Pulled strings

A volunteer recently wrote that coming to South Africa was both one of the most heart warming and heart breaking experiences of her life. This pretty much sums up my day-to-day. Rarely does a day go by where my heart isn't pulled hard in both directions.

Sometimes I realise my heart has become a bit more hardened by these experiences, that the emotions on my face don't always reveal that which is in my heart. And for those who know how easily my face and tears have betrayed my feelings in the past, this is a huge shift. I suppose as we humans get older, we do begin to change; we realise we can't so easily get away with crying and facial honesty anymore. We adapt to the world - for me this has been an unwitting biproduct of a challenging environment where one really does have to change face in order to cope.

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Six year-old Thabo (renamed for anonymity) pulls on my heart strings as often as he can, virtually every day. Generally it is in the good heart warming fashion. The second I pull up my driveway, he runs over to help me carry in my bags (partially curious, I know, to find out what I've been busy buying). In the evenings, as soon as I turn on the tap, he bolts over from his catty-corner plot to help water my garden. Whether it's watering the jasmine by hand or moving the sprinkler through the maze of spinach, beets and tomatoes, he is eternally eager to be of assistance - and therefore, of notice.

Through my organisation, I've started offering a class to the surrounding village community called First Fridays. Fifteen youngsters ranging in age from 5 to 16 join in for arts, crafts, and drama games. We had one such class on 1st April and the two hours went by swimmingly well. Until Thabo locked up. Someone older had taken away his broom during clean-up time and he would not budge from his position (right in front of a particularly dirty corner). The older kids were trying to sweep around him and Thabo remained frozen in a little ball, crying.

I must admit, dealing with tantrums is not my speciality, nor much in the realm of my experience. I decided to intervene to a) console Thabo and b) to get the group back to order. I tried to move him elsewhere, which was probably a bad decision! The little guy almost bit me in the process and it just exacerbated the situation. I was actually shocked, based on Thabo's past devotion, that he would dare try to bite me. I decided to let Thabo alone.

For almost twenty minutes he sat, steadfast in his position. The class was wrapping up. We were looking at the pictures they'd been busy working on, giving out verbal acknowledgements for the "most glittery," the "most orange," the "most stripey," etc. Still, Thabo sat, unbudged. Finally as I handed out stickers he managed to emerge from his personal holding cell to collect.

That was Friday and it wore on my sleeve all night. Saturday, yesterday, I was busy working at the arts centre and heard screaming coming from the yard opposite. I saw the old man Fezile beating down on something and realised it was Thabo. Gogo (grandma) was carrying him through the yard, angrily kicking a bucket as they waded through the grass. The screaming ensued. It absolutely pierced my heart.

Because of my role in the community (where I have to be careful with all relationships and try not "to judge"), I have learned to distance myself from the tragedy that is corporal punishment in the classroom. But this was my first time witnessing it in the home. It really did make the stick-beating they use at school seem like a slap on the wrist.

Honestly, even now, I'm not judging. I know Fezile and Gogo are grandparents, from a different era, with a limited idea of what discipline looks like. But it doesn't mean seeing my baby, Thabo, hurt, kills me any less.

Yesterday evening I decided to pay Becca and Phindi, Thabo's aunt and uncle, a visit to find out more about the poor boy's deamons. I've always known he is an orphan and wondered if there was some trauma from that which played into his strange behaviour the day before. Let me repaint the picture Rebecca laid out for me:
"Thabo was still nursing on his mother's breast at two years of age, when his mother passed away. He was inconsolable and his grandparents didn't know how to handle him. To keep him from crying, they spoiled him. When he was 4 or 5 years he became very ill. That was when the doctors discovered he was infected with HIV - most likely from his mother's breastmilk. He has since been put on treatment. But something changed in him while he was ill. He can now hurt anyone and not really know what he's doing - and I mean, really hurt. Now he's still spoiled. And if he doesn't get his way, sometimes the only way they know how to handle him is for Fezile to discipline him. It's because he wasn't raised by his mother."

Now it's Sunday morning. I suppose I can't do much different to what I'm already doing. I feel a bit useless. Many people use the word "devastated" too easily. But I am devastated, in it's full form, for this little guy. After the beating yesterday, I walked by Thabo's house to turn on the water pump in the school. Thabo scampered behind me, happily, and I handed him the key - so he could do his favourite thing - unlock the door. I am not so hardened. But Thabo has still managed to open a new part of me, a part that continually seems to open manifest as I form new relationships with more and more children. It's a chamber of the heart that is exponential in its pathways; the more doors you open, the more chambers there are. You realise there is no limit to the love that can be expressed towards children. Consequently, you also know there's no restriction to the amount of hurt you can feel on their behalf.