Border Security

In June of 2009, our government responded to the 9-11 attacks and the immediate demands that our border be secured when they finally required passports at the border. It only took 8-years and this action accomplished so much.

Business in U.S. cities along our border sharply declined. U.S. businesses lost almost all customers from Mexico. Tourism in the border-towns came to a standstill. No longer are the hotels in our U.S. border-cities filled with tourists en-route to Mexico for a day of shopping. The border-town restaurants, gas stations, malls, and shops no longer sell to tourists going to Mexico.

Finally, after 8-years of protests and worry we can all feel safe. There is very little tourist traffic on the bridges from Mexico.

Now, if we can only find a way to stop the drug traffickers and others intent on doing us harm from crossing the border. Now, if we can only find employment on both sides of the border, before the drug cartels become the only employer still hiring.

Since it took eight years for the government to figure out how to say, "Show me your passport." I suspect it will take longer to solve the real problems.

Pull Yourself Up!

Juanita was born with twisted feet and a malformed tendon. Her parents were told, “This is the way she is and nothing can be done.”

She was raised without hope of improvement. When Juanita was old enough to start school, her mother carried her to and from the school. Juanita did not use her muscles and never learned to use the toilet. Her mother made several trips to the school each day to change her daughter’s diaper. After three years of schooling, her parents stopped taking her to school. It was too difficult to make these constant trips to school and Juanita had grown tired of the teasing of other children.

She remained at home for the next 20 years of her life. Most of her time was spent in bed. Her parents could not afford a wheel chair. Eventually, an old wheel chair was given to the family, but Juanita would slip out of it because she had difficulty sitting up.

Juanita likes to paint and draw to pass the time. She has a quick smile and tries to enjoy life. Her father works as a laborer. The money he brings home puts food on the table and is barely enough for the basics.

In 2008, Juanita's mother heard about children receiving surgery at the private downtown clinic that enabled them to walk. She took Juanita to a doctor at the clinic. The doctor sent her to the Gabby Brimmer Physical Therapy Center as a first step towards help.

At Gabby Brimmer, Juanita received free treatments. Most of these treatments involved a physical therapist, painful massages and painful exercises. After several months of treatments, the doctor told her that she could contact Paper Houses Across the Border.

In the past, the doctor had performed surgeries and the parents did not participate in the painful physical therapy required for the surgery to succeed. This time, we know that Juanita will participate in the therapy because she already began and there was some progress.

We agreed to pay for the surgeries needed to change this young lady’s world. The doctor outlined his plan. First, Juanita would undergo three sessions of physical therapy every week at Gabby Brimmer. Next, the first operation would be completed to correct the tendon problem. This would be followed up with a month of additional physical therapy and then a second operation to correct the twisted feet would be performed.

Today, I showed up unannounced to observe the therapy session. If began with work on a large gymnastic mat. A physical therapist guided, monitored, cheered and coached Juanita through a series of routines that stretched muscles, long unused. With tears in her eye, Juanita pushed herself as hard as she could endure. At the end of this session, she was at the far end of the mat. The therapist told her to scoot across the mat so she could go to the next room. Usually, Juanita was picked up from where-ever she was on the mat when this routine was completed. Today, she was told to get herself to the end of the mat, where her wheel-chair waited. She used her hands and legs to scoot across the mat a few inches at a time. Twice, she stopped to rest. Her mother, father and the therapist kept clapping and cheering her on, until she finally reached the chair. Her father lifter her into the chair.

I hoped that there would be a rest between activities, but there was not. An old dining room chair was taken from the conference room and placed in front of white metal bars that were bolted into the wall. The bars form a sort of ladder. Juanita’s father picked her up from the wheelchair and sat her on the dining room chair facing the bars. Ten pound weights were fastened to Juanita’s ankles. The therapist explained, “When she stands, the weights will force those twisted feet to be flat against the floor. There will be pain, but this is necessary to help.”

Juanita took a deep breath, grasped a rung of the ladder and pulled herself up from the chair. Her feet were off the floor, and then she lowered herself until the feet were flat on the floor. Very slowly, she continued to lower her body, until she was sitting in the chair. She instantly began the process again. She repeated this painful exercise ten times. When she finally sat down after ten repetitions, there were tears streaming down her face. She caught her breath and looked at her father.

