Brush with Haiti (30 page)

After the nastiness of office politics had taken a toll on my physical wellbeing, I went to see Dr. N. A friend of mine who had embraced natural health and alternative medicine once mentioned him and I knew when it came time to see someone I would seek him out. In that first appointment, he promptly put me on a fast. "Thou shalt detox" was his first commandment. He then sent me for blood work to have my levels of all sorts of things checked and within weeks balanced them all, adding high doses of vitamin D. I felt great. He frequently asked about my work and recommended I more often take a path of least resistance at the office and let myself shine in my giftedness. That was easier said than done, but I applied what advice I could. He also asked about my love life.

"It's ok," I would tell him, knowing that he knew better.

"You need to have sex more often," he would tell me, and at periodic visits asked how I was doing in that area.

"Fine," I would say.

"You will make someone a good wife someday," he told me. If I had heard that at any other time in my life I would have met it with resentment, but at this point it seemed a good time. Dr. N. just seemed to know when it was beneficial to hear certain things. At this age, independent and secure, I knew I would choose the right husband if it came to that.

"What are you working on this summer?" he asked in early 2011, knowing the spring semester was coming to an end.

"I'm writing a book about Haiti."

"Ahh..." He was sincerely interested and seemed to be interpreting the peace that showed in my face. We had talked about my writing projects before, but this one was different. "I love the Haitian people."

"Me, too," I responded. I was not sure "love" was the right word for my feelings toward the entire people of any country and wondered in what ways he might love them, and to what degree.

"You know, many of them came from my people in Africa, the Igbo." I did not know that, but looked deep into his dark eyes, as if through them, and into the matter of his mind. I suddenly pictured the matter liquefying into blood, flowing through his veins, down his arms, out his fingertips, and meeting with the endless, rough waters of the Atlantic. Fixed on his eyes, my peripheral vision held the color of his skin in soft focus. "And they were taken to the Caribbean."

I loved my visits to his office and wondered whether it was because he had a way of hypnotizing me. I wanted him to transfer all that he knew from generations of presence on the planet, or from some sort of universal energy of knowledge, from his mind into mine. I wanted to understand all that he understood, beyond my book learning, lecture note taking, and physical visits to the country. I wanted to know what he knew.

"What is the title of your book?" he asked. Titles should not matter at this point, I thought, and they can certainly change at any time before publication. I considered it a strange question.

"Brush with Haiti"
I said. For some reason I did already know what the title would be, and it was not simply a working title. It was helping to frame the book, not so much providing a structure as it was painting a backdrop that gave me the serenity to keep writing.

"Brush with Haiti,"
he repeated.

"Because I have studied it and taught about it and have been there, but I don't feel that I really know it, or anything about it, or ever will. Certainly not well enough to write a book about it, but I can't seem to stop writing."

He knew I had been there. I made a visit to his office just before my trip preceding the earthquake. I was due for a checkup and asked about malaria preventative and possible immunizations. On my trip with the bishop we had been advised to prepare for malaria and have the series of Hepatitis shots, as well as tetanus, and I complied.

"You're healthy, aren't you?" he asked as if to remind me. "You're feeling well?"

"Yes." He recommended a nutrition-dense pro-biotic powder to mix with my drinking water every other morning.

"That should keep your gut working properly. And just eat natural foods while you're there. That shouldn't be too difficult. You will be fine."

When his nurse came into the examination room and found out I was traveling to Haiti, she asked for a favor.

"Would you bring me back a shot glass? Every time I know someone traveling to another country, I ask them to bring me a shot glass. I have them from all over the world now, but none from Haiti." I did not doubt that. Visits to Haiti are rarely of the shot glass kind and this one would be no different.

"Sure," I said. "I'll see what I can do."

