La Blog de Annie: October 2009

Friday, October 30, 2009

The Great Falls at Paterson, New Jersey

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Some Desert Creatures...

A Gila Monster. Very rare. Very beautiful. I was writing in my journal one evening in camp when this one decided to walk up to me. Very strange, since they are generally quite shy. This is only the second one I've ever seen in my life. I have to say I was unnerved, if honored that it didn't seem to be frightened of me.

A tarantula. They are fairly common in these parts. I don't find them to be as unsettling as I would think. They are also quite beautiful.

A desert rat.

An Assortment of Desert Photos

This is a slashed water bottle, an all too common occurence. We write messages on the bottles that we leave; this one says "Que logren sus suenos" (may your dreams be realized). Ironic.

A former volunteer painted this flag for the camp. The virgencita is of course a well-known and loved image. The hope is that folks will see her and feel safe coming into camp for help, if they need it.

The last week of camp this summer... Week 17!

This picture makes me laugh because I look so exhausted... did I look that tired all summer?

The Last Few Weekends in the Desert

While I have been transitioning to life in Tucson over the past month, I am still in the desert pretty much every weekend.

I have seen fewer snakes lately (maybe they don't like the cold weather?), but this one was pretty good sized, no?

Ah, the desert sky... so amazing.

Just another sunset.

This is Pepan, the undocumented kitten. His name means butterfly in an indigenous language that is spoken in Chiapas. He spent the weekend in camp being adorable and was loved by everyone. I zipped him up inside my fleece to keep him warm and we were both quite content!

Monday, October 19, 2009

Davy!!!

Life in the Desert

Sorting out the logistics of who is going where in the morning...

The best place to ride...

Doing blister care.

Pensamientos

We must hope against hope. We are called to do so especially within a hopeless humanity that is more and more paralyzed by fear… fear is useless, and instead we must look for love far and wide.
- Oscar Andrés Cardinal Rodríguez

La calle es un espejo de
las formas de dominacion
y poder donde los mas
grandes y rapidos
intentan aplastar a los
mas pequenos y lentos.
El uso de la bicicleta,
como medio autonomo de
transporte, es una forma
de insurrection al
capitalismo. No
queremos ser grandes y
veloces como las autos,
ni mucho menos
poderosos, solo ser
libres...

As long as there is a United States of America, there will be territorial and social boundaries between it and the rest of the world. What is not given is the nature of those boundaries. Whether they are walls or bridges, or boundaries of death or of life, whether we perceive and treat those on the other side of those boundaries as inferior and less worthy of lives of multifaceted security, or as fully human and thus deserving of the same rights and privileges as us, is, as always, a matter up for grabs.
- Joseph Nevins

If I had any hatred, I wouldn’t have lasted at all.
Hatred is self-destructive… you have to have Love for a cause.
- Emma Tenayuca, labor organizer

Nothing is more practical than finding God, that is, falling in love in a quite absolute, final way. What you are in love with, what seizes your imagination, will affect every-thing. It will decide what will get you out of bed in the morning, what you will do with your evenings, how you will spend your weekends, what you read, who you know, what breaks your heart, and what amazes you with joy and gratitude. Fall in love. Stay in love. And it will decide everything.
- Pedro Arrupe, S.J.

To the question "Who do you say that I am?" we cannot give a merely theoretical or theological answer. What answers it, in the final analysis, is our life, our personal history, our manner of living the gospel.
- Gustavo Gutierrez

Because love is an act of courage, not of fear, love is commitment to others. No matter where the oppressed are found, the act of love is commitment to their cause - the cause of liberation.
- Paulo Freire

The average American consumes as much as 50 Haitians... What would happen if the fifty Haitians consumed as many cars, as many televisions, as many refrigerators or as many luxury goods as the one American? Nothing. Nothing would ever happen again. We would have to change planets. Ours, which is already close to catastrophe, couldn't take it.
The precarious equilibrium of the world depends on the perpetuation of injustice. So that some can consume more, people must continue to consume less. To keep people in their place, the system produces armaments. Incapable of fighting poverty, the system fights the poor.
-Eduardo Galeano

We are not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice, but we are to drive a spoke into the wheel itself.
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Solidarity is another name for the kind of love that moves feet, hands, hearts, material goods, assistance, and sacrifice toward the pain, danger, misfortune, disaster, repression or death of other persons or a whole people.
- Jon Sobrino, SJ