Her father started to pick Juanita up to place her back into her wheel-chair. Then he stopped and sat his daughter back on the dinning room chair. Juanita looked at him in puzzlement. Her father tightened his jaw and said, “You do it. Pull yourself up. I will put your chair under you. You must pull yourself up.”

Juanita’s face took on a look of determination. She looked into her father’s eyes and without a word, communicated to him that he was right. She must pull herself up. The muscles in her arms and biceps showed the strain. Her eyed quivered from effort and her entire body seemed to tremble. Juanita pulled herself up! As she lowered herself into the wheelchair there was a look of accomplishment on her face that could not have been there except for the heart-aching firmness of her father.

We followed Juanita into the room with the metal whirlpool bath. The therapist and family lifter her from the wheelchair and into the hot tub. The tub seemed identical to the one that was used at the Houston Police Academy when a Cadet strained a muscle. There was one notable difference. The room at the police academy was air conditioned. The room with this hot tub was not. As we watched Juanita perform a series of exercises and watched the therapist push, rush and stretch Juanita’s feet and legs, the sweat pursed out of us. Her parents were soaked from the heat in this tiny room.

After she was dried off, Juanita was taken to another room for a type of electrical therapy for her leg muscles. This would conclude today’s therapy session. Juanita comes three times each week. She and her family confirmed that everything we watched was typical. The only thing differed about some of the visits is that the family and Juanita meet with a psychologist once a month. The cost of the therapy is $5 per session. There is no extra cost for the monthly psychology session. That is included in the $5 cost.

Juanita said that she feels stronger and more full of life than she ever thought possible. She is convinced she will walk. I am convinced that wihat-ever happens, will happen because Juanita pulls herself up.

Violence in Mexico

USA Today July 30, 2009

In a novel attempt to lure back wary tourists scared off by high crime rates and last spring's swine flu outbreak, the Mexico City government is offering visitors free health and travel insurance through December.

San Francisco Chronicle May 2009

The paradox of Mexico's plight is that its government has been doing everything by the book, from exemplary economic policy to cracking down on drug cartels to reacting quickly and vigorously to the first clusters of flu cases.

"First there's the economic crisis, second there's the whole insecurity situation as a result of the drug-related crime, now third you have this epidemic compounding an already bad impact on the economy," said Nora Lustig, a Mexico expert at George Washington University and the Center for Global Development. "It means the average Mexican is going to be in a pretty horrible situation with not many other places to go."

The biggest traditional safety valve - a job in the United States - is all but closed by the U.S. recession. For the past year, illegal immigration from Mexico has been flat, according estimates from the Pew Hispanic Center.

View From The Bottom

The Mexican people need work, not hand-outs. The economy is in trouble and will remain in trouble until the drug violence stops. When you and your children are hungry, you simply want the opportunity to earn enough money to put some food on the table. The people are so beaten down that many would accept a truce with drug gangs. Many talk about the hopelessness of changing the politicians. They shrug when talking about graft, corruption and gangs. They simply want to eat.

When you see it, when you talk with parents skipping meals so their children have something to eat, you empathize.

However, accepting corruption, gang-rule, and injustice is not in anyone's long term interest. It is especially not in the interest of the United States. If the gangs win, and they may, the violence will continue to reach across out border and will spread.

You kill weeds at their roots. We must help Mexico to rebuild its economy, win the war against the drug gangs, and do everything possible to make our neighbor an economic miracle.

I walk the streets of Texas border-cities and Mexican border-cities. This is not a theory or an academic study. This is the life on our streets. Houston, Austin, Dallas and Baltimore are all affected by the gangs of Mexico.

Changing Mexico is a matter of choice. We, in the United States, have the ability and means to give the Mexican people the edge they need.

The Future

The news is filled with stories about next year. We worry about taxes, health care, jobs, the economy and a host of other important things. Our concerns are legitimate.

We look through the lens of hope and think in terms of why I can do to help. I can’t find a passage that says, “Blessed are those that find others to blame, Blessed are those that wish they could help, Blessed are those that want to help” so I am helping.

