THIS ALARM CLOCK WILL WAKE YOU UP

Today it was back down to the mall shopping for a little clock. I thought I would try a large department store. As I walked in, I asked myself "where would I be if I were a travel alarm?"

It proved to be a senseless question

I wandered the aisles and up and down the escalators looking for a travel alarm clock. Now where would the clock department be? After about thirty minutes of wandering around in the store I found a cute salesperson and asked her where they had their travel alarms. She smiled and said over in the bedding department and downstairs in the electronics department. I thought bedding, it seemed a little odd, nevertheless I hiked over to bedding and looked and looked; sheets and blankets they had but no travel alarms.


Then I walked over to the escalator and glided down to the first floor and found a salesperson and asked where the electronics department was and she nodded her head toward the east. Heading east I found electronics and searched the entire department. I found the electronics salesperson and asked him where the travel alarms were. Alarm clocks? I think they're upstairs near the bath section". Bath section, now that figures, that's where I would keep my travel alarms. So back up the escalator I went and took a long hike to the bath section and again no travel alarms.

Now I'm biting my lip, I'm determined to get that clock. It's now a quest!

Wandering around I found the same sales person that started me off and asked again where the travel alarms might be.

Cynically, I suggested that the travel alarm clocks may be in the lingerie department. She looked at me thoughtfully and said, "No, I don't think they would be there." I think they're in the bedding area over near that wall. I replied that I couldn't find them there. "Here" she said, "I'll show you." We were well on our way to bedding when she asked another salesperson who said that the travel alarm clocks were in the kitchen department. And we switched courses and ultimately found travel alarms in the home furnishings department.

I bought one with a loud alarm. Made in China! And by now I was hungry enough to eat it ... but I'm not into Chinese food.

I noticed, in very small print on the bottom of the face of my new alarm clock is a warning!

"WARNING: THIS ALARM CLOCK WILL WAKE YOU UP"

What a pleasant surprise. True story.

THE STORY CROSSES TELL

The other day as I was driving past Tijuana's cemetery for the poor, I saw this view... so I pulled over and took a few photos. It was late in the afternoon and the shadows were just right. What I saw was truly 'the valley of death'. Often I have used this place as a backdrop for teaching our American teens about values. A simple lesson ... ultimately all of our stuff will end up in the hill to the left which is the dump, the Tijuana dump, and our bodies, well, they'll end up in a grave somewhere. Indeed, gravity will claim it's own. What a spot for teaching about life, values, and what's really important, namely people ... people are eternal, we should never forget that. Acres and acres of people that were but are no more!

How many of these people who were laid to rest here ever knew what the cross above them stood for.

An eternal mistake!

I think of the potential of all of those little crosses. Count them, hundreds of them, each unique yet all made common by poverty and death.

As I mused, looking over the crosses in this dry, weedy and trash-filled cemetery, I asked myself, "how much good could have been done had these people lived?" It's possible the world could have been changed by even one of these had they lived to their potential.

Let's look at these crosses from another angle; we can't escape seeing the potential for good in this graveyard for the poor. I guess that's a strange thing to say, but think about it. Is there good in death?

The truth is, because of these deaths, many gang fights never occurred. People were never murdered, never raped, never robbed. Hundreds of fatherless or motherless children were never born.

The surrounding community of Fausto is filled with the living ... and is plagued with drugs and violence of all kinds, the same things that populated this cemetery. Innocent little kids, many of them fatherless, growing up to become the same dark community.

In this valley of death I don't like to think about the unseen ... the spiritual side of this cemetery, or any cemetery. The many that blindly fell over the side of the living and dropped into eternity without knowing God; without knowing their destiny. Leaving life alone, and with nothing, absolutely nothing!

Never knowing that the cross above them was intended by God to save them before death not post them after death.

A BAD BATTERY

Saturday night I stopped by Isidro's house in the evening to let he and Luis off ... it was a long day of checking out orphanages. I was tired and ready for home.

When I got back into my SUV. to return home ... my car wouldn't start! Oh! Oh! No battery! No lights. No nothing! ... here in Pana!

Pana is well known to be a bad area at night, especially if you're a Gringo and your car is dead. A couple of houses down the street two steel doors were pulled open. A mom 'n pop tire repair shop appeared which looked like any other house ... Seeing that I needed help, two Mexican men motioned me inside.

My first thought was ... is this the last of von? But at this point what are my options?

I put the car in neutral and slowly coasted in ... the men lifted the hood and started cleaning the battery, pulled it out and with a make-shift charger fast charged it.

During our conversation I told him who I was and who we were. The man, Ramon, who spoke good English, said " Oh, I've heard of you; you guys are the ones who help people."

What a relief!

When they were finished, I asked him how much for the battery charge. "No charge!" He wouldn't take a cent. "Don't let the engine die ..."

Thanks I said, and headed for home with an engine and lights.

It's nice, if you're going to be in a bad area in Tijuana on a dark night ... to be known for doing good.

Note: Two days later I returned and brought him a set of wrenches. I noted that night he only had a pair of pliers and a screw driver.

UNLOVED BOYS

I've never felt unloved. It must be a terrible feeling. Yesterday, in Tijuana, I took twelve year old Isidro shopping ... not for clothes or food but for an orphanage that he would feel comfortable in.

I don't like that kind of shopping.

What hurts most of all is that Isidro isn't a bad kid (yet.) He's a thin quiet boy who goes to school even though he isn't encouraged to. On off days you might find he and his buddy Luis working along a local dirt road, filling the big pot holes and hoping some drivers will give them a tip. They earned $4. one day. The other day he proudly showed me his watermelon plant and tomato plant near the house.

Twelve, the critical age.

He knows I like figs, so after I left he climbed a neighbor's fig tree and picked me a load of ripe figs, but I didn't return for about a week ... so much for the figs.

To his stepfather Isidro is a threat; to his alcoholic mother he's a liability. It seems the only one who really loves him is his dog.

At one point in the 'shopping' tour we sat alone in an orphanage and talked about the changes he would experience becoming part of an orphanage. The freedom he would have to give up, and the rules and discipline he would have to accept.

I told him very clearly; it's an orphanage or the street, you have to choose.

Isidro sat looking into my eyes and listening. No questions. No emotion.

In the afternoon we arrived back at the small shack he calls home, I told him to think things over and be sure of his decision. I'll be back Saturday, when he's to give me his decision.

As we got out of the car, his mother met us on the street. "Why did you bring him back? I thought you were going to leave him at an orphanage!"

How would you feel if you were Isidro?

My world is full of unloved and worthless kids ... but who really cares?