The Shoebox

 My name is Kathleen, and I was born in Los Angeles within a family struggling with addiction issues of different forms. My mother was a registered nurse working graveyard shift with a dependence on Demerol. She stole the drug from work, self-medicating to deal with her issues & yet undiagnosed schizophrenia.                                                  

My mother, Christmas 1970

My father had issues with control, money, and keeping his house in order. Many weekends, he drove across the border in Tijuana to purchase baby Amazon parrots and smuggled them back to Los Angeles stashed underneath the backseat of his convertible 69" Karmann Ghia. He did this on a regular basis, and I now realize that back home, he raised the them & sold the adult birds for profit.

My first memory ever is lying down in my crib as an infant, with the white bars surrounding me, and a small mobile overhead. In the crib with me, and all around were snakes, eels, scorpions, and spiders, busily crawling throughout my crib. In the next instant, I am up high, overhead, watching the tiny baby in her crib struggling to be with these creatures, and feeling helpless to do anything. 

                                                                          

The author, age 2 in 1970

In 1977 Social services showed up at the home, with court paperwork ordering both myself & older sister to be taken away from our parents, claiming them unfit. Much later I found out there was a collective effort between neighbors and police officers to have "the children taken out of the family situation", and that very evening we were taken away to Mc Laren Hall, in El Monte California. I was nine years old.

Being taken away from an abusive & neglectful family was very scary & shocking, no matter what was going on...as this was the only home I knew. 

Mac Laren Hall was opened in the 1940's, and it's original purpose was to house neglected & unwanted youth, but by our arrival in the late seventies, it seemed more like a prison for children. In 2003 it was closed permanently due to hundreds of allegations of abuse to the children housed there.

We arrived during evening hours, after a Social Worker intercepted my mother's schedule due to threats of arrest. My sister & I  had only the clothes on our back when they picked us up, and I can remember the starkness of the facility with bright florescent lights shining overhead. They separated us due to our age gap, my sister was 13, & I was 9, and took me to the "Children's ward" with box-style bedrooms where the furniture was bolted to the ground. The heavy block door had a window, and not much else. As she was leaving, the Social worker handed me a white shoebox. 

Opening the shoebox, I saw let out a heavy sigh of relief as inside were the basic necessities I would need for the next couple of weeks, during my time at Mc Laren Hall. The shoebox held a toothbrush, toothpaste, hair comb & barrettes. There was also a small toy inside the box, and I held it for a long time, wondering if my sister also got one. I felt extremely grateful to receive this gift, and wondered where it came from. 

Mc Laren Hall seemed like a prison of sorts...with tall concrete walls, plain plastic chairs, and many of the children there already in self-destruction mode. Fights & threats were common, with the older kids ganging up on the smaller ones. Abandonment was everywhere, and few parents came to see their children...so many were gone, high, or just didn't seem to care. Early on, I was able to realize just how lucky we were, our parents were close by & did seem to care. Within one month my sister & I were both placed together in the same foster home just a few miles away.

Forty-five years later, I had completely forgotten about these memories until my neighbor showed me her latest attempt to reach out to a child in need during the Holiday season.  She pulled out a red & white printed shoebox that her church had given her with instructions how-to fill it...and the memories came rushing back. I saw myself sitting on the edge of a bed at Mc Laren Hall with the shoebox on my lap.

Inspired,  I signed up to be able to fill a Shoe box for child. This Holiday season I was able to "Pay it Forward" and do for others. This brought tremendous satisfaction, joy, and healing for me, truly showing me how blessed I am. 

I filled it up with the basics, tooth brush & paste, 4 pairs of cotton socks, hairbrush & set of barrettes. For fun I added sunglasses & hand mirror, imaging a young woman opening the box. Feeling nostalgic & grateful to be of service & find a company that does this on a large-scale. That shoebox was an anchor to me, holding me steady as uncertainty & drama made me feel I was sinking. It brought me hope & reassurance that I can still feel today. 

I'm happy to see that "Samaritan's Purse", a Christian Humanitarian Aid organizes & distributes these "shoeboxes" to various churches around Southern California. It was founded in 1970, and focuses on crisis relief & development. It is a 501 Tax Exempt Charity. 

The website "Charity Navigator" gives this organization a 4 Star rating, I was glad to discover. My sole purpose of writing this piece was to let people know the relief a child can feel when it is helped. In no way shape or form am I trying to promote any organization whatsoever. May we all reach out to help a child in need, for they are the future. Blessings on you dear reader.  🕯