11:30 am but then apparently her family never showed up to bring her here so she got outside with her bags and her two little ones who were around 2 and 4. She got a trike to drive her to the base of the hill but he would take her no further. A stranger saw her distress (another woman who has also given birth here) and got another trike to get her up the hill. We got her in the door and for a few contractions it looked like we would have a sala birth. I cannot even imagine how brave this mama must be to load herself and two little ones into a public conveyance and try to get to us by herself! To the stranger who helped her: GOD BLESS YOUR BEAUTIFUL HEART! Then that stranger stayed and helped mind her little ones until after the birth. I suppose you are wondering why this simple sweet little birth story has appeared here at the end of my story about Beth. Well this birth is what inspired me to tell Beth’s story as well as this mama’s story… or at least what I suspect her story may be. You see, after the birth I was helping to clean some blood and vernix off of this mama’s hands… Oh God! Her HANDS! I literally stopped and looked at her chart again. She really was 25. Her hands looked and felt like an ancient old woman’s. This means that this young, young mama had worked somewhere, probably as a domestic for most of her teenage years and adult life for sure. I went back to cleaning her hands and I looked at my hands against the backdrop of hers. I saw a tear fall onto the cotton ball soaked with alcohol that I was using to remove the blood. My hands, as worn and calloused as they are, still looked better than hers and I am almost twice her age. I stared at the tear as it soaked into the cotton and all I could think of was the woman in the bible who washed Jesus’ feet with her tears. Another tear fell and splashed onto the back of her hand. She looked at her hand and then up at me with questioning eyes. She saw my tears. I smiled at her as brightly as I could and then I carefully turned the cotton ball around so the tear soaked side was against her hand and gently finished cleaning her dear, tired, scarred hands and silently said a little prayer of blessing over her. Oh Lord, please help me remember that no matter how tired I am, there’s someone more tired. No matter how hard I work, someone has worked even harder, and no matter how badly I have been hurt there are those in the world whose suffering I cannot even imagine! Everyone has a struggle, everyone has a story, and behind every smiling face there is most likely some kind of pain. I will remember that as I go through my days. I can count my blessings for they are many. I have a good, good life and am very rich up aside the rest of the world. I hope I never forget that and can always use these lessons to keep my own journey in perspective. Bitterness is an ugly state of existence, so I choose to be grateful instead… and I am! I AM! I am thankful for each person God gives me the opportunity to love… *sigh* …. more fingerprints on my heart!