Page 2/The Battalion/Monday, April 11, 1983
opinion
Focus on the homeless
A couple of miles outside the tiny town
of Cherokee, a row of small cottages
stands beside the highway.
A group of little boys plays football in
one of the yards, beside the large sign
that says, “Cherokee — Home for the
Children.” In the gravel driveway, three
-children race on bicycles — Christmas
presents from long-absent parents.
Few of the children who live here are
orphans. Most have been abandoned by
their parents, or sent to the home by pa
rents who were unable or unwilling to
provide for them. Some of them spend
the school holidays with what they call
their “real families,” as if, somehow, the
blood relatives that they see once a year
are more real than the houseparents that
take care of them every day.
Tonight, Cherokee High School plays
Goldthwaite in basketball, and boys from
the home make up over half the varsity
team. The children who aren’t on the
team will pile on the bus to go and watch.
The girls’ team plays first. Veronica,
one of the oldest girls from the home, is
the team’s star.
Not exceptionally tall, but as muscular
as any of the boys on the varsity team,
she’s a terror on the court. She’s not fast,
but she hustles, playing as if her life de
pended on it. She wears a look of utmost
concentration and determination. She
never smiles, not even when her team
scores.
Veronica takes pride in the fact that
she’s fouled out of every game this sea
son. She’s tough.
She’s tough off the court, too. Her
thick black hair is cut short. She wears
jeans, T-shirts and a rebellious express
ion that seems to defy femininity. No
thing can hurt Veronica.
Veronica feels, but she’s an expert at
hiding her feelings.
“You can’t trust anyone,” she says.
“Your best friend will turn around and
stab you in the back.”
So there is no trust in her life. Church
groups come to visit the children and
work at the home, but she doesn’t let
anyone get close to her — not anymore.
“They just come and stay for a while
and then leave again,” she says. “They say
they’ll come back, but they don’t. They
say they’ll write, and they usually don’t.”
Even when she gets letters, she doesn’t
write back. She’s afraid that she’ll let
someone get close to her, and “get all torn
up inside again.”
She speaks from experience. Her
young face already shows lines of pain,
and her dark eyes belong to a person
who’s older than 18. Although I’m older
than she, I am the child.
I don’t ask her about her life, because
that would break the shell she’s built
around her. I want to tell her about trust,
and about love, but what can I say to
anesthize the memories of her past? And
what have I experienced in my sheltered
life, that I can tell her that her perception
of the world is wrong?
I look at her and see her tough ex
terior, but the younger children see
more. She’s the one they go to when they
need someone to cry on, and she’s the
one the younger teenage girls confide in.
And she’s the one who’s written pages
and pages of poetry, giving a verse to a
special child now and then.
She gives of herself, and I feel small.
Like most college students, I am the
center of my world. Classes, schedules
projects, clubs, activities, parties, friends
an, occasional call from the folks at home
— everything revolves around me.
But Veronica, and the rest of the chil
dren, throw my neatly ordered priorities
into confusion. I think about the chil
dren, step outside myself for a while, and
realize that failing that test next week and
not lining up that big date for the
weekend are minor worries.
They force me to shift my focus off
myself and look at the pain they live with
every day. And my visit has been worth
while if I can see a small boy’s eyes light
up when I offer to play catch with him, or
give a big, warm hug to a little girl whose
life hasn’t been filled with the hugs and
kisses a child needs.
the small society
Man
IM TMl-^
by Brickman
^ooV, <£U?THir^ AKP A
TA*
©1981 King Fssturos Syndicate. Inc World rights reserved
3 -50
PRESIDENT
ROY WILLIAMS'
IRIS ALWAYS
OPEN
...AT LEAST
DURING
VISITING
HOURS
Letters: Palestinian complaints
Editor:
I agree with Carol Parzen, that the
Holocaust and its victims should never be
forgotten, because as she said, “Deeply
Berrys World
1983 by NEA, Inc
“Someday, I want to be a congressman just like
you so I can go on neat junkets too!”
rf
inhuman crimes require us to take time
to reflect on how to prevent them from
ever happening again.”
“Ironies of ironies” that these other
wise truthful and words should be
spoken by a person who, herself, sup
ports state, built on the suffering and
oppression of an innocent people. One
wonders vyhere you get the nerve to
speak on crimes against humanity, while
you are doing the same thing through
expulsions and massacres, killing chil
dren, women and innocent people as if
they want to prove to the world that his
tory can repeat itself.
