Juanito

About a year ago I had a strange experience. On the second day of a ten-day Habitat for Humanity build trip to Honduras, we had gone to the work site for orientation and to get our hands dirty a little bit. We spent the morning starting to dig trenches for the sewer lines from 18 houses that were nearing completion. Turns out that was to be our main task for the following week. But the thing we did most this particular day was play with the children from the neighborhood and the adjacent orphanage.

We returned to the Hotel San Jorge late that afternoon to clean up and rest before dinner. The local church has a Saturday afternoon Mass at 5 PM, so three of us brave souls -- my son Dan, Becky and I -- decided to go. Don't quote me on this, but I believe the church was built in colonial times about 400 or so years ago. Let's just say it's seen better days, though it was sporting a new coat of white paint or whitewash, which really made it stand out.

Attending a Mass celebrated in a foreign language is a curious experience. I know some Spanish, but not really enough to translate competely on the fly. However fifty years of Mass attendance definitely helps you understand what's going on, even if you don't literally understand the prayers. I struggled with the sermon, but it seemed almost equal parts religion and politics, with references to justice and poverty and the poor. Mixing politics and religion is a pretty well worn path in Central America, thanks in no small part to Archbishop Oscar Romero of El Salvador.

Everything else was pretty much what you'd expect until the very end of Mass. Just as we were set to leave, a man appeared in the aisle on my left. "Appeared" is the only way I can describe it, because one second I was thinking about leaving, and the next, here he was -- and he had taken my right hand in his.

He was obviously drunk, and smelled of someone who had been drinking liquor for an extended period of time. His hand was cold to the touch, and clammy, and he swayed a little from side to side as he stood there, looking me in the eye. "My name Juanito. Johnny." He spoke a little bit of English, though his inebriation did not make it any easier to understand. He kept saying something over and over, a question. "Do you know O-ma-ha?" The very bizarreness of the question, standing in an old colonial church of a backwater town in Honduras, didn't make it any easier to understand.

Juanito was not aggressive in any threatening sort of way, but he did not let go of my hand, either. He was right up in my personal space, no more than a foot from me. I could not leave without making a scene. And of course none of the townspeople came to the aid of this gringo either.

"Do you know O-ma-ha. Neh-brah-ka." I tried to relax a little bit and listen. I looked over at Dan and Becky and they looked...freaked out. But what I eventually pieced together was that Juanito had emigrated to the U.S. for a period of time and had worked as a migrant laborer in Omaha and Lincoln, Nebraska. What an epic trip that must have been, from Santa Rosa to Omaha and back again.

Juanito held my hand for a long time...ten minutes that seemed like ten hours. Every once in a while he'd say again, "my name Juanito...Johnny" like I hadn't heard him before. I tried to communicate with him as best I could, with his handful of English and my handful of Spanish, but finally I just had to go. So I finally told him so, took my hand back, and we left.

Of course he followed us, and finally got down to his apparent reason for accosting us -- he asked Dan for money, and thankfully Dan didn't give him any. I'm certain he would have bought liquor. Juanito followed us for a couple of blocks, and I was starting to get concerned that he'd follow us back to the hotel. But when we turned left to head back up the street the hotel was on, I just said, "Adios, Juanito" and turned away. We left him behind at the square. I never saw him again.

I never felt afraid the whole time he held my hand, though I'd be lying if I told you it was easy or comfortable. But it forced me to look in the eye a person I probably would have hurried past had I seen him on the street, a kind of social leper. Forced me to see him as another human being in a very bad place in his life. I still think of him sometimes, and it causes me to say a prayer for him. God only knows what the rest of his story is. I hope it got better.

Being the analytical type, I can't help ask, why me? And why did he say so many times, "My name...Juanito...Johnny"? I wonder if it was part of humanizing him -- his mother and father probably called him Juanito (maybe Dad was Juan). Friends called him Juanito. Maybe he had brothers and sisters that called him Juanito. I'll never know.

But there are a couple of uncomfortable coincidences I've thought about. Juanito was not just some guy with a buzz on, out for a good time on a Saturday night. You just knew the guy was an alcoholic, maybe toward the end of the road. My Dad was an alcoholic. And his name was Johnny. Not John or Jack -- my Mom and his friends called him Johnny. He passed away (dry and sober, thank God) in 1991. But in a small strange way, saying adios to Juanito was also like saying goodbye to Dad. I don't know if you ever really get over having an alcoholic parent, but maybe somehow, some day, you do get beyond it. I don't know why, but I think that day I started a new chapter in getting beyond it.

I also sometimes think about the passage from Matthew (Mt 25:31-46) which says in part:

'Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you,
or thirsty and give you drink?
When did we see you a stranger and welcome you,
or naked and clothe you?
When did we see you ill or in prison, and visit you?'
And the king will say to them in reply,
'Amen, I say to you, whatever you did
for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.'

Did I welcome Juanito as a stranger? It's a little bewildering to think of Juanito as Christ in that situation. But maybe that was Jesus' point -- he's not always going to have a halo and a band of cherubim ministering to him. Did I welcome him, or did I fail to minister to him? I wonder...the right thing to do was not at all clear to me then or now. But I did stay with him and listen, and that's a start.