With the struggle: Beauty and Horror

I had a nice morning a few days ago. After laser frogs woke me up (they sound like bweiw! bweiw!) I read a little bit in the hammock and warmed up some tinto (strong, black and very sweet coffee) that I had made yesterday. Using the customary black rubber boots, I crossed the rain engorged stream between the FOR house and the house of Lucia, a new friend. Maryeli, Lucia’s oldest daughter, was outside getting two horses ready to go the 1.5 hours down to the nearest town. I stayed a while in Lucia’s house trying to maintain conversation and throwing Lucia and her daughters into fits of laughter with my attempts to cook eggs, catch a cat, speak, etc. After coming back to the FOR house, I had just started warming up some more tinto when a large Colombian military helicopter appeared over the hill right behind Lucia’s house. The made-in-the-USA helicopter circled the small community of La Union (where we live) low enough that I could see the faces of the soldiers inside and then disappeared behind a hill further down the mountain from La Union. I, and others who also had come outside, heard it stay there until it reappeared, circled La Union again and flew out of sight. I returned to the house to find I had burnt the tinto.

I’m surrounded by beauty and horror in the peace community. While I relish the prevalence of heavy rains, birdsong, peaceful mornings, budding friendships, shared food, and laughing with strangers I’m also always aware of the horror of threats, loss, fear, and violent death. It’s hard for me to understand or piece together how they can coexist. Its neither beautiful nor horrifying here; its both, depending on the moment you’re in, with the other always lurking, waiting to show itself as the Mr. Hyde of the context. These first two weeks I’ve mostly experienced the beauty of this dynamic. But the horror creeps in or saturates every experience whether it be through rumors of nearby troops, shots heard at night, painful stories of the not so distant past, fears expressed, helicopter fly-overs or just the ever-present knowledge that you live in a community that is threatened by its own government. In the midst of a life of work, rest, and fellowship that I’ve come to enjoy I feel the presence of the military daily as well as the living memory of over 150 community members they’ve been involved in killing.

It’s been about three weeks that I’ve been in the community and I’m very happy to be here but also look forward to maturing in my relationships with people here and with my understanding of the struggle of the community. From my arrival it’s been obvious that my time here will seriously affect me, hopefully more on the beauty side and less on the horror. I hope that all of you are well and able to find or create beauty in your lives wherever you are. In the mean time, enjoy some photos that I’ve posted below.