Finalist: The Boston Globe, by Jessica Rinaldi
Nominated Work
To the judges of the Pulitzer Prize:
She crouched on the toilet, layering a thin line of white powdered heroin along the rim of her welfare card and inhaled sharply. Outside the bathroom door, her young daughters wailed for their mom, small fists banging futilely against the door. Raquel Rodriquez ignored them, eyes closed as she waited for the drug hit to take hold. When it did, she wiped her eyes and turned the handle, enveloping the sobbing children in hugs.
Heroin and other opioids have devastated countless families nationwide, killing 1,200 or more each year in Massachusetts alone. But often that toll remains unseen. Mothers like Raquel grapple with addiction away from the glare of the camera, their struggles untold until the worst happens.
Jessica Rinaldi was there to photograph the raw moment in late 2014 when Raquel took that hit in the bathroom. The troubled mother had invited Rinaldi into her chaotic home, opening up about her struggle – with poverty, with her children, and most of all with drugs. Rinaldi was there nine days later when the 48-year-old addict swallowed her first cup of methadone, resolving that this time, she was quitting for good. In all, the photographer spent more than a year chronicling Raquel’s story, from the first, anxious days of recovery to the downward slide that came with summer.
As 2015 unfolded, Raquel’s tale of addiction collided with another of year’s biggest news stories in Massachusetts – the tale of a beleaguered state Department of Children and Families trying (and too often failing) to protect children in unstable homes. These, too, are accounts that tend to play out in private, until and unless tragedy strikes. But Rinaldi was there to capture the day-to-day strife, and occasional victory, of a childhood interrupted by addiction. She was there as six-year-old Mimi stood on the sidewalk in the cold, clutching her mother’s purse as she waited for her to return from the clinic. She documented the rare triumph when Mimi graduated from kindergarten, her smile wide. With a sensitive, spare style, Rinaldi captured not just the heartbreak, but the bright, sometimes silly moments that define even the most difficult childhoods.
In August, as Raquel succumbed again to the pull of opioids, Rinaldi was there again, as she was on the inevitable day when the state took the children. Perched on the floor of the squalid bedroom, Rinaldi took photographs as Raquel writhed her bed, the gravity of the situation only just setting in.
We proudly nominate Rinaldi’s work for the Pulitzer Prize in Feature Photography.
Sincerely,
Brian McGrory
Editor, The Boston Globe
Nominated Work
A Life Unraveling -- Heroin and other opioids have devastated Massachusetts families, killing an estimated 1,200 people last year and unraveling the lives of countless more. For Raquel Rodriguez, drugs have been the one constant in her life. High on heroin, after being clean for eight months, a frustrated Raquel Rodriguez begs her daughter Estrella to stop jumping on the bed in their apartment in East Boston (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe - December 27, 2015).
With the bathroom door locked to keep her daughters out, Raquel leans over and snorts heroin inside her apartment. Moments earlier, Estrella had tried to block her mother's way into the bathroom, and now the girls are crying outside of the door as she gets high (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe - December 27, 2015).
Mimi escaped into her parents' room to watch television the night before her mother started treatment at a methadone clinic. The older of the two children, Mimi is silly but also sensitive and responsible, often helping Raquel with small things like pulling up the socks she can't reach, or swooping in with a hug when she can sense that her mom's mood is about to take a turn (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe- December 27, 2015).
High on heroin, Raquel Rodriguez reacts as her daughters, Estrella and Mimi, run back and forth across her small living room. Tomorrow, Raquel will go to the clinic and get her first dose of methadone, but tonight she worries that she won’t be able to do it (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe- December 27, 2015).
A week prior to getting clean, Raquel flips over a shopping cart so she can rest while walking Estrella home from her Headstart program. The heroin that she had taken earlier was starting to wear off, leaving her in pain. Above all else for Raquel are her daughters. She frets over them constantly, and relies on them to take care of each other, and sometimes her (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe- December 27, 2015).
As the girls play on the way to their mother's trauma and addiction program graduation, Raquel starts to nod off from the methadone. "It's like a battle going on inside me between the methadone and the addiction; and I know I can win but it's hard," Raquel says (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe- December 27, 2015).
Mimi waits outside the clinic in Chelsea holding her mom's purse and their new puppy, while Raquel gets her dose of methadone. Raquel gave in to Mimi's begging to bring the puppy to the clinic, not realizing that animals weren't allowed inside (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe - December 27, 2015).
Surrounded by other proud parents Raquel claps and cheers during Mimi's kindergarten graduation ceremony. It had been a dark spring, but after completing a three-week outpatient addiction program, Raquel was feeling hopeful (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe - December 27, 2015).
Raquel's husband Jose sits with her at Walgreens to keep her company as she waits for her nine prescriptions. Jose was different from the other men who had been in Raquel's life. He drank too much, but he didn't do drugs. He was quiet, supportive and he stuck around (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe - December 27, 2015).
Estrella laughs as she runs ahead of her mother and sister on their walk home from school. Raquel is determined to get clean for her two young daughters. "I want them both to have a childhood that I never knew existed. Happiness, joy, love..." she said (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe - December 27, 2015).
In the midst of a relapse, Raquel leans in her doorway and tells her heroin supplier how alone and frustrated she feels. He encourages her and tells her not to give up, saying that she is one of the strongest women he knows (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe- December 27, 2015).
High on heroin, Raquel checks Facebook on her phone moments after writing a post asking for help to find a new apartment. "I am in desperate need of all the help I can get. I have two children ages 4 and 6," she wrote, "and am a recovering addict struggling everyday to move forward for my children." (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe - December 27, 2015).
Often defiant, Estrella continues to play on the computer after Raquel repeatedly asked her not to. High, and having lost her patience, Raquel snaps at Estrella, telling her that she needs the computer in order to find them a new place to live. The day before, their landlord had threatened them with eviction (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe - December 27, 2015).
Running late for a crucial doctor's appointment to increase her methadone dose, a panicked Raquel waits to drop off Estrella at camp. But the damage is done. The next day, the state takes the girls. They are whisked away from camp, where, according to court documents, Raquel was unable to speak in complete sentences when she dropped them off, depositing the girls with "poor hygiene and inappropriate clothing." (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe- December 27, 2015).
After a bout with pneumonia, Jose started taking her to church. At the end of Mass the children's choir starts to sing and Raquel breaks down, missing her daughters (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe- December 27, 2015).
Raquel and her Uncle Bobby make their way towards the Suffolk County Juvenile Courthouse, to go before a judge and find out what will be necessary to get the girls back (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe- December 27, 2015).
Sitting on her daughters' bed, Raquel clutches Estrella's giant teddy bear and cries for her children. "I want my babies." (Jessica Rinaldi, The Boston Globe - December, 27, 2015).