More about that homeless conversation

Posted on February 8, 2017 | 9 comments

Of all those conversations I wrote about yesterday, the one about homeless and those unable to care for themselves has more to it than I originally wrote. Yes, I am concerned about older homeless citizens that I have been seeing on the north end of our town. I do wonder who looks out for those who are without family or friends. Even citizens who seem to be secure can be in danger should they become unable to make decisions for themselves.

A little closer to home, though, involves a situation with a young woman who showed up on our doorstep two separate times looking for a place to stay. I don’t know the girl. Never saw her before. The first time she rang our doorbell, late in the evening asking for a safe house, was such a surprise to me that I could only think to send her to a nearby fire station. A few evenings later we returned after dark to find the same girl resting near our garage. This time I was better prepared to ask some questions and try to find a solution for her.

Her answers and demeanor gave me pause. I tried calling different agencies such as the police and then a help line but no one could give me a definite answer. The best I could offer was to take the girl to a homeless shelter that is across town. I thought I had her convinced but at the last minute she changed her mind and walked away. She allowed me to pray for her and give her some water and juice before leaving.

The next day I tried some other agencies and one gave me a referral to a place for single women. It’s far from our house. The woman must be there at 3 pm for intake interview with check-in at 4:30. There are only 40 beds and they have been full every night for months. I am not surprised, but I’m not too sure how to get this girl to the place. I’ve not seen her since last week and may never see her again.

There is a need for a homeless shelter on this side of town, but I doubt it will ever happen. No one wants these places in their neighborhood. It is all perplexing to me. I like to find solutions to problems, but this one is way over my head.

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Conversations

Posted on February 7, 2017 | 5 comments

It was after 7 this morning before I rolled out of bed. Very unusual for me. The night had been spent with wild and crazy dreams which may have made me more tired than rested. I awoke thinking about the dreams and wondering where some of the material for them came from. Then I remembered. I had a number of serious conversations the last few days with a variety of people. My mind had jumbled all those conversations into a long stream of dreams.

I was out early Monday morning, running errands. I like to start early, right after 8:30 and be home by 11. During the drive between stops a friend left a message on my phone letting me know she was hospitalized. When I arrived at my next stop I called her and we talked for about a half hour. She is hospitalized, having gone for heart tests on Friday that in turn required her heart to be restarted TWICE. She faces open-heart surgery today. She also faces a long recuperation and rehabilitation period. It makes me sad as she is the same age as my husband. She has smoked and eaten badly all of her adult life. The heart surgeon told her that almost every patient he operates on has been a smoker.

After finishing my errands and coming home I found a message on the home answering machine from my sister who I had not heard from in months. We live in the same town but rarely see one another. She celebrated her 82nd birthday last week, and I had sent her a card with a photograph of Terry and me. My sister does not have a computer so there is no way of keeping her apprised of what we do except by phone/snail mail. After the birthday celebrations with her grandchildren and visits from her great grandchildren, she had time to sit and talk for awhile.

A couple in our church celebrated their 61st wedding anniversary on Sunday. I chatted with them about their achievement and how so many did not reach that number. We also talked about how so many of the younger people are not even getting married any more, taking their chances with the legal quandaries that can come about without the legal documentation. I’ve seen that with children at school whose parents never married, especially if the birth father’s name is not on their birth certificate. It can cause havoc with their life should something happen to one of the parents.

My sister got married shortly after I was born, and had she and her first husband remained married, they would be celebrating their 65th anniversary later this year. I brought this up while chatting with her on the phone, telling her about the couple who has been married 61 years. She marveled at that and said she admired those who could make it in a marriage, long-term. Her first husband is still alive but doing very poorly, health-wise. Her second husband, who was abusive, has been out of the picture for a long time and we never even mention his name, but the knowledge of his one-time existence in her life, and the reason for her diminished lifestyle, is still there, nonetheless. It was a bad decision to marry him and get his name legally attached to hers. I tried to dissuade her, but you know, people in love never see what others see. Perhaps it is better to just live together.

And the final conversation jangling around in my head is that of homeless people, especially the elderly and those with mental issues. I was discussing the importance of having a network, a support system, when one gets older. What happens to those without family or friends who develop dementia and can no longer care for themselves, but no one is around to witness the progression and get help for the person? The other two people in the conversation were telling me the difficulty of getting conservatorship and getting help for those in that situation.

