Life in a War Zone

When you're living in a war zone, you don't have time to think about the people who have died or your family that you have lost.  Your thoughts revolve around survival.  Finding food. Making it to the next day without being wounded or losing a limb.  Trying to ensure the safety of those still left.  It's only after you leave the zone that you have time to process, to mourn, to release everything.

Yesterday I spent time with the Peace Club kids at Mt. Rainier.  MJ and Becky worked with neighborhood kids to teach them peace skills.  What was fascinating, was how different and yet similar these youth were to the kids from the Sursum Corda neighborhood.  Same age. Same genders.  Both groups love to be silly and loud and exert their energy.  And differences.  Demographic differences such as ethnicity, income, home situation.  But deeper differences, too (not to downplay the other ones).  Differences like, the fact that many of the SC kids live, essentially, in a war zone.  Their lives are on the edge and the concerns of the adults center around things such as finding enough food, having school supplies, making sure that their kids aren't shot, tracking down the necessary health care.  We're talking basics, folks.  And the other kids (who, to be fair, I've only spent 1 hour with) come from 2 parent homes, where they play instruments and have the private music lessons that accompany that. The parents are the earthy-crunchy type, and they live simply, because they can afford to and choose to live simply.

I'm not downplaying the choices of the families with the means to live simply.  Bravo, for modeling a simple lifestyle for your children, for teaching them peacemaking skills at such a young age, for instilling a care for creation and the environment.  But it is not the same as living in a war zone.

We all have our own versions of war zones, and I've recently calmed my life in such a way that I am out of the war zones.  I realized tonight, that once removed, I could mourn.  I could mourn my grandpa's death-- and find that I mourn it almost daily now.  I could mourn the loss of working with my kids at my old job.  I could mourn many other things and work on moving forward.  I could choose to work here and help effect systemic change.  I could choose to live precariously, to struggle with compassion, (feeling with) and to try to build community.

But I couldn't do it while I was still in a war zone.  Peacemaking was much easier to continue to engage in, from outside the chaos, the survival mode, the insanity of the insecurity.