A new year is coming up...one for hope...or...?

This jpeg feels right. In so many ways.
The year, 2008, is getting to a close. Soon, in a few hours, we will be hearing all the celebrations of the new year: TV's booming countdown screams; computer monitors in their basso:squeaky tones foretelling the future thru some acclaimed pundit's interview; living room soft music in the houses of those about to leave for a party, and many, many other variations of the theme.

For many, the year has gone well. For so many, the year has NOT gone well. Both could be the riders on the horse.

I was thinking of those that immigrated here in search for better horizons. Where are they now? How are they now? Now that work has shrunk, or disappeared. What to do? No roots here...maybe. But return to what? If it is bad here, how can it be there? Hold on? Wait? Or, "Let's get past the "octavitas", and then we'll go out and it'll be better", the faces across Home Depot seem to say.

It is cold this winter, and then it is warm, almost hot. That is the way this present hope seems to flow. In the meantime, Georgia Counties gear up for more jails and more treaties: Cobb, Gwinnett, Stewart. The AJC reports: ..."As of October, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency picked up some 3,500 prisoners arrested in Cobb County who were determined to be in the country illegally. Cobb County Sheriff Neil Warren says the county’s immigration enforcement effort, which critics have said mostly targets Latinos, has not factored into an increase in the county jail population. (!) Most prisoners are in county custody an average of 72 hours before they are picked up by ICE agents.“I really couldn’t say that this was responsible for an increase in the population,” Warren said. “They are in here because they violated the laws of Cobb County.” See the story in Friday's, Dec 26 paper.

Those words do not make sense.

Moreover, it is a crime now , "to be determined to be in the country..."??? What is that all about?

The inner, deep drive for "self evident pursuit of" life, liberty and happiness presses on. Search for livelihood, even across frontiers. Risk your life. Cross deserts. Fall prey to dangers, scammers, abuse. Fall...ah! Fall 40 feet from a scaffolding pouring cement ... the AJC reports that: "...Dr. Donald Leslie, medical director at the Shepherd Center, said three of the four being transferred... from Grady Memorial Hospital’s intensive care unit to the ICU at Shepherd. Leslie said the men are all Hispanic (18 of them) and in their mid-20s to late 30s.“The majority of them are spinal injuries, and there is one who has a traumatic brain injury,” Leslie said. The worker with the brain injury underwent surgery at Grady for a fractured skull, he said." (I add: and one died upon falling). What a Friday before "Navidad".

Yet, there are those who will be oblivious to all that sacrifice. They will only see your value in the shadows of their opportunism. When the light of associating with you comes up, they don't know who you are. "I don't know this man", echoes of a 2000 year old Thursday story. Or, they'd rather see you behind bars, lest their supporters deny them the vote (and its comforts) in the next elections.

So, who's the rider on the horse? Where is it heading? Home to rest? The answer depends on what's in the 'saddlebags'. That will let us know whether that head is floating high, tired from the wheeling-dealing pursuits of the day. And knowing they will pay off soon. In a Big way. Huge. Ahhhh!

Or, it could be an empty bag. Tired too. But from searching, asking, working, and pretending. Now going back home, head filled with inner dialogues, maybe of bad news: "no hice nada, Nena".

From the back, not much difference between the two. No? So, 2009, what will you bring?