On top of the conversations, also bouncing around in my head are plans for coffee fellowship after church next Sunday. I am in charge of the refreshments and  I have a Valentine’s theme in mind. That’s what part of my errand-running was about, getting supplies. Those plans got dumped in with the various conversations and made my dreams hectic and chaotic. I’m staying home today as the weather forecast calls for another rain storm. At least it’s warm–60 degrees this morning.

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Sometimes a sticker is all it takes

Posted on February 3, 2017 | 6 comments

Upon arriving at the cafeteria yesterday, I found one of the kindergartners sitting at a table in the back, by herself. This is the little girl for whom I got the alarm clock.  Now she was tearful and not eating much of her lunch except the pizza. I sat down, and said hello, then asked how she was doing.

“I want my mom,” she said through the tears.

“Are you having a bad day,” I asked. She nodded yes, sniffling. My assumption was that she was in trouble and that’s why she was at the back table. I would later learn that she had asked her teacher if she could sit back there, far from her class.

“We all have days like that. Yesterday I had a bit of a bad day.” Then I took out my phone, showed her the picture of our lunch from the previous day, and told her what had happened with the meal being spilled on my leg and foot. She giggled.

“Yeah, I smelled like barbecue pork for the rest of the day.”

“Did you know today is the 100th day of school and that you are now 100 days smarter?” She perked up a little more.

“I have a sticker for you that you can wear that says I’m 100 days smarter. Would you like one?” She nodded yes, so I got the sticker out and put it on her shirt. She smiled, still sniffling, and she said “thank you.”

“Are you going to be okay for the afternoon?”

“Yes,” she replied, smiling more and cleaning up her lunch detritus.

“I’m so glad. All of us have some hard days, but we can bounce back. You’ve done a good job bouncing back, so I have another sticker you can take with you.” I then gave her one of the very special Bounce Back Kid stickers that I rarely hand out. They are like gold. A bigger smile. And another “thank you.”

I talked to the noon-time aide to let her know the little girl was ready to go with the class. That’s when I learned that she wasn’t in trouble, she just wanted to have time by herself. The last time I saw her, she was skipping out the door, at the end of the line with the other kindergartners.

 

 

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Working with small children can be hazardous 

Posted on February 2, 2017 | 8 comments

Small children cough, sneeze, and wipe their hands on me. A flu shot is mandatory. I take probiotics to stay healthy. I also change out of my school clothes as soon as I get home. I’m always washing my hands, and I carry tissues and hand wipes in my bag of tricks, along with stickers, to hand out as I move through the crowds of children who seek me out on the playground and in the cafeteria.


I’ve had two jackets at the dry cleaners recently. One had milk spilled on it by the little girl sitting next to me in the cafeteria. The other one had pink-reddish smears on the back probably put there when one of the kids hugged me. The dry cleaning lady pointed out, with both jackets, moth holes and asked if I was sure I wanted the jackets cleaned. She probably thinks I’m some eccentric old lady.

“Yes, please clean it. I know the holes are there, but this jacket is only worn to school, to work with small children,” was the response both times.

Those two jackets, one purple, one maroon, are the only items I wear to school that need to be dry cleaned, and I only wear them on really cold days. We’ve had lots of really cold days since Christmas break.

Yesterday we had pulled pork for lunch.


This time, a different first grade girl, dumped the container on the right on my pants and shoes. Lots of pork and barbecue sauce. Fortunately, the items could be easily cleaned.

Today is the 100th day of school for our students. Lunch will be pizza, which I don’t eat, and we’ll see what happens as far as messes go.

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The digibus changed my plans

Posted on January 30, 2017 | 11 comments

That quiet peaceful Friday at home changed suddenly when I read on instagram of a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the West Fresno Library for the County Library’s digibus. I was quite excited to do this because 1) I had just learned that West Fresno (where Columbia Elementary is located) has a county library branch, and 2) the digibus sounded like something I wanted to know more about.

The West Fresno Library is fairly new. That’s why I didn’t know about it. The building wasn’t even there when our daughter was attending high school right across the street. It was a big vacant lot back in the 90s. Now it’s a Fresno County Service Center as well as the library. Lots of parking there, too. The digibus was sitting in the lot when I got there. There was plenty of seating and a ribbon around the bus that would later be cut and everyone invited on the bus to take a look at what it offers.

This was a joint effort of many local groups (and even the California State Library) to reconfigure a Winnebago into a rolling computer lab that will head to some of the most remote areas of the Central Valley where people lack access to technology and skills with which to use it. The digibus has wifi and 12 computer stations where people can learn computer skills, job-seeking skills, and be better prepared for jobs other than agriculture field work, which is quickly fading due to reduced acreage planted and more mechanization.

