Ella’s Story
May 01, 2005
I’ve known Ella for a long time. In my first encounter with her, she was trying to kill a dog. She had cornered this old stray dog in the upstairs of an abandoned house in our neighborhood. The loud noise drew me to see what on earth was going on. I found Ella, beating this old dog with a broom. I yelled at her and told her to stop; she did and promptly left the house without speaking. Speaking wasn’t something she did much of. I would see her many times roaming the neighborhood with her backpack. I would wave, trying to be friendly. Sometimes she would wave back; other times, an angry stare was all I would receive. My next memorable encounter with her was one evening when I was leading a small group Bible study in the community. Ella had obviously heard about the open door policy and decided to drop in. She was late, but we welcomed her quietly, and quickly continued with the study. She listened for a short time, then raised her hand to be called on. I recognized her, anxiously waiting to hear what question she might have. A question never came. She put her hand down when I recognized her and said, “I know who you are....you’re that judge; I know what you’re up to, I’ve been watching you. You’re undercover getting information about my people.” With that, she got up and left the building leaving all of us speechless. It wasn’t too long after this when I realized Ella lived behind us with her mother. Several friends gave me pieces of information about Ella. I collected them and began to understand she had a mental condition, and wasn’t in her right mind most of the time. I began to see her more often walking through the neighborhood. As time passed, something changed because she would speak and seemed to be more relaxed, even smiling from time to time. I came to learn that she was taking medication, which allowed her to deal with her condition. Several years have passed since these early encounters with Ella. The latest one was from a distance. I was driving home one very cold evening, and as I turned the corner I saw a fire. Coming closer I realized it was in Ella’s front yard. She built a small fire and was warming herself by it. This seemed strange. I didn’t think her mother would permit this kind of thing, even though she wasn’t hurting anyone or anything. The next morning, as I drove by, I saw Ella bringing things out of the house to put on the fire. That’s when I knew something had happened. Sure enough, I came to find out that her mother had passed away. Ella was still in her right mind, but she was cold and she was doing what she had to do to stay warm on that cold winter night. Soon afterwards, I saw that her house was up for a tax sale by the city. Ella didn’t have any money and probably knew nothing about paying property taxes. The house was sold at the auction and I haven’t seen Ella since. Her situation was so fragile that it surprised me. I really never thought about what would happen to Ella when her mother was no longer there to watch over her. It just seemed like one day Ella had a place to live, food to eat, and someone to remind her to take her medicine, and then this system that cared for Ella was gone. At least from my observation, Ella had no safety net to insure that she would have someone to care for her. The poor, oftentimes, have to rely on extended family as their support system. If a single mother goes to prison, then someone in the family steps forward to care for the children. If someone dies, whomever or whatever is left behind is absorbed into the remaining family system. The family is the structure that insures that there is someplace for those caught in these difficult situations. Family is the structure that provides this care system for everyone, rich or poor. But over the last couple of decades, we’ve seen this system begin to break down. More marriages now end in divorce than those keeping their commitments to each other. More and more children are born into single parent situations. The number of grandparents raising grandchildren has increased substantially. The uncertainty of what constitutes a family is increasingly in question. All of these things are telling signs of our future. Historically, the extended family has always been the stable institution that has sustained humanity. I’m not a professional sociologist, but in my limited experience in working with problems that plague our city and our neighborhoods, I can clearly see that most of them can be traced back to a breakdown of the family. Healthy cities are made up of healthy neighborhoods that are made up of healthy individuals. Individuals gain their healthy perspective from their childhood and how they grew up. We know that families provide the platform to insure that children grow up healthy. Any conversation with a seasoned youth worker will reveal that they can usually pick out the children that have healthy family situations. The behavior, attitudes and self-image of these children are many times different from the others. Ella’s story is tragic and sad. The poor are many times living on the edge. I realize how quickly things can change. All any of us have is this day that God has given us. When crisis or tragedy happens and breaks down the family structure, the Christian family can step in. As people who believe that God desires us to bear our brother’s burden and give of ourselves to those in need, shouldn’t we offer this support? Ella, I realize now that I could very well have failed you because I didn’t respond. I’m not sure if I’ll ever see you again, but I’m grateful for the lesson I’ve learned from knowing you.
Cityscapes is written by Chris Martin, President, Knoxville Leadership Foundation.
