2006 Christmas Tour

This weekend felt like the "Chriselo Family Christmas Tour" with back and forth traveling to malls and parties in three different states. Noella hung in there like a trooper, she had a great time Saturday (with my side of the family) and Sunday (with Chistine's side). It was good to hang out with my side after not seeing some of them for almost two years! Christmas Eve, as always, was the time to continue our tradition of dinner, merengue, and opening gifts. "Pelito", Christine's grandfather was there again like at Thanksgiving. This may very well be the last time many of us see him, and though we never spoke it, we all thought the same thing as we said our good-bye's. By looking at the growing younger deneration, I could tell Christine's family is accultuating much the same as my family at least thirty earlier. It's good to see her side is able to hold on to more traditions from the motherland. We need to pass those forward as much as possible.
Monday was time for a quiet dinner in my house with my mom. It was relaxing to finally be home, and it was special in it's own way. My only wish is for a peaceful and prosperous 2007....

The State of Things

One day at a time. One choice at a time. One action at a time. There is only what is immediately before you in the swirl of chaos that is everyday life. If one so chooses, becoming a 'Master of The Multi-Task' can yield prodigious results. Where does it end though? There is always the next task no matter how many times you clone yourself.

My wife sent me a poem by a teenage cancer patient with six months to live. "Slow Dance" is a well written encapsulation of regret and advice to those who don't slow down to enjoy the simple things. It was my wife's way of telling me I'm missing out on things, and she's right...

I'm always trying to "turn the corner" at work yet never seem to get there. My involvement in community matters has taken up quite a bit of brain power not to mention tapped quite a bit of my emotional reserves, and the rat race has only just begun. My homegrown remedy: I bought my first electric guitar yesterday. That plus the next two weeks off will go a long way toward getting me in touch with the state of things.

I'm living in two worlds: Work/Community & Home. I wish the two wouldn't feel so mutually exclusive. It's hard to stay grounded when you are under attack on one side and painfully missed on the other. I'm nothing without my family, yet the pull to do more is so strong. One day at a time. One choice at a time. One action at a time....

TBP Part 4: Congressional Scandals & The American Political System

The Jack Abramoff Scandal may very well be remembered as a watershed in American history. Slowly but surely, the influence of "big money" and corporate interests in our political system has devolved our democracy into a modern day resurrected Feudal System of Lords and vassals. In time leading up to the Jack Abramoff Scandal you could sense the nerves rattling on Capital Hill as if people were saying on the inside that "the jig is up", or that a house of cards were about to fall. Down they fell, from Randall Cunningham to Bob Ney, Tom Delay, Mark Foley, and a host of other leaders and associates. Republicans were swept into a deadly rip tide of their own creation, and that political ocean current was fed by the category 7 Hurricane "Bush's-Failed-Iraq-Policy." Churning and stationary that storm is still building strength, but most of us are not aware how deadly this storm can be since it's still located "off-shore." The tide swept through Congress, the Republicans were felled on The Hill, party control shifted in governorships and state legislatures, and the White House lost Rumsfeld (or placed him on the sacrificial altar).

It's been said that "Absolute power corrupts absolutely," and that has never been more true than has been the case these past six years (and longer if you start to analyze it thoroughly). The progressive programs and policies of the last 60 years that began under the Roosevelt Administration's "New Deal" and expanded under the Johnson Administration "War on Poverty" have been reversed. Angered by what they perceived as social program excesses, conservatives worked slowly over several decades to change the landscape by: swinging southern conservative Democrats to their cause, forging alliances with Christian groups, mastering grassroots politics, supporting conservative candidates in local and state races, and controlling the message through conservative bought and operated media outlets.

What went wrong was what almost always happen when you have too much of a good thing: you abuse it. Conservative administrations our recent conservative Congress have become corrupted by money and power the same way their Democratic/Progressive counterparts were during their excessive reign. Money controls access and having access helps to set the agenda. Today lobbyists have become a quasi third branch of government, and the average American will never have the same level of access that lobbyists and their special interest clients currently have. The Congressional Scandals are disaffecting the Republican base and Americans in general, but what the situation highlights is how far removed from the our founding father's vision we have become. As long as money remains the overwhelmingly dominant determinant of access, a "government of the people, for the people, by the people" will remain an elusive concept once dreamt about eleven score and ten years ago...

A Life Deferred

"What happens to a dream deferred?" - Langston Hughes

I studied Langston Hughes in college, and this poem has always remained in the back of my mind. It's a question I ask myself everyday in some form when I go to work; so many lives put on hold by lack of opportunity, limited skill sets, and poor choices. Stepping back and seeing the enormity of the challenge for what it is can be intimidating. It seems almost futile at times, and then there are times when you feel you've made a difference. This week has been hard...

A young man who turns twenty today sits in Riker's Island prison accused of murder. This is a young man I have known since the age of seven. Is he a killer? No. Is he guilty? Probably. Is he stupid? Yes...that is my "non-P.C." way of spitting out my frustration with the fact that he is functionally illiterate and has made a string of very bad choices. When his parents came to the United States from the Dominican Republic, I doubt their vision of the American Dream was incarceration for their youngest child. This is more than a dream deferred, this young man has become a statistic; another life deferred.

The plus side to his downfall is the fact that other "borderline" youth have taken some of our programs at Inwood Community Services, Inc. a little more seriously. My colleagues and I are swimming in a rip current trying to follow a diagonal track toward shore. I'm a firm believer in planting seeds and hoping for the best, but this one hurts. As a parent, I can identify with a parent's hope that your children will turn out okay. This is different. I've worked with literally hundreds of youth, but no turn for the worst has ever blindsided me or touched me as deeply as this. Why? We held him under our wing for a few years...very closely as a matter of fact, but then our project "lost funding" and many of our initiatives and participants scattered.

Damn...

He could have been saved. There are many we can't, and many we won't. I know he could have been, and that hurts...