I met many people at this ribbon-cutting. The man who designed the bus’s exterior gave me a quick tour and told me how he had come up with the logos and designs. The woman who does the library’s social media made the connection with me and comments I had left on her postings. The library staff person for the West Fresno branch (there is no librarian). I also got to visit with an old friend who is the managing librarian of the area in which the West Fresno branch resides. We had a bit of a conversation about the lack of a librarian for this area. She firmly informed me that it would not be changing any time soon.

One lady with whom I chatted for quite awhile is on various committees and works with various organizations for the betterment of the West Fresno community. One of the questions she asked me, after learning what I do at Columbia, “are you afraid to come to this part of town?”

Although I understood her reasoning for asking this of an older white woman, I was saddened that she even had to ask it.

“No, of course not. I’ve been coming over to this side of town for decades. I actually requested to do my student teaching, 30 years ago, on this side of town, at Edison High. My university supervisor came twice to watch me teach and said he wouldn’t be back because it was too scary to come out to that school.”

All this time and nothing much has changed. West Fresno is still getting short-shrift. Abandoned properties. Retail desert. Few parks, and those that are there aren’t well maintained. Crowded schools. High poverty. And now I learn that the beautiful library doesn’t have a full time librarian. This is what I call injustice.

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It’s Friday and the sun is shining

Posted on January 27, 2017 | 6 comments

After a week of early mornings, today we slept in until 6:30. Although still dark at that time, the sun soon shows itself on a cloudless morning like this. Cold and frosty, but sunny.

After doing laundry I have very little to accomplish today, unless it gets warm enough to work in the yard. Then I MIGHT rake leaves, but I may not. Terry and I are making plans for later today. Unusual for us to plan something late in the day since I’m not at my peak, but there are a couple of things we would really like to do, and they are late in the day. Maybe if I’m quiet and still during the day I will be able to be vivacious into the evening.

A local company that makes soap from the milk of its goat herds is having a popup in a nearby small town. I’ve never actually been to this downtown area, only driven around it, so I would like to see it, close-up. I would also love to see the soap company’s owner and get a bar of her newest soap.

Tomorrow is Chinese New Year–the year of the rooster. Terry and I like to have Chinese food to commemorate the occasion each year, and one of our favorite restaurants is on the way back from that little outlying town.

There is also a book-signing at the University from 6 to 8 that I would love to attend. Just wish it was during the day. The book, “All They Will Call You,” by Tim Z. Hernandez, is a sort of historical true fiction–documentary fiction– about a group of Mexican immigrants, being sent back to Mexico in a plane that crashes soon after takeoff on January 28, 1948. The immigrants were part of the Bracero program. I remember my father getting workers for our farm through the program. Although the names of the pilot and immigration employees were noted, the Mexican immigrants never had their names mentioned and they were buried in an unmarked grave in Fresno. Hernandez tells their story.

The sun is shining, for which I am grateful. The day is quiet and peaceful, which I need after a busy week. After the chaplain’s meeting yesterday, where I heard about so many being ill or near death, I am very thankful for good health and energy to do the work I want to do for the time being.

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Seeking sunshine & better days

Posted on January 25, 2017 | 3 comments

The weather here has matched my mood–gloomy. We’ve had more rain this month than ever in Januarys past.

Although we need the water, the cold and gloomy days have not made me happy. Every time a storm front blows in or out, and the air pressure changes, the migraines hit. I’ve used more imitex this month than ever in Januarys past.

The third graders at Columbia have been asking me to come have lunch with them. The only way that is possible is to add an extra day to my schedule. On Tuesday this week, and hopefully for the next few weeks, i’m making a point of getting to Columbia for lunch with the bigger kids. Wednesday and Thursday are set aside for the first graders.

So many of the third graders (who were the first students I read to when I started as school chaplain two years ago) want to sit with me at lunch. We run out of room at the table. I took lots of stickers and puzzle pages but ran out before lunch was over. I will have to get more for next week. The cafeteria manager told me that there were more kids in attendance on Tuesday than any other day this year. She could only attribute it to the sunshine.

Next week is the 100th day of school. I have a special book to read and special stickers for the children to wear stating they are 100 days smarter. We celebrate all kinds of things in first grade!  But I find the fifth and sixth graders like this stuff, too.

Here is some elementary school fashion to make you smile. These shoes sure brightened my day:

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