We still believe one of the most powerful phrases in Scripture is “I Am” - this was not only how God named himself for Moses, it is the one phrase that changes everything. We don’t say: I am going to, One day I will help, Someone else should do something.

We say, “I am helping” and state what we are doing. Now. Now is all of the time we can be certain to experience. I often remember my favorite Aunt. She was in good health, young and went for annual check-ups. She dropped dead of a heart attack. She was young and the attack came without warning. I often think of my close friend, Mike. He was a computer programer. He came home from his morning jog and dropped dead while taking off his jogging suit. The only time we are certain to experience is this moment.

Mexico and the Disabled

The Economist-July 18-24, 2009 Issue (p36)

“Lending A Hand”

The lead-in to this story about help for the disabled in Mexico is about the hiring of people with disabilities at the Mexico City Airport. This small story also reported ". . . Mexico, now at the vanguard of the disabled rights movement in the developing world . . . began a number of initiatives, including installing wheel-chair ramps in 26,000 schools, and providing subsidized loans for housing for the disabled."

As a believer in Mexico, I am glad to read positive stories about that nation’s government. However, here are the facts I see in the colonias of northern Mexico. Please keep in mind that most schools, government services, and living conditions along the border exceed those in most parts of Mexico.

When attending a graduation ceremony for schools that serve disabled children in Acuna, Mexico, parents flock to me and ask if I can provide a wheel-chair for their child. It seemed that half of the children that were unable to stand did not have a wheel-chair of their own. Many mothers carried their children up the aisle to receive their diplomas. We also encounter children with disabilities as we walk the dirt streets of the colonias.

Sergio was five years old when we met. It was at the end of a day spent delivering food door-to-door. We discovered that a few sacks of food remained and we simply stopped the truck and picked a house at random.

The lady at that house thanked us for the groceries and invited us into her little house. We met her husband and noticed the little boy on the bed. His little legs looked extraordinarily thin and we learned that he could not walk.

His mother explained, “He was born this way. The doctors just told us that this is the way he is and there is nothing to be done.”

I asked if he attended school and learned that he attended a nearby kinder. His mother carried him to the school bus every morning. Each day, she boarded the bus, carried him into the classroom, placed him at his desk and then walked home. At the end of each school-day, she walked the mile to his school, picked him up from his desk, boarded the school-bus and returned home. The family cannot afford a wheel-chair.

There are thousands of ‘Sergios’ without wheel-chairs. But here is the really sad part of the story: I suspect that many of these children are exactly like Sergio. Not only do they not have a wheel-chair, there is corrective surgery that can enable these children to walk!

Paper Houses Across the Border (http:/paperhouses.org) paid for Sergio to be examined at a private clinic. He underwent surgery and was dancing at the Kinder graduation.

I am glad and proud that Mexico is building ramps at schools for the many children in wheel-chairs. However, the world needs to understand the reality of children living in need of a wheel chair and that thousands only need a wheel-chair because their parents cannot afford surgery that will change the life of the child, the child’s family and the lives of untold generations. These operations generally cost less than $10,000. To enable Sergio to walk, we spend $6,500. That seems a small price to pay.

I am not advocating a change in Mexico’s policies, health-care, or suggesting there is anything wrong. I answer to a higher authority than Mexico or the United States. I was instructed to feed the poor, give drink to the thirsty, and to clothe the naked. I was told that whatever I do for the least of these I do for Him. I was also told whatever I do not do for the least of these I do not do for Him. So, it is my responsibility.

We try not to live in ‘the land of Should’ and duck responsibilities by figuring out who ‘should’ do these things. We see children like Sergio as opportunities to answer a prayer and work a miracle.

If you think that little Sergio was happy when he stood in front of his classmates for the first time, you should have seen my face!

The Real People - - - The Real Story

On a good day, the news stories are accurate, timely and not slanted to promote a hidden agenda. Most of these stories are written from the top down and not from the view of the people living the story. Providing the world-view of situations is exactly what the news should provide and this requires top-down reporting. However, the individual human part of the story is also important.

Economic policies, enforcement of immigration, factory closings, drug wars, and 108 degree temperatures are all stories told from the top down. I hope to turn those stories upside-down and write from the street level. People are where these stories begin.

Bob