I never cared for Mrs. Baker, the woman who lived alone across the street from the home in Vermont where I grew up.  At best, she was pecular, but other, less gracious neighbors might have called her an intrusive, demanding complainer.  She complained about our dog's barking, the neighbor's delay in raking their autumn leaves, and the trash cans beside our house.  She called my father late at night for rides home from the bus station.  And worst of all, she hired me.

Yes, old Mrs. Baker hired me to mow her lawn, rake her leaves, change the beds for the boarders who rented rooms in her attic, and even- as a 13 yer old kid- I was hired to insulate her attic.  I had no idea what I was doing. Nevertheless, I kept agreeing to work for her even though I was paid, what was, even in the 70's, a pittance. I guess II hadn't yet learned the skill of saying 'No' to an adult.  Also, my mind's eye envisioned the awkward conversation we'd have if I had turned down her job offers only to be found playing wiffle ball in the street the same day.  

The worst, though, was when I was 15, and she called one summer afternoon to ask if I could come across the street to take a Polaroid picture of her.  It seems she was going to send her pic to a psychic in Colorado to have him read her aura. (Trust me, there's a lot I could have said about her aura without any photos.)  I grudgingly went, took the shot, and left as quickly as possible.  Fifteen minutes later, she called again. She needed a clearler pihoto.  I crossed Edgewood Drive again, snapped a Polaroid again, and beat it out of her house as quickly as possible again.  But I wasn't free.  She called again.  Then a fourth time.  Still unable to say, "No", I kept going, snapping her camera, and rushing home in hopes of being left alone.  Finally my father, who was pretty quick witted and was well aware of Mrs. Baker's quirks, said that if she called again I should say I only take nudes.  "No way," I replied, "She might say 'Okay'!"  

Then there was the day that next winter when she asked me about my future.  I told her I wanted to work with children with disablilites in some capacity.  She asked what I was doing to get experience in this type of work, and I had no answer for her.  She told me she would  take me into Burlington to use the University library to fnd out what types of summer camps for kids with special needs were in Vermont.  As always, I couldn't say, "No."  We picked a day, and I reluctantly took the shotgun seat in her VW bug.  While she ran errands, I went to the UVM library, and asked for help finding information about summer camps in Vermont.  No Googling in 1977.  I happened upon a camp for the blind and visually impaired in the little town of Hardwick.  By the next two summers, 1978, and again in 1979, I was a junior counselor at Camp Wapanacki, all thanks to old Mrs. Baker.  

And it was at Camp Wapanacki that I met Peter Ash, a camper in my cabin both summers. Peter has albinism.  I have not seen him since the summer of '79, but we were recently reunited by a chance encounter on the internet.  (that story can be found here:  https://www.supremecourtjesters.org/SCJ-Blogs/Post/1672/How-I-Reconnected-With-a-Guy-I-Haven-t-Seen-in-40-Years )  It turns out this little kid from my summer camp is now the most prominent advocate for people with albinism in Africa. 

And advocates are needed. In much of rural Africa, especially East Africa, people with albinism are considered immortal and good luck.  From the demeening use of their hair woven into fishing nets for better catches, to their horror of disembodied legs placed at the entrance to mines for prosperous excavation, to ground bones of exhumed albino corpses used in potions, the treatment is hellish.  Peter, now a Baptist minister, has addressed this persecution with a many facited approach:   Getting albino chlidren into residential schools, providing prosthetics for those who have been attacked, even attempting to prosecute witch doctors for their crimes.  He does this through the NGO "Under the Same Sun".  

It was because of the unexpected crossing of our paths described in the blog above that got me involved in this issue.  I had my middle school students read "Golden Boy", a novel about a boy with albinism in Tanzania.  Then we watched a video put out by UTTS, in which albino children in Africa were interviewed.  After the video, I asked my 7th and 8th graders, "Who's sad?  Who's mad?"  Everyone raised their hands. Then I asked them what they could do about it.  

This is what resulted.  On a Friday night recently, these same middle school kids prepared an African dinner and invited local clergy to attend.  This was not a fund raiser, but a time for the students to be the teachers.The turn out was small, but significant: 12 people representing six churches of four different denominations and from five differnet towns.  The meal of chick pea stew, curried potatoes and a coconut cake, cooked by the kids with the supervision of my wife, was outstanding.  But that was just the start.

After supper, Amber and Jake tag teamed a speech that informed our small but supportive audience what albinism is, its prevelance in Africa (Much higher there than anywhere else in the world), the mistreatment of them, and what UTTS is doing to change things for the better.  Then a student-made slide show was presented in which the audience got to see both the results of attacks on African albinos as well as more encourging photos of kids trying out their new prosthetics, getting free gifts of sunscreen, and worshiping God.  There were plenty of tears.

After the program was over, three church leaders invited the students to come speak at their churches, and we're already comparing possiblr dates to make this happen.  And as Christians in Maine become slowly more aware of the need and the hope of the albino population in subsaharan Africa, I guess cranky, old Mrs. Baker deserves a tip of the hat.