this past week has been by far the most challenging of my entire stay in camden thus far. This week i learned alot about alot of different things (or actually i heard about alot of things and am still trying to process them):
i heard about what it actually felt like to shoot heroin, complete euphoria and nothing matters when you are high. it takes away physical pain and especially emotional pain. I heard that it changes though, the more you take it. it then happens that you don't take it to feel euphoric, you need it to stay right. you need it so you don't get sick. you need it. you lose morals to get money.
i heard what it was like to start smoking weed, no big deal. i heard that after 10 years of that you need something better to feel good. i heard that you just try something else. in camden, mostlikely crack is the drug of choice or wet (a cigarette dipped in formaldehyde, a preserving embalming fluid for bodies to be buried.) I hear that crack as well as heroin makes you lose morals to get money to buy it. the man who told me this,kevin, is a cross dressing prostitute who sells his body to buy crack. he said he got into crack when he was a freshman in high school and then dropped out. he's been on the street ever since. kevin has huge scars on his face and throat. he gets beaten up frequently he says, because of what he does to make money.
i heard what it was like to have AIDS after being sexually assaulted and to only be able to treat it using medicAID and welfare (which doesn't cover the cost of the medications needed to help treat it) because of disability.
i heard that a cop at the junior highschool got knocked out by a seventh grade student who was in the middle of a fight when the officer tried to break it up.
i witnessed a kid in my afterschool program snap with displaced anger and threaten to kill one of the leaders for no real apparent reason, then ten minutes later be completely fine.
i heard the aching struggle of a woman trying to get custody of her child after relapsing on heroin and going to rehab for the third time.
i heard the tears of a full grown man who had been beat, robbed and raped by a drug dealer so that the man knew that he was never welcome in that part of town. they they took everything from him and he wept.
i heard the faith of an addict wanting to become normal again in society
i heard the hope of a homeless man getting a permanent residence.
i hear the Love of a God who doesn't want people to hurt.
this past week was hard; i heard alot but i learned alot. i can scarcely take in all that i have witnessed. i learn not to take anything for granted. i learn that everything cannot be taken at face value. i learn for the millionth time that people are people and people need love. i am incapable of giving the kind of healing love that is desparately needed for people in camden and everywhere else-- but i am gaining new perspective on the One who does bring a balm-bearing Word of Love to this community, and it is truly beautiful.
