Song Of The Children...

"Children begin by loving their parents;
as they grow older they judge them;
sometimes they forgive them..."
- Oscar Wilde, Picture of Dorian Gray

By DUARDO PAZ-MARTINEZ
The Paz Files

BROWNSVILLE, Texas - A little girl and her brother died last week in the dusty bordertown of Laredo, where their 38-year-old single mother shot them for the worst of reasons: she could no longer care for them, no longer clothe them, no longer feed them, no longer promise them life.

The two kids, 12-year-old Ramie and 10-year-old Timothy, endured the last days of their lives somehow knowing their fate. They and their mother, Rachelle, were at the lowest rung of the social ladder, living in a battered camper trailer in one of the city's trailer parks, fighting for food and shelter each and every day. Their mom, lost in the unreliable netherworld of child support and unable to get state and federal authorities to help her, killed them in the building that housed the state's food stamps office, where she had recently been turned down after failing to submit paperwork related to her monthly income.

Rachelle Grimmer also shot and killed herself.

Those who knew her at the trailer park said she struggled to take care of her children, that she gathered food as best she could, that she feuded with the social service agency workers, that she finally snapped and did the unthinkable. Family members added she'd seemed lost after splitting from her husband, who lived in Wyoming and Montana. All she had at the end were minimal child support payments. It wasn't enough.

Little Ramie Grimmer, shown in photo above, had posted a message on Facebook last Monday that was cryptic as cryptic could ever be: "may die 2today." Her harried mother had taken a supervisor hostage in the Texas Department of Human Services office in a dispute over her denial of food stamp benefits. Rachelle Grimmer eventually released the supervisor, but after a seven-hour standoff, police say she shot Ramie and Timothy Grimmer, before killing herself.

The story has resonance in the Rio Grande Valley, as well, where countless women struggle to make ends meet when the fathers of their children bolt and then refuse to pay child support. It is the unspoken stain on the border culture, a situation that places women in the same straits Rachelle Grimmer found herself in last week. Often, when jailed, these deadbeat dads find sympathy on the part of the Macho-friendly courts and are quickly released. The women, meanwhile, get pushed aside, their children forced to depend on welfare assistance or help from family members. It is the Mexican way in the Rio Grande Valley, a sport that goes against the very culture of the ethnic group that historically said family comes first.

But in the RGV, it doesn't take much for a man to bolt his family. One loose skirt and they're out the door. So long, child support. And if that same man gets wind of a second man in his woman's life even after he splits, well, bar the Godamned barn door - that woman will never get a cent. It has been so for much of the Valley's modern history. Children are not as valued along the border as they are elsewhere in the country. That is the sad lament told by the overwhelming majority of these abandoned women. You hear horror stories at every stop, from the welfare offices, to the laundromats, to the cantinas. Women weep; lazy men sleep. Children go to bed crying, fully-knowing that they have less than other neighborhood kids, and fully-aware that their Dad, for some reason, won't work, won't get a job to support them.

It remains the shame of an entire region, one without solution.

Friends, hold your head high and inhale a deep breath. It's Christmastime and, supposedly, there is joy across the land. But while you're celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ, ask yourself these questions: What are you doing for your children? What have you done? How much do you care? Are they healthy? Do they have clean clothes? Are they eating well? Can you look them in the eye?

They say the best thing you can do for kids is to be good to their mother.

Yes, that is true. Some men know that, some do not and never will. A woman at the end of her rope is not attractive; they're fighting for survival. Children under the care of such a woman soon realize they are helpless. They see their Mom going through Hell and all they can do is cry, all the time wondering where Dad went and why he won't help.

If you're among the lucky, your children adore you. If you're among the uncaring Deadbeats, well, you should know that these same children remember everything about their Mom and Dad, and they know who was and wasn't there when the going got tough. They'll know who answered their prayers for clothing and shelter, and who busted their tail to make sure they had food on the table, a blanket in bed, a roof over their head.

Youngsters Ramie and Timothy Grimmer went through familial Hell in their final days, not knowing if the lousy trailer they lived in would keep them warm, not knowing if Mom would be able to find a loaf of bread or another can of beans at the local food shelter, not really knowing if Christmas had ever been meant for them...

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