I am not convinced
the court, or any system without the nurturing skills of a mother’s touch, or a
father’s knowing can shape a child better. To honor the sacred teachings
planted, and activated within Eddie is to restore balance where balance wavered
in the care of those who know and love, and understand, at the deepest levels,
the hows of raising a boy into his manhood, which is, as he is learning, full
of perils, rewards, lessons, consequences, and forces to master from within.
The story of a man is the story of a child. It is the story
of a search for treasures, and the life of Edgardo is no different.
Since the time of his early teens, when I first met him, I have been captivated
by what shone, what was planted, and developed within him by the skill of his
parents. It separated him from his peers, and left him curious about life, and
how to live it. How to continue what is good and right within his development
is the center question and task upon the table.
We met in the mountains of Virginia on a Rotary sponsored
camping trip some years ago that has become an annual event since then. The
mountains illuminate the essential core of every living thing amongst its
boulders, its foliage, mystery and dramas, and its deep investments in the forests
we all slept in, and explored. Eddie, like any kid, explored. For a child it is
the exploration of a thing that makes it one’s own. For a man child at this
stage of his life the exploration of excellence he has been fashioned from, who
he is, and where he fits, and his quest to give birth to who he is needs to be
in the possibilities of his life outside of a prison system incapable of
restoring or developing light within a young man whom many have invested so
much into the promise of his contribution to the world we share, and hope to
make better.
- Dawn Wolf, Keeper of Stories
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