Brazilian Teenagers After a Downpour

Rain
Originally uploaded by Blue Dragonfly Girl

A week ago today, I got caught in a terrific downpour on my way home from my internship. Of course, I hadn't remembered my umbrella. Worse than that, I'd considered taking it, but thought, "Nah!" Eventually I stopped caring about getting wet (it was too late for that) and just started enjoying myself.

A few blocks away from the hostel, with the rain subsiding, I found myself behind a group of teenagers, dressed mostly in black clothing. They were giggling and doing silly things (pressing all the call buttons outside an apartment building and then running away, for example) and skipping over puddles. Like me, they were soaking wet.

One of the girls turned to me and said, "Will you give me a hug?"

I paused for a second to comprehend and then said, "Ok."

Inwardly, I felt a bit nervous. Everyone I talk to is reminding me to take precautions, to be careful.

But at the same point, I didn't want to deny a hug. It was part of the fun that she was half joking and half genuine.

We hugged.

I was quite aware of how my bag was hanging and aware that no movement was being made towards it. Though I'm sure in that moment someone could have pick-pocketed me without me noticing. So, I was a little tense. But, I was trying to overcome that because it just felt like extra, unnecessary weight.

"Don't worry," said one of the other boys, laughing, and reading my subconscious fears, "We're not going to assault you."

"No, we love you" said the hugging girl and then repeated in English this time, "I love you." They were laughing. I laughed.We smiled. I felt a lot of love for them.

Our paths parted ways.

And I just smiled to myself about that little encounter. Who knows what they were intending. Really, it didn't matter. I'm sure it was a spontaneous part of their antics. The energy behind it was silly and sweet. Reminding me that sometimes it's good to let down our guard a little, just to trust in a wet hug with a stranger on a street corner, because maybe that's exactly what we need.

Dedication

Looking Out
Originally uploaded by Blue Dragonfly Girl

I found out in an email that a friend of mine just died in a motorcycle accident early this morning. Like me, he was in his late 20s.

I hadn`t seen him since high school, but we still talked on the phone every once in a while and laughed a lot together while we caught up on each other's lives. The last contact I had with him was a few text messages exchanged on his birthday last March. I met him when I was 15-years-old at a meditation retreat in New Hampshire. I was smitten with this curly-haired boy and his sweet smile.

I can't believe he's gone. He wasn't in my daily life. We lived in different parts of the country and our paths didn't cross much. But he has had a place in my heart since we were teenagers.

I feel that overwhelming sadness and pain at trying to comprehend that someone whose presence-at-a-distance I took for granted, is now no longer here.

I recall lines from a publication I have been reading about a program for youth in conflict with the law in Porto Alegre*. I'll roughly translate a bit of it here:

"...we were able to confirm that a majority of them [adolescents in the program] lived with death as a daily presence in their lives...It's hard to find one of them who in one moment or another didn't make reference to someone close to them who had died and most often of a violent death. Relatives, brothers, uncles, cousins and even their parents or neighbors, friends or fellow gang members." (p. 108)

I realize how privileged I am to be 28-years-old and mourning, for the first time, the death of someone I care about, who was my age. It overwhelms me to imagine the depths of the losses experienced by the adolescents that I will be working with through my internship...
 
I start tomorrow morning at 8:30 AM. 

In yoga people often dedicate their practice to a theme or a goal or a person. And so, I want to dedicate the next four months that I spend with these youth, who have been through so much already in their young lives, to the memory of my friend, who is gone from this life far too soon.

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* Craidy, C. M. & Gonçalves, L. L. (2005). Medidas sócio-educativas: Da repressão á edução. Porto Alegre: UFRGS Editora.