Chico, my friends...

LORD help me to speak with tact and an honest heart.

Know that in no way I'll be able to explain and expand on my current emotions, and the situations that have recently gone down. Just pray for a good friend of mine (Chico), and know that he's asking for prayers and well wishers, while he finds his place in a human holding facility.

Chico was my first well wisher upon my return to Thunder Bay and in less than a week, through a half hug and a cheep word of hope I had to say my good byes.

This is a story of a truly awesome individual and his journey from Ecuador to Canada, some regretful choices and the only promises being kept in life, being the promise of a life on the streets.

His life has been changed and changed and now seemed to be finding a consistent pace. He was able to kick some habits and find some new friends and programs to help him clean up for his daughter. He seriously lives for his daughter, I really don't know if I'll ever have that kind of love for someone, she was honestly ALLLL he had. But after an argument over custody with is ex, things were said, actions made and he found himself out of hope and possibly out of his daughters life. This was still over the summer, and now in a frustrating court hearing he found out he could be in a lot more trouble than expected. He has been able to see his daughter on and off through out the year but is not the current care giver and is having so much trouble with the person who is (not the mom). Another problem he's had is with Child and family services and the fact that the current care giver would honestly be a decent parent(which even he admits is good), but this care giver still is not the mother or father. And so Child and family seems to want him to give up on his daughter and let this other person raise his kid. He comes from messed up family situation and has never known a father or mother of his own and he can't bare the thought of his kid having the same life.

Unfortunately this last night brought him more misfortune and misunderstanding. Basically he said something to someone about still wanting to be a part of his daughters life, that someone passed it along to his ex and she took it as a threat, calling for an arrest under a breach of restraining order.


So this last night I spent with Chico talking, praying and frustratingly waiting for some arrogant jerks to come in, tell him that if he says anything they'll use it against him and demine him to cuffs. These guys were seriously such jerks. What I really didn't like was they came in asking question without listening to the answers. So I thought I would help everyone understand but I was told I was 'obstructing the peace' by trying to explain through Chico's Spanish accent. Then when I questioned the definition of 'obstruction the peace' they said they could define it however they felt; which was total shat! So I said "really you can make up laws on the spot?"... after that the tension mostly dissipated. But I got so pissed again when after they had him in the car they talked about who would bring him in to 'get a domestic' ; I guess they have some sort of a-whole points on the force.

Another person I have a very hard time not hating is a Mr. Hopkinson, his 'defense' lawyer that he had 2 days earlier at his court hearing to settle the past restraining order. This man may be over worked and under funded but the fact that he carried a complete lack of emotion a non-repentant or simpatico candice as he carried forward a case he was not prepaired to forward, made me want to puke all over his face. I couldn't believe that his client didn't know the Crowns allegation, what he was going to plead, even his options made me so sick; the only words he was giving was Jan. 12, 9AM be there. The whole hearing was a joke, there was no address from the defendant no witnesses questioned, just an ill prepaired lawyer and a very very confused man who did not know what tomorrow would hold or what was going on. The fact that the rest of his life is altered by a single verb... 'guilty'...... blows my mind. The whole hearing, I couldn't believe that this was it. That this short confusing and one sided 30min session could be the determiner of lives (his daughters and his).

This life is seriously E-ffed for a lot of people.

Ignorance may make a man into a criminal, but it doesn't make him into a sinner.

Pray for this man!

Pray that he won't be deported
That he won't find his way back to
the life he came from,
and that he'll find/keep the hope that
has brought him so far from where he
has been.

He knows that I'm writing this and is so close to understanding how great grace is.
Remember

Leviticus 19:34

34 The alien living with you must be treated as one of your native-born. Love him as yourself, for you were aliens in Egypt. I am the LORD your God.