I figured I would try once I got back to the airport gift shop, but did not give it much more thought. However, in the artisans' cooperative where Renate took me on our last day before the earthquake, there they were - hand painted and beautiful. I looked carefully at the variations in style and the colors chosen, trying to decide between the simple brush-stroked houses and palm trees or flowers and birds. I found myself spending far too much time contemplating the perfect one, but finally made a selection along with my bracelet and other things.

She was very pleased and surprised that I had even remembered. As I handed it to her she looked as if she had seen a ghost, and mumbled something about the earthquake.

Yes, it was true. I just missed it, but had not forgotten her request. I wondered whether she would actually use it and thought maybe it was for wheatgrass or something, since she worked for Dr. N. and all. Now, more than a year later, that exchange seemed so far in the distant past.

"I'm writing a book, too," Dr. N. told me.

"About what?" I asked.

"Slavery."

I looked again at his skin and eyes. He had migrated from Africa a century after slavery had ended and under different circumstances. I was interested in his take on it. His understanding of the world in general and happenings in it transcended the material and always reach toward the good. His story was sure to acknowledge the gruesome history and horrid individual accounts yet conclude something unique and not yet stated. I looked forward to it, whatever it might be.

"I don't understand what has happened to the Haitian people. They have the same blood and yet they have not been able to succeed. We have always been the entrepreneurs."

"Slavery happened," I reminded him, as if that needed to be said. "Though Haitians were the first in the Americas to abolish it."

"It's true," he said, nodding. "You know," he continued, "it is as if they are still enslaved mentally. Imagine this: Someone places a very heavy chain on one leg of a baby elephant so all it can do is walk in one small circle. Then the elephant grows into a strong adult, the chain is cut and a much smaller one, attached to nothing, is put in its place. The elephant might continue to walk in one small circle, believing it is limited and not knowing its own power. I am afraid that is what has happened to the Haitian people." His ease with the animal story fascinated me. "In my homeland, we lived with animals. We were not treated as animals."

I recalled the entrepreneurial spirit and accomplishments of the Haitians I had met. On a larger scale, however, their potential for economic development appeared still shackled.

"So how is your sex life?" he asked. "Are you still California dreaming?" I had confessed some time before that I never quite got over my former love who had moved to California. "California is beautiful. My brother lives in a huge house on a very large piece of land high on a mountain. You can see forever."

He put one hand on my shoulder and the other just below my collar bone. Then he pounded three of his fingers hard into my chest, just left of center.

"How does that feel?"

"Ok," I replied, knowing that he knew exactly what he was doing to me. My heart began fluttering and the chest area surrounding it became warm.

"You know, there is just one source of love energy that manifests itself in many ways and in many people. If you open your eyes you will find someone else."

Really, I thought.

"Allow yourself to feel it again." I wondered whether a new love would walk into my life or whether my love for Haiti would be reignited in some way.

Dr. N.'s office is usually filled with patients waiting for what has sometimes seemed an eternity, and this is why. He engages with each one of them far more than any doctor I have known. On this day, I was his last patient, so he and I let the conversation meander, but I knew his devoted office staff was waiting to get out of there.

On my way home, I remembered reading something about the practice of tapping and realized he was treating my heart. He must have known that if he had asked my permission, I might not have given it.

The women I eventually
came to know who worked through their churches on various activities were truly impressive and those of Westminster Presbyterian were no exception. They invited me to speak to their Missions Committee about the projects developed by Haitian Connection. The group included a friend and neighbor, her sister, my former student Heleine who was born in Haiti, and an incredibly involved community leader and wife of a prominent attorney, among others. Westminster was well-known for its active engagement, and it was no surprise that the parking lot was nearly full on this Wednesday evening. In addition to a variety of well-attended committee meetings, the preschool was hosting an open house. I remembered how unwelcome I had felt at the St. Thomas More Peace and Social Justice meeting I first attended and suddenly realized that it was not due to the women there who were, in fact, exceptionally dedicated. It was me. That was at a time in my life when I had let any sense of self-worth be undermined. Things were different now.

