Monessen Day Three: The Problem Kids

Because we did not need a second orientation on Tuesday, my group was scheduled to go to the other project to entertain the kids for the morning and to have lunch with them before leaving for Kid's Club at 11:30.  We arrived at Park Manor just after 9:00 and the kids quickly found us as they are now used to having YouthWorks kids to play with twice a week.  We headed over to the kickball court (Park is the nicer of the two Manors.  Highland did not have the areas for the kids to play like Park did) and one boy, I'll call him "T" started dictating orders as far as who were the team captains.  Rach, one of my girls, teasingly asked him "Are you in charge around here?"  T looked at her with daggers coming out of his eyes and replied, "You gettin' smart with me?" We were all a bit taken aback by his attitude and a bit later, when Rach again tried to make conversation with him, he told her to "shut the f#&* up." and the went on to say that he "didn't need to play with this piece of trash."  God love Rachel, she never stopped smiling, though I was livid and even though it was not very Christian-like, I threw a few comments T's way.

The game was short-lived due to T's mean nature, such as when a little girl of about five went up to kick, T abandoned his place in the outfield to come right up to her, knowing she would be unable to kick the ball very far and used her as an "easy out".  The little girl left the field crying with her sister.  About that time, our group decided they'd had enough of T and kickball and they headed to the basketball court.  T, a kid of big build, was not that great at the game and seemed to settle down a little other than shoving Rachel once.  I yelled at him that I was about to take him out of the game if he touched her again and the morning went by with no further incident. 

We found out that morning that T was one of the kids who had been suspended from Kid's Club for a week.  Go figure.  When we headed to lunch (the women at the apartment site prepared lunch for the kids in the summer as so many of them are on their own all day while parents work) T actually sat with Rachel and was well behaved interestingly enough.

Kid's Club brought its own set of challenges on Tuesday.  A little boy who had been so well behaved on Monday had to be taken home as he refused to listen to anyone.  Another eight year old girl, who looked and dressed every day of 15, kept pestering us to use a cell phone.  I sat outside a closet where a little boy hid and still another hid under the table (as it turns out, the table hider's mom is in a mental institution and his dad is in jail.  The little guy is in a foster home).

When I went to take the first batch of kids home, one boy refused to get in the car and Kirk had to walk around to him before he would get in.  When he got in, he stated, "Fine, I'm in, but I ain't wearing no seatbelt."  I informed him that the car was not moving until he was wearing it but he still refused.  I then turned off the engine and replied, "Well, then you aren't getting air conditioning."  The other kid's club kids went crazy on the kid until he put on his belt.

I spoke with Kelly later that day about T and she explained to me that T did well when he was buddied up with a teenage boy at kid's club.  She stated that T had not had that last week and had gotten into trouble.  I decided to talk to our Chris, who would be with the kids the next day, to see if he would be willing to take on the task.  It was a huge job, but Chris (big, dumb) is indeed big; broad shoulders and chest, but really good natured. When I talked to Chris, he agreed.

After dinner, three local teens took us on a prayer walk and we walked down an alley that used to be called (I think) Drug Alley.  They stopped in front of this wall that YouthWorks had painted over a few years ago and they explained that on the wall used to be the names of people.  Once their name was crossed out, that person would be dead in a few days; all part of the drug dealing and using life.  Another story they told was of a little girl who had walked down to play in the river.  A gang member, under the influence of drugs, went down there and killed her.  Since that time, community members teamed up to try to stop the violence and now the alley is regularly patrolled by the police. 

We walked up to the church, 162 steep stone steps and I did it!  Nearly killed me, but I did it.  I was last, but I did it!  We were actually supposed to walk up the hill instead of the steps, but there were police cars in the area so they rerouted us, much to Paula's and my concern.  We could see Kyle talking discreetly on the phone and we gathered that there had been some gang activity at Highland, which was were my group was scheduled to go tomorrow to help the maintenance guys.

During church group time, the kids and Paula expressed their concern on going to Highland, so later that night, when I saw Kelly, I spoke to her.  She assured me that the maintenance guys were very protective of the YouthWorks kids and if there was even an undercurrent of something going on, they would not let us come.  She also told me that she would call him in the morning to find out where things stood.

As it turned out, we were not going to Highland.