…Actually a Community of People

It’s utterly amazing what a person can witness if she bothers to open her eyes. If she musters the strength to fight off the lull of ignorance for just a few minutes…if she can gather the courage to look beyond her own immediate reality…if she would put down the iPod, cell phone, remote control, book, purse, keys and whatever else holds her attention for this fleeting instant…she might bear witness to something whose images and message may linger far beyond this moment.

She might see something that stirs within her discomfort or sadness, guilt and shame, perhaps disgust. She might see—reality, maybe not her own but that of someone else. Although the visuals and storyline may be foreign to her everyday life, these elements could comprise the daily grind of her neighbor. No less important, no less relevant, and certainly not any less human.

This documentary offers a glimpse at what one person witnessed when he bothered to open his eyes… when he mustered the strength to educate himself…when he gathered the courage to enter his neighborhood… and when he picked up a video camera to capture a few fleeting moments of life that transcend beyond Skid Row in Los Angeles and into every town in the US and past our borders.

Through his actions he transforms psych patients, crack addicts, soccer moms, gangsters, artists, Agent Orange vets, missions, parolees, dealers, and sex offenders into…what they actually are, that is a community of people. With this video he offers testimony to us all that the issues of housing, racism, employment, addiction, mental health and so much more are alive at our door and in our own neighborhoods. It’s not testimony all of us have the capacity to cope with or even wish to hear.

Part of me flinches when I think of what gritty truths will greet my eyes upon their opening…but I can try to remember this documentary. I can remember that all I stand to see upon opening my eyes and engaging the world around me is a community of people living in my own neighborhood. No less important, no less relevant, and certainly not any less human.