paradises and prisons
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A journey.TRANSCRIPT
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7April 10-16, 2013The WoodsTock IndependenT
basic supplies for the evening before we headed back to our boat. We climbed aboard and the strange woman stood on the shore and watched us leave looking very much like a sea witch under the glow of the moonlight.
We boated over to a small deserted island and ate a delicious dinner by campfire. As we sat under the stars, we discussed the differences between our cultures, our hopes and our dreams. GaGa said many people in Port Barton lived hard lives and made very little money from their jobs as tour guides, fishermen or trinket sellers on the beach. They often dreamed of escaping to the U.S. or Manila for better work opportuni-ties.
For me, Port Barton was a dream world an island fantasy so different from anything Id ever known. It was my idea of a true paradise.
For GaGa, Port Barton was a prison. He seemed to yearn for a life beyond the swaying palms, even as I wished I had more time to spend beneath their shade.
That night I lay in my tent under the stars and the sound of ocean waves lured me to sleep as they lapped gently against the shore. I fell asleep thinking how wonderful it was to camp on a deserted island on the opposite side of the planet. In the boat where GaGa slept, perhaps he drifted off wondering if hed ever escape
the sandy shores. In the morning light we were both quiet
and contemplative as we headed back to the main village.
Through talking at length with GaGa, I learned once again how things are not always what they seem when viewed through another persons eyes. Spend-ing time in Port Barton unveiled all the things I take for granted, how blind to my blessings Ive been and how spoiled Ive become as an American.
I also concluded that although some people in the small village of Port Barton want to escape their island prisons, in many ways they are richer than those of us who live in prisons of our own making concrete and cubicle prisons construct-ed of cynicism, materialism and skewed ideas of what true success and happiness really mean.
Would I trade my life of privilege for a life living in a small fishing village by the sea? Sometimes the thought is tempting, but I believe I am where I am for a reason.
There are many treasures to be had in Port Barton, and I do hope one day GaGa comes to understand the blessings he has under his feet.
Visiting his world opened my eyes to my own.
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I was looking for signs of spring last week as I drove on Lake Street toward Route 47, and I saw something new at Dick Tracy Park. Never before had I seen a garden of dozens of bright blue, shining pinwheels. I didnt have time to stop and read the signs in the garden, but I saw Pinwheels for Prevention as I drove by.
The next morning, I saw another blue pinwheel garden in the yard of the Old Courthouse building on the Square. The gardens, I found out later, were planted in Woodstock because April is Child Abuse Prevention Month.
The Prevent Child Abuse Illinois website provided the following informa-tion: the pinwheel gardens are part of a nationwide public awareness initiative for the prevention of child abuse and ne-glect. The goal is to change how Ameri-cans think about prevention to have us focus on preventing abuse and neglect before it happens in the first place by ensuring that our nations children are raised in healthy, stable, loving, nurturing and stimulating environments at home, in school and in the community.
Thanks to Child Advocacy Center of McHenry County, CASA (Court Ap-pointed Special Advocates) of McHenry County, Northwest Treatment Associ-ates and Turning Point for Woodstocks pinwheel gardens and for the work they
do every day to ease the pain of children who are sexually and physically abused.
To support Pin-wheels for Prevention, call 815-334-9597.
MoreMy husband, Jim,
and I hosted two grandchildren Friday evening to Sunday afternoon. John, 4, and Charles, 2, are the children of son Matt and daughter-in-law Alexis. Our activities included rolling up the living room carpet so we could create a road for the trucks. The trucks are two 18-wheel toy semis that are 30 or more years old and belonged to our sons. The road was bright pink, heavy bond paper I had saved for just such an occasion. Each sheet was 8.5 inches wide and about 5 feet long. John, Charles and I used lots of masking tape to hold them in place and together.
Charles, for some reason, likes to help wash clothes. Lets do laundry, he said. So, all the laundry baskets were empty when he left.
