He was pushing his wife Betty down Harding Place near Interstate 24 around 9:00 at night. I asked, “Where are you going?” Johnny quietly replied, “McDonalds.”
If you were to look into the lives of those on the street you would often find a life of minor criminal offenses, drug use, signs of alcohol abuse and more. If you only glanced over the surface one might come to the conclusion, “He or she is a bad person.” However, you have to look deeper than the surface to understand that most on the street had a life of tragedy that most of us would not understand. For many, those tragedies and traumas started in their childhood and one traumatic event after the other continued into their adult lives – all events untreated by professional help.
As for Johnny and Betty, they have been married for the past 17 years. They have been each other’s rock throughout those years and have helped each other in many ways.
Last night when I saw the two, Johnny had just dropped off Betty’s prescription for insulin, she is a diabetic. He told me, “I will pick it up tomorrow – it will only be $18 because we have insurance with only a small co-pay.” He then leaned over to me and whispered as if afraid to say it out loud, “She also has breast cancer.”
The two live in a small tent and Johnny showed me a heater they just received from a friend who is part of Open Table Nashville. “See, it attaches to propane tanks and it keeps us warm at night,” he told me while describing how it works. I smiled and asked, “You need some extra propane to stay warm?”
My friend Joel Vernon and I then headed to Walmart and bought six tanks of propane for the two. When we returned and met them at McDonalds, they were full of joy. The smiles cost the us $24, but will keep them warm for six nights. Little Things.
"Life is made up, not of great sacrifices or duties, but of little things, in which smiles and kindness, and small obligations given habitually, are what preserve the heart and secure comfort." - Humphry Davy (1778-1829), Cornish chemist and inventor
Diabetic in a Third World Country
For those who know me, you know I don’t like to be real serious. I prefer to see people smile and laugh. When I was in the area of LaRepresa I met this woman who had a great sense of humor.
She lives in a small wooden home made of what appeared to be wooden slats or clapboard. My friend Leslie greeted her by saying “Feliz Navidad (Merry Christmas).” That is just about the only thing that Leslie can say in Spanish, but this young lady got a real kick out of it considering it is October. She even did a little dance for us and then invited us to sit on her front porch.
Her home, with a thick concrete floor, was very neat and clean inside. I noticed on a shelf she had several whiskey bottles, all empty. I jokingly said to her with the help of a translator, “I see you are a big fan of whiskey.” She laughed and said, “No, no – I like the bottles, they are good for decoration (No, no - Me gustan las botellas, que son buenos para la decoración).”
Our conversation then turned a little more serious. She told of how she suffers from diabetes and her blood sugar level is currently too high. I felt bad for her because high blood sugar levels can make you feel sick to your stomach, weak and groggy. Despite those pains, she still managed to laugh at some of the things I had to say when I told her I was a crazy American (Americano loco).
She told me she receives her medication from the nearby Farmacia del Pueblo El Caobal (The Pharmacy in El Caobal). I asked if she was out of medication and she smiled and said, “No.”
In 2014, there were 669,000 cases of diabetes in the Dominican Republic. Keep in mind the country is about half the size of the state of Tennessee, but has well over 10-million residents.
Despite her illness she had a great laugh. She loves her husband who works hard daily and she loves her home. You can’t get much better than that.
“I see skies of blue, and clouds of white,
The bright blessed day, the dark sacred night
And I think to myself
What a wonderful world.”
-Louis Armstrong