DOES THIS STORY BOTHER YOU?

 

As I arrived in the parking lot yesterday for my 5+ mile walk/run and still sitting in my van, I looked over to my left and there was a lady sitting in her truck and we both smiled at one another.  We were both gathering what we would bring along on our hikes.  I got my pedometer on my hip, water in my water holder, set my timer on my watch and off I went.  We went our separate ways and I was, as usual, ready to get going seriously. 

The lady in the van walked ahead of me at the beginning, but when it was time for me to jog, I passed her.  We stayed separated for quite a while, until she caught up with me and realized we walked about the same speed, which is power walking.

We started talking and soon we were like old friends.  She told me about an accident she was in where she broke both her knees.  How did she do that?  She was sitting in her car in the parking lot where she worked, eight months pregnant, when a street cleaning machine which was used to clean the parking lot ran into her pinning her chest and knees into the dashboard and a metal piece from the cleaning truck into her left side.  She was trapped against a building two hours that way.  She was even on TV.

Soon enough, she told me how she came to this country (illegally) from Mexico.  Her father was a matchmaker and when she was around 16 years old, her father told her she was going to marry a boy she didn't even know in two weeks.  So she and her girlfriend took a chance and ran over the border to the United States and made it.

She went to a church and the priest told her that he would let her stay there if she would clean the church and surroundings of the property, including landscaping.  So she did.  The priest, as well as the members belonging to the church, complemented her on what a great job she was doing.

Shortly after,  the priest learned of a doctor and his wife who had three kids and was on their way of having a set of twins.  She would now work for them.  They got her her Green Card, directed her on how to get a college education and become a nurse.  I don't know if these people paid for her education (most likely).

Does this story bother you?  It sure bothered me.