They opened the meeting with a prayer and then corrected and approved the minutes of the last meeting. For some reason I had been quite nervous about the talk, perhaps because my friends were there. I had planned and replanned a PowerPoint presentation in my head, with photos, maps, and some explanation of the work of Haitian Connection, then decided against it altogether. It was a relief to find there was no projector available anyway. There I sat with the nicest group of women you would ever want to meet, around a conference table at what I had known as the church down the street when I was growing up. It was where I attended Girl Scout meetings and attained my Red Cross First Aid certification. Though remodeled, I could remember where it was that I learned how to start a fire, sail against the wind, find the North Star, apply a tourniquet, and even suck the venom from a snake bite.

I spoke for what I thought was only about ten minutes, maybe fifteen, because they had other matters to take care of at the meeting. It is likely that I went over, as professors are accustomed to speaking an hour and twenty minutes at a pop, twice a week, times two to four classes, on any number of topics. Perhaps I did not go into great detail in my effort to keep within the time limit. Whatever I said was a blur, and then I sat. It was silent. There was a seeming gulf between us. Had I made a mistake of some kind? Was it because I had been there and they hadn't and I failed to make something clear? Was my Catholicism showing through? Was it something else I said? Then the questions began. We ended up conversing for perhaps 40 minutes or more. They wanted to know so much and in the end expressed a desire to donate enough money to have a house built.

The houses being designed through Haitian Connection were simple, useful, and once occupied, beautiful. Ofpainted concrete block, they provided a living area, kitchen, and bedroom for a woman and her family. Women in Haiti are often the primary breadwinners, and families, the community, and the general economy depend upon them. For a woman to have a secure home for herself and her children can help to lay a more stable foundation for the future. I think the Westminster women recognized this and saw funding the project as one considered "woman to woman."

Some months went by and when arrangements were finally made to hold their final fundraising brunch, I was feeling quite detached from the project, though I did not know why. To be part of such an act of kindness, even in a tangential way, should have brought some dimension of enjoyment. In fact, I was unequivocally unhappy. Again, it was due not to the project but to my own circumstances. As absurd as it is, we too often see matters through a prism of our own concerns.

Sam was preparing to leave for college downstate and I was in the final stages of selling my own home. It was a 3-bedroom mid-century modern split level. I had bought it a couple years after my divorce, in order to move on with my life. It broke my heart knowing that I had broken my children's hearts by selling their childhood home. But this new one was brick and plaster, built solidly into the earth and surrounded by mature trees. I wanted it to give me stability and security and proof that I could manage on my own when others believed I could not. I wanted to show my children that I could provide; that they could depend on me. It took a tremendous amount of work, as it was in need of serious updating, which in turn took a tremendous amount of time and money. I underestimated how difficult it would be to keep my head above water, especially with unforeseen strains in the housing market, and in the end I had very little equity left. But I did it. The first years we were there were hard and I tried not to let my kids see me cry, so I would hold back the tears until my head hit the pillow.

And now I was letting that part of my life go. My mother kept referring to me as an empty-nester. When I had first heard that term years before, I imagined being an empty nester together with someone someday. But that was not to be. It was a great house, but I could not imagine living in it by myself. The time to go had come.

On the bright side, this would be the time when I might move to an apartment in downtown Chicago and make the reverse commute to campus. Apartment hunting had become new to me again when I interviewed for a position as Executive History Producer at C-SPAN two years before. Hours of sifting through apartment listings online and dreaming of living in D.C. turned into days and then into weeks. The time between interviews was torture, and long before I was informed that I did not get the job, I realized that maybe what I truly wanted to do was sell the house and bring the suburban chapter of my life to an end. The man for whom I was still holding a torch had lived in a downtown high-rise when I met him. Though the relationship had long since ended, I yearned for the feeling of his surroundings, his view, and believed that just about 650 square feet overlooking Lake Michigan was just what I was missing. But accepting an offer on the house and seeing a tentative closing date in print made it all too apparent that no dwelling could act as a substitute for him.