Reflecting: A Way to Prepare
for What Might Lie
Ahead
Dear Readers,
Welcome to the first edition of Literacy Links for 2006! A new year gives
us space to not only make resolutions and to hold a promise to the coming
year, but it also gives us a chance to reflect on the year that has recently
passed. For many, this last year’s series of devastating natural
disasters altered their lives in ways I am sure they could not have possibly
anticipated a year ago. The space we imagine for ourselves as we make lofty
resolutions at the start of each year is seldom the space we occupy a year
later. How many of you are resolving yet again to take off those pesky
10 pounds for good this year?
The events and stories of this past year caused me to stop and catch my
heart skipping a beat on more than one occasion. It was just six short
months ago that I used these pages to describe to you how I had reached
my goal of home ownership. I explained how it was the goal of providing
a place large enough for all of my family to stay when visiting me that
helped to motivate me while I saved for 10 years before purchasing a home
of my own.
Well, I believe blessings are seldom disguised, so it was my honor to
be able to use my new home to provide shelter to my family from New Orleans
who were directly affected by Hurricane Katrina. As my uncle was still
anxiously waiting to learn if my aunt, an ER nurse and hospital administrator
had survived the hurricane and subsequent levees breaking, I was trying
desperately to get his daughter out of New Orleans and here to Texas to
live with me. While the frantic “hurry up and wait” of those
days seems far away and the details are gradually dulling in my memory,
the lessons I learned about how life can change in an instant remain with
me. I also learned that when life changes so drastically, so quickly, that
it takes your breath away, it is through the kindness of others that you
learn to survive it.
It took me five days to get my cousin here to Texas. Each day she got
a little closer, traveling from one town to the next through the help of
friends she had made throughout her childhood. It was once she made her
way to Baton Rouge to stay with a former classmate that I finally felt
I had some control over the situation as I planned to drive into Louisiana
to get her. And while I do not remember who put the thought into my head
to call the airlines, it was the kindness of an airline agent who finally
arranged to fly her to Houston. Safe and exhausted she exchanged with me
a hug that translated simply into “thank you.”
While I was helping my cousin adjust to life in College Station, Texas,
Peggy Sue Durbin, the editor of this newsletter was working tirelessly
to help displaced families make the transition to our community. As the
owner of several rental properties, she provided housing to families who
were in desperate need. She spearheaded collection drives and diligently
provided for the families that she was in essence adopting. My cousin and
the families Peggy Sue was helping to provide for had barely settled into
their new lives before we braced ourselves for Hurricane Rita.
This time I was able to open my home to several individuals from the Houston
area who needed a place to stay while they rode out the storm. Again, the
blessings of having the new house were apparent. While I pumped the air
into seven air mattresses, and tried to think where to put the 12 individuals,
who might be staying with me indefinitely, I was grateful to be in the
position to be able to grant assistance. And while the storm was a bullet
many of us missed, others were not so lucky.
In the months that have followed the hurricanes, earthquakes, fires, and
the tsunami of 2004, it has become instinctual to reflect on these disasters
and to think about how to prepare for and respond to any number of crises.
It is with these recent disasters in mind that this edition of Literacy
Links was prepared. It seems responsible and fitting to give individuals
the space to reflect and to describe the events as they experienced them.
We hope that you will resonate with the message of Anthony Gabriel’s
article, which asks for readers to see these disasters as an opportunity
for literacy beyond just rebirth and reconstruction. We also feel it is
important for you to be informed as to what the response by the field of
adult literacy has been. Robert Pinhero, Vice Chair of ProLiteracy America’s
Governance Council offers insight into the steps ProLiteracy has taken
in the wake of the recent disasters. While it is hard to be truly comforted
after any natural disaster, we hope that you will find this article reassuring
in its description of ProLiteracy’s efforts to help. Since we believe
all events can be educative ones, we hope you will find useful the article
on using FEMA materials to help your ESL and GED students deal with disasters.
In the same scope, the article on the Home Safety Literacy Project is one
that we think provides invaluable information. Many stories of heroes
have emerged in the aftermath of the recent hurricanes and the entire Ysleta
Community Learning Center can certainly be included in that category.
Their story of how they responded to the recent disasters is a poignant
one. The young lady who donated the money she had been saving to buy a
cake for her Quinceañera certainly moved me.
It is my sincerest wish that all of the articles in this issue will move
you to reflect, to resolve, and most importantly to remember the year that
has recently passed. For it is only in reflecting and remembering that
we can begin to prepare for what may lie ahead. While my cousin has returned
to Louisiana and her life has begun to resemble something close to normalcy,
she still works a little bit each day to discover the meaning in what
has transpired in what she had thought was to be one of the best years
of her life (her last year as a college student at Tulane University).
And each day I think she gets a
little bit closer. My wish for this year is that we all do.
Best wishes for the New Year and happy reading,
Dr. Dominique T. Chlup
Director of TCALL &
Principal Investigator on the Clearinghouse Project
  
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