For example, look at what was accom
plished recently in Lebanon by those who
talk about unparalleled crime against
humankind. Aggies don’t buy that any
more, they are fed up with worthless
words and pretending because they are
aware of what’s happening in the world.
So your letter was a nice attempt and
your Israel Awareness Week, too, but it
does you no good. And believe me, once
you turn the lights off and you have a
moment of silence, all you will see is no
thing but the reflection of the brutal
crimes which are committed daily, as if
it’s a habit, against my people, the Palesti
nians.
Emad Yasin ’83
Election thanks
Editor:
Howdy Ags!
I’m writing this just to thank you.
Thank you for being so nice and tolerant
of myself and the many other candidates
who knocked on your doors or talked
with you while we campaigned for our
respective races the last couple of weeks.
Thank you also for turning out to vote
March 29th and 30th. I would also like to
encourage you to vote in the run-offs
Tuesday. Have a voice in who represents
you.
Again, thanks Ags., for without you,
campaigning and elections would be in
vain. Win or lose, the Twelfth Man makes
it all worth it.
Gig ’em!
Frank Reister
802 Natalie
Slouch By Jim Earl
&LQ0D
DRIVE
he
nee I
aciati
jwor
:r to i
ss.
Fhet
jects]
is res
nts o
: fun
of thi
“We
d wa
:ther
lin tl
:kney
it anc
irmai
‘There’s nobody here!*’
‘Waste World’ tour
could be highlight
tan-C
d Cof
:ek Br
oclani
Dios
(I em
by Dick West
United Press International
composed of barrels and stee/i
containing toxic wastes.
Fun-seekers willing to standinlin liege
WASHINGTON — It’s a miserable
disaster indeed that doesn’t blow, shake,
rattle or roll somebody some good.
rewarded by a roller-coaster ride
and through Mount Dumpmore.w art’s
When the eruptions first started.
Mount St. Helens may have seemed an
unmitigated calamity. But that was be
fore the federal government designated
the catastrophe as a National Volcanic
Area, and souvenir dealers moved in.
they can see the containers rustif
disintegrating, their contentsoozinj iza
a nearby creek
Bra
mi B
After that, board an elevatedm
ail for a trip across the creek toa
(I
ased
Thiirsd
made island where a faulty nucta
tor is regularly venting radioacthe
into the atmosphere.
Now, with another vacation season
getting under way, it behooves both gov
ernmental agencies and private investors
to provide more cataclysmic attractions.
The final thrill might be a ride
simulated railroad that ends wiiha
car jumping the track and defii
surrounding area withadeadlydii
Tourists are a hardy lot. All they need
is a little encouragement and even deba
cles can become Grand Canyons.
The single admission ticketalsoi
ties tourists to watch panic-stricken
dents being evacuated to temporarfi
ters in churches and public schooii
Thus far, to cite one distressing omis
sion, hardly anything has been done to
upgrade the sightseeing potential of
Times Beach, Mo., and other communi
ties contaminated by toxic material.
Yet environmental adulteration
would be an almost ideal leitmotif for a
theme park.
I am even willing to suggest a name:
“Waste World.” Here’s the drill:
The promoters of “Waste World” buy
up tracts of land that have been conde
mned due to spraying, leakage, spillage
or some other inadvertent method of
spreading poison.
Each piece of property is then de
veloped to carry out part of the “Waste
World” theme.
I visualize as a typical unit an amuse
ment park called “Pollutionland.” It is
built around a towering, Alpine-like
structure — Mount Dumpmore — that is
Much of the appeal comes
quirement that all park visitors^
contamination suits and headgeai
plete with individual oxygen app*
and Geiger counters.
Most tourists, I’m sure, w
dressing up like that, particular
younger members of a vacationing
ly. It would provide an elememof;
ture you just don’t get climbingilK
tue of Liberty, traipsing througli^
Capitol or driving through a
wood.
Upon leaving “Waste World,”'-
would pass through a detoxifi
chamber, something like a car"
which they would be scrubbed
brushed clean of any contana
What fun!
Add a trace of acid rain falling
food pavilion and how the money
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