Baking cookies is one of the joys our grandchildren and I share. I invited
cousin Reagan, 7, over to make sugar cookies with John while Charles napped. She and I would have preferred choco-late chip cookies, but Johns parents asked me to limit his chocolate intake. Sugar cookies are too fussy for me with the chill time between mixing and rolling the dough and the mess of rolling, using cookie cutters and sprinkling or dous-ing the cookies with sugar. Thankfully, the reward of eating them justifies the means.
Going to playgrounds is a joy our grandchildren and Jim share. Jim came home just in time Saturday evening to take John and Charles to the playground at Olson Elementary School. Its a won-derful playground, and all three delight-ed in their walk there and back.
Taking baths, reading books and shar-ing time together brought each day to a close. And, grandchildren and grandpar-ents slept well.
Still more
Last week, I stopped to see Don Peasley, 90. I hadnt seen him in about a month since a day or two after he suffered a stroke. Our last visit was at Centegra Hospital Woodstock, or Me-morial, as he prefers to call Woodstocks hospital. Since then, hes graduated from residential therapy to living and working
again from his home. Don is a go-out-to-lunch professional.
No sooner was I through the door, than he said, I havent had lunch. Have you? I said I hadnt eaten, and he replied, Lets go to lunch.
With George, Dons caregiver, to as-sist Don on stairs, we went to lunch. We talked, ate and paused to visit with the myriad of people Don knows.
The same day, I visited my 88-year-old Uncle Virgil known to many of you as Virgil Smith. He had a stroke last fall and is now making his home at Valley-Hi. Uncle Virgil loves being with people he always has, so he thrives on his interac-tions with and attention from the staff and residents. We sat in the sun at the end of Melody Lane, one of the halls with a sitting area at its west end. We talked about family. I asked him what he remembered from the Depression, and he shared his memories of going into Aurora with his mother to sell eggs for 11 cents a dozen. We talked and laughed for more than an hour.
As pinwheels direct our attention to preventing child abuse, may the warm spring days remind us to spend time with the children and elders in our lives.
column
Spring is busting out with pinwheels and more
Cheryl Wormley is publisher of The Wood-stock Independent.
Declarations
CherylWormley
OpiniOn
There are moments in time and certain people and places you encounter that transform the way you think about the world, humanity and yourself.
Ive been reflecting on some of these experiences in my own life.
One such special place and person I encountered while vacationing in the small coastal village of Port Barton, on the island of Palawan, Philippines. Some-times called the Last Frontier, Palawan is one of the few islands in the Pacific that is not yet spoiled or overrun with tourists. Featuring a gorgeous beach, lush forests, waterfalls and endearing (but somewhat cautious) people, the village of Port Bar-ton was for me, a tonic for the weary soul.
Getting there wasnt easy. It was a bumpy, confusing and slightly danger-ous five-hour drive from the capital of Puerto Princessa through dusty rolling countryside, jungle and over a precarious mountain road. There is no paved road into or out of Port Barton.
I spent the first few days in the village strolling along the beach, chatting with the locals and getting used to the fact that the electricity was only available during set hours. It was a wonderful change of
pace. I also made a new friend named GaGa, a young local man who worked as a tour guide.
One day when I mentioned I wanted to camp out on a deserted island, he offered to take me to a nearby fishing village to stock up on supplies and then head out to another island to camp for the evening.
We found the fish-ing village cloaked in darkness when we arrived. We disembarked from the boat and followed an eerie, mumbling elderly woman down a pathway lit by flickering candles and the beams of our flashlights. I remember children staring wide-eyed in the shadows, peeking out from around their parents and the sides of their huts. Captivated, I felt like I had stepped into a page of a National Geographic magazine.
GaGa and I stopped at three small shops where we gathered fresh fish and
Paradises and prisonscolumn
Rhonda Mix is a staff writer for The Wood-stock Independent.
Mix Messages
Rhonda Mix