Guarded

Fires are up. Well, that's an understatement, the fires are the worst they've been in California history.

But it's not gardening I want to talk about today. Or fires.

Luana, the woman guard who has been downstairs for what, 3 years?, is leaving.

She's a level-headed woman in her 50s who I think lives down in the inner city.

She'd been gone for several weeks and I'd worried about her, because she's there every morning at 8:00am when I come in. She's always smiling and has a bit of that "well, hell, we're all working here" attitude that I always like. But she's a damn hard worker and incredibly nice.

She came back one morning and I said, "Hey Luana! We missed you around here!" (It's not that either of us ever has a lot of time to speak in the morning, but I had to figure out what was going on). "I thought you'd left us!"

She laughed and replied with her Southernish accents, "Aw Tim, you know I wouldn't do that. I was taking care of a family emergency."

"I'm sorry to hear. What happened?"

"Aw, my aunt died after a long battle with cancer."

"Oh, Luana, I'm sorry."

"That's okay, she was sick and she's in a better place now."

I agreed.

"You know, September's going to always be a hard month. My brother was murdered in September. My uncle was shot. And now this."

I told her I was sorry again. Honestly, I didn't know what to say.

"And problem with my aunt is, she's got four foster kids and they said they was going to put them back in the system since there's no one to take 'em. So they've all moved in with me."

Which is right around the time I went into shock. Here's this woman, with grown kids on her own, taking in four foster kids, with an array of history and problems, into her home. The oldest 16 and the youngest 5.

My first thought was, "Are you crazy? Do you know what the hell this is going to do to your life? How it's going to shake it the hell apart?" Wendy and I had already taken in a teen, our niece, for a little over a year and her general lack of discipline and our straight-and-narrow made for terrible bedfellows. It ended badly.

So this was the story several weeks ago. Yesterday she told me she's leaving.

"Tim, these kids have a lot of special needs. I've got to run them all around town to therapists, doctors. Sometimes I have to go to three appointments a day. I can't do that and keep this job."

I suggested maybe the building that employed her would let her stay on a flex schedule.

"Naw, I already tried that, and it's not going to work. They're trying everything they can to make me stay, but it's better to leave while they still love me."

I didn't ask her how she was going to make ends meet. I don't know. I know that foster care will give you money for each child, I'm just not sure if that's enough for everyone in her house to live on.

Of course part of me feels bad for losing her, I love seeing her everyday. But I told her anyway, "You're doing the right thing. You're changing the course of these kids' lives. And that's a really honorable thing to do."

I don't know what I'd do in similar circumstances. Not at all. Hopefully I'll never have to face it. Hopefully if I ever do, like Luana, I'll know what to do.

It is funny, you see someone every day, an acquaintance you see, the teller at the bank, the postman, the UPS guy, but you may have absolutely no idea what's going on in their lives, or how similar their lives are to yours.

Or mine.

We're talking about me here, Mr. Know-It-All-Seen-It-All.

I'm glad I talked to Luana. I'm glad she's my friend. I'm glad she's taking care of those kids who probably never had a first chance, so someone else can give them their second.