¡Meet
Maria! Written 2014 Mayo
One thing there is no shortage of here in Chile is
interesting people who are living difficult lives. Maria is a woman in her 70’s. She lives alone in a small house here in Los Vilos. Well, almost alone. Her son ‘un borracho’
(Roberto) as she introduced him lives ‘around’ her house. He sleeps on the
front porch stoop at night to guard over her home and during the day he hovers
in the back patio area and slips in and out of the house when she isn’t looking
to raid the fridge. He’s seldom invited in but you can tell she loves him. Maria is very hard of hearing, even
when she has her hearing aid on.
Dale and Pres. Jerez visited her at her home and soon
afterwards she fell ill (not due to the visit hopefully) and asked for a blessing.
She had been in the hospital so they picked her up in the car, gave her a ride
back home and then a blessing.
Evidently she had been in the hospital for several days because upon
entering her home they we all greeted with quite a situation. Her cats had been shut up in her
hogar. There was excrement all
over and several of her ‘grandma’s collection items’ (vases, urns, figurines
etc) were broken. It was a
wreck and the smell was horrible.
Another week or two passed and I was invited to go visiting
teaching to this same house. Maria
could not hear us knocking at her door nor could she hear the ring of her phone
when we tried to call her. We left
but later returned for a 2nd try. At last her son (Roberto) came out from around back. He said
he would get her and soon disappeared into the rear section of the patio. We heard him as he proceeded to yell
very loudly and pounded on her back entrance. It worked and Maria woke up!
She let us in the front door. The smell of cat urine was
still very strong in her home even though the mess had been cleaned up. As we
began chatting a white cat came out from under the couch. I watched as it
jumped from the floor to the sofa then to the table top and proceeded climbing
up her lace curtains at the front window clawing and shredding them. Soon, another white cat pushed inside
the front door which hadn’t been latched tightly and I saw a third cat waiting
outside. She said she only owned one cat.
We’ve noticed that most of the cats and dogs here seem to enter homes,
stores, restaurants and churches at will.
Often they are ‘shooed’ out but if you are in any way agressive to an
animal you are frowned upon. Due
to Hna Marias hearing loss her speech is a bit slurred but she is still
understandable. (Uh, that is if you can understand Spanish ;)
Well, last Sunday Marie was asked to share a few remarks in
Sacrament Mtg. When it was her turn, she gathered her scriptures and purse and
headed up to the pulpit to deliver her talk. She is very intelligent and has a beautiful, strong
testimony of Jesus Christ. About 3
minutes into her talk the chapel erupted with the sound of her cell phone
ringing. She has to set it really
loud so she can hear it, but it turns out she was the only one in the
congregation who couldn’t hear it.
She had set her purse on the side of the pulpit/podium and so one of the
members of the branch presidency, hoping to help her, reached for it
(hesitantly and timidly, using only his thumb and index finger). He soon realized it wasn’t in her purse
but on her body. She was wearing a
sweater with a large pocket on the side, so he lightly tapped that as she came
all of a sudden came to understand that it was her cell phone ringing! At this point she gasped and flung
aside the scarf at her neck, and reaching into her bosom, she retrieved her
cell-phone and turned it off.
(Luckily she didn’t answer it J)
I would be lying to say this was the only exciting moment of
this meeting. Meetings are seldom
normal here. On Mother’s Day
little 9 year old Carlota, was sitting next to me. She had a small balloon filled with flour (rather than air).
It had a face drawn with marker on it.
During the meeting she stretched it a little too far, once too often and
it EXPLODED, spraying flour all over herself, the pew and the floor. I managed
to escape the worst of it. Her mom
was sooooo distraught and began trying to clean it up with her fingers and
scraping it together into piles with pieces of paper. It is by far the biggest mess I have ever seen in the chapel
(yes, even worse than vomit).
Clouds of flour dust covered Carlota’s black knit pants, dark hair and
chubby cheeks as she tried to help her mom. Seriously I thought her mom would never return due to
embarrassment. At the end of the
meeting we asked an Elder (Beck) to get the vacuum and I explained to her
mother that one day she would look back on this incident and laugh about it. I
had to reassure her it was OK and that everyone that has ever had a child
understood. She broke down and
cried pretty hard. She was ready to go home but they stayed through the rest of
the meetings. Carlota has some learning problems so I know her mom is pretty
stressed at how out-of-control she can get.
Sadly one of the other interruptions for this meeting (the
original meeting I was writing about) turned out to be a heart-attack of one of
the husband/fathers of a family. He is not a member & was at home when it
happened. His wife and 2 (grown) children were scattered in the chapel (one
sitting up front on the stand) so each in his own turn, received news of the
emergency (via text?) and gathering up their things, left. The father is OK now and expected to
recover fully. I spent much of my
time during this same meeting helping to entertain a little boy about 4 years
old and his sister (2yrs) so their grandma (or great aunt?) could listen to the
talks. She usually has her hands full with the kids and doesn’t seem to have an
abundance of patience. Sometimes she is louder in trying to shush & corral
them & get them to be quiet, than the kids are. It was fun for me to help out but she knew I was
caring for them so when the 2 year old escaped out of the chapel a few times it
was me chasing her! I always
love the look on little kids’ faces when they hear me try to speak
Spanish. They know I am worse than
them!
*PS-I wrote this post a few weeks ago. This past weekend
Roberto passed away. We visited
Maria and she told us it all happened in 10min. It was probably due to liver
cirrhosis but he ended up having a heart attack. By the time she had run (4-5blocks down the street) to the
hospital to get help and returned he was gone. She is very upset to lose one of her children. He was about
50years old. It is very shocking
how many people have very short lives here. Health care is Gov. run and really
horrible. We know so many maimed, crippled, deaf and blind people who would not
be thus if they had had the good fortune to live in the USA. (Not sure how long that will remain
true with all the current issues going on with health-care, immigration
etc. We are praying for our dear
country!)
PSS.... One more update to Meet Maria (Arancivia)
One of Robertos friends that went to Marias house to be with the
family and share in their grief and memories at the time of his death, went out
back to the patio area. They had a fire going to stay warm and he somehow
got too close and caught on fire. Maria told us about this when we last
visited her. The ambulence came to her house and he was taken to the La
Serena hospital. (a few hours to the north). I learned last week
that he too passed away.
Senior Missionaries
Valparaiso from a distance
Valpo - houses being rebuilt from a fire
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