Playing Fair and Being Kind

On hold at City of Rocks State Park, New Mexico

 Fifteen minutes after I’d last spoken to a human voice, I began to estimate how many times I’d listened to this particularly horrible song on my battery-dwindling cell phone. I was on hold with a road assistance operator/representative for the company that provided such service and insurance for the private school I was volunteering with in far-away Las Vegas, New Mexico. I was presently in City of Rocks State Park, pretty much by myself. I mean the park had a few campers spaced out around but none within sight of my location. I was standing about fifty yards away, and in plain sight of the unable-to-start school bus. This was where I could get the best cell phone signal. I was standing next to the community showers and toilet facility. Otherwise, the scenery was spectacular and on any other day I would be fascinated by the multi-story tall boulders and rocks scattered about. As I mentioned, I was held prisoner by the fact that I’d been put on hold to wait for instruction from the person to whom I’d been speaking and telling about my quandary.

I checked the time on my wrist watch. I was getting frustrated with my mess. Because I’d been having a dickens-of-a-time getting to this point in the process of gaining road side assistance I didn’t dare relinquish my place in the queue. Regarding the music, the one and only tune was idiotic. I mean the same three-and-a-half-minute song played over and over. The lyrics were unintelligible. A male tenor with several guitars and a western/country beat was keeping me occupied while the only thread I had to civilization was creeping away into the sunset. Distancing was in motion. I was on the part of an exponential curve that begins to head for the bottom at a rate faster than one can enjoy. The curve I speak of applied to my patience, mental acuity, and the battery in my cell phone. All of these conditions were slipping rapidly toward zero leaving me with a trio of personal companions behaving like rabid hyenas. I was experiencing a visit with the Transactional Analysis Triangle. My Rescuer roll had transformed into full blown Victim mode.

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I have experienced my share of violence in a long and participatory time on earth. The sense of danger in a violent situation can be subtle to obvious. I’m sure most people know when a violent or threatening event is present. Whatever is going on has a sense of dread attached. It’s complicated with all that is present with the addition of all that has been experienced before. I had trouble connecting to the person who handled my call initially. Through a series of mis-dialed numbers and bad connections I had identified, with the help of the representative, that I needed another number not contained on the insurance card that I had in my possession. I don’t remember what the function of the number was or its capacity in solving the problem of getting road-side assistance to me at the City of Rocks. A few additional phone calls to my boss in Las Vegas armed me with a slew of numbers I was prepared to provide to my telephone mate should I ever hear from her again. I didn’t dare hang up and try to reconnect. The bird in the hand was more of a sure thing than the others in the bush. I stayed on the line, on hold, on tenterhooks.

The adventure turned out very well. Proper serial numbers were found and recorded. People who could help locally were contacted. I got a tow truck to get me to Deming which is south very near the border and into a repair shop that specialized in automobile electric systems. The problem was about what I expected. The terminal block under the hood of the bus had been utilized more than it could should have been for auxiliary loads for the bus and one of the most recent modifications had resulted in the mechanic leaving a battery power supply post loose to the point that vibrations had finally caused an open circuit to the battery. The starter motor was on that circuit causing the non-starting situation.

In subsequent years and at various times while working with the incarcerated men in Maine State Prison I have had opportunity to raise the problem of Cultural and Structural Violence. My situation on hold in City of Rocks State Park was a classic scene that many people who have to use governmental systems to gain help or assistance in order to make their lives easier. Many or most systems have built in difficulties that do not advance the solution to the needs of the users. And often, such as in my case, the danger of losing the use of a service exists to the point of placing someone in danger of not getting the intended service or assistance to downright losing total access and being placed in a more treacherous position. I could have lost telephone service and not been able to get out of City of Rocks State Park that evening. I’d be in a place where I would need to spend the night on the bus without proper clothing or bedding for the night.

The danger of losing my place in queue was conditional on my tolerance to listening to an unbroken string of repeated noise trying to pass for country/western music. This was a case of stresses being cumulative. I had the stress of being alone in a place in the wild of the desert. I was not able to get out of there because the bus couldn’t start. The bus could not be left for fear of being stripped by others.

There are many known cases of people who have no power to change the system having to put up with bus schedules that do not connect well enough in order to make appointments, hold jobs, get medical help, apply for better jobs, etcetera. You can look up “structural violence” of “cultural violence” and find many more examples of the type that would cause citizens to be prevented from improving their lives. The reason that they are considered violent is pretty simple and that is that the conditions are in place and can easily be rectified.  No one in the power structure seems to care enough to do that. The conditions remain and the people continue to suffer cumulative stressors.

Gentle George
19 May 2020