October 16^th 2019| Julia Becerra.

Save Your Prayers

My friend Myla’s  words kept pouring out of her mouth,  full of emotion: “ and …. that day, I stood there listening to what my neighbor was saying,  my mind trying to process the words, ‘ there has been a shooting at the same church your husband and kids were attending this morning’ ”

“A shooting inside the church?  That could not be possible!” 

As my friend Myla continued narrating the story, I pressed my fingers against each other not knowing what to do with my hands, with my arms?  Should I hug her and console her, or should I let her continue her release from that memory. 

The traumatic event had taken place years ago, but she was reliving it in a way expressed in her whole body.  Her hands started to shake, her face became pale, her voice trembled

“At the time, my son was .. 3 years old., my daughter, 7. they had gone there with their dad, my husband. They did not return …”

While I kept quiet and listened, I thought of my own children, of how I would have reacted…  No sense… whatever my mind was imagining the response would be, it probably had nothing to do with the real reaction when something like that happens…

I kept my thoughts at bay, and I went back to focus on her narration, after all, I was there to listen to it.  To learn from a close second hand the stories of the lives of people who are survivors of mass violence….  The same ones  just mentioned briefly during a funeral service or in a line in the newspapers  article about the story, and after that, forgotten, left on their own to fight with their demons, their memories, their traumas and to continue with life, without their loved ones, probably without enough financial support, always  hoping for their wounded ones to recover, for the disappeared ones to show up alive and healthy, and for the others… to rest in peace.

I kept listening as she, while taking breaks sometimes to cry and others to stop her tears from blooming again,  let go her until-then-tightly-held memories and brought me back to that day, that Sunday when all had happened. 

For a moment, I wished I hadn’t made the decision to be there, I was feeling her pain as mine, and her emotions were so vivid … but how else could I have written the novel Save Your Prayers, if not by talking with people like Myla?  Real courageous people who had given everything and more to fight to get their families back?  Fight to provide for their children and to support others on the same situation?  How else could I have known of all the things she went through to rescue her family after being kidnapped?  How would I know how her body stopped and almost dropped on top of the dead body lying on a puddle of blood right outside of church, when she went to look for her family that day?

There was no other way to do it. I had to be there, listening, holding my emotions.   Only because it was my intention all along to bring out to light the stories of people like her, of tenacious women who risk their lives to save their families, women that are forced to leave life as they once knew it, to escape violence and to provide a better future for their children.

Myla was glad to be talking to me about her experience, on the name of many other people, men, women, children who have lived similar stories or even more dramatic ones,  and who haven’t had the opportunity to talk about them with anybody.  They had kept those stories and their emotions lingering in their mind and bodies, burning them, consuming their beings… for years. 

For all of them, I wanted to write this novel, to help their liberation, to honor their pain, bravery, resilience and faith.

Throughout their stories, without knowing it, they give us an unforgettable lesson of humbleness and strength.

I invite you to also honor them by reading my historical fiction Novel, Save Your Prayers, now available in Amazon, in paperback and ebook format.

Thank you for reading my blog. For more information on this novel and other upcoming publications you may visit http://www.JulesHeartly.com