Crosetti 10 Years Later

 I posted about an episode of the TV series: homicide: life on the street ten years ago. i was reviewing the blog entry and decided to revisit this.

I rewatched the last few minutes of the episode and yes I continued to feel the resonance in observing Pembleton being a one man honor guard but I discovered that another subplot of the episode that also sparked an emotional resonance in how Crosetti's partner was so sure that Crosetti must have been the victim of foul play because if he had been suicidal the partner would have seen the signs. However, the autopsy report indicated the presence of a number of different tranquilizers and anti-depressants in Crossetti's blood, not to mention a blood alcohol of .25 (over 3 times the legal limit). When this comes to light, the partner loses it and bursts into tears because he'd had no idea that his partner was that disturbed.

I consider this a good sign because it's resonating with my own sense of neglect in being aware of how other people are doing.

SOTU

For want of a better title, I've tentatively named it SOTU as a acronym for state of the union, prompted by going through this blog and rediscovering a number of milestones on this journey which has seemingly gone in directions which resulted in my crossing paths. And it's necessary that I somehow acknowledge this to see how far I've come since this all started.

While I continue to make posts here, the reality is that BK has gone by the wayside and the goal is to get another 501(c)3 launched within the next 12 months. I may elect to start a new blog that reflects that or just continue to post here so as to keep the details of journey a bit more linear to follow.

After reviewing my stories about various people I've encountered along the way as well as comments about my way out of the shadows, I guess I'd say I've regressed in some ways and hidden in the shadows of the dragon I'd identify as the pandemic. I have no stories about people who've been coming to dinner because the pandemic prompted me to adopt a protocol that's kept me at arm's length hiding behind a portable serving table set up on the sidewalk that allows us to serve food without actually being in the park. 

Some of these people have managed to find ways to be living indoors now, but that seems to result in a whole new set of challenges for those involved - and it seems I'm being drawn (or more appropriately, being dragged kicking and screaming) to expand beyond a weekly dinner to help these people with these challenges.

A lot of it has been driven by someone I've referred to as Rob who has been in town for about nine months and is headed back to Miami this week where he considers himself to be "home" now. I've been resistant to his goading, but it was actually a scene from episode of a TV series called NCIS Origins that finally brought me to where I am now.

For those of you unfamiliar with the show, it is a prequel to the long running series NCIS whose main appeal (IMO) was in the personage of the main character federal agent former Marine sniper Gibbs whose life was scarred by the murder of his wife and daughter due to their witnessing a crime committed by a Mexican gangster. The federal agent assigned to the case breaks a rule by letting Gibbs learn the location of that gangster in Mexico resulting in Gibbs sneaking into Mexico and using his sniper skills to assassinate the gangster, after which Gibbs then left the Marines and became a federal agent. The show kinda jumped the shark when Gibbs became well-adjusted and everyone on the show was happy IMO. I think the powers that be recognized this and developed the prequel, which goes back and starts with the murder of the wife and daughter. Offscreen Gibbs commits the assassination and wants to tell the federal agent who befriended Gibbs, but the federal agent who that knows that he broke a rule by revealing the information and is also trying to deal with some marital problems gives Gibbs the cold shoulder.  With no one else to turn to Gibbs goes into a serious emotional downspin but forms an unlikely (and only) friendship with his apartment manager, a short, loudmouthed, overweight woman who's alienated her son due to her brusque ways. Gibbs gets into a number of bar fights and when both the federal agent and the apartment manager go to get him out of jail - the federal agent wanting to chew him out, there's a confrontation between the two. She tells the agent that he's gained Gibbs' respect and berates the agent for abandoning Gibbs. When the agent claims that it's not his business, she responds with:

"... it *is* your business. you just wish it wasn't. two separate things, you selfish PRICK!"

This line hit me right between the eyes. I've discovered that some of the regulars actually talk about me every day and they want to spend more time with me.

And maybe I'm in denial, but I'd like to go back and say that it might be more accurate that it's my fear of failure that's held me back, but either way something that's tied to the issues I had with my mother also got a flashlight shone on them in a subsequent scene where Gibbs (Mark Harmon from NCIS) is narrating and describing the morning of his first day of being a federal agent with memories of his family completely disrupting his emotional equilibrium. He wants to just lie in bed curled up in a fetal position 

"...but then I heard a voice in my head say: 'Leroy, quit being a little bitch and get up and go to work!"

which is of course what the apartment manager (who developed terminal cancer but reconciled with her son and spent her last months living with him which is all she wanted. besides saving Gibbs) would have told him.

I've been looking for a cheerleader (with BIG pompoms) when maybe what I need more is a drill sergeant to kick my butt to get into gear.

Home Life

 I've been able to connect with a number of people over the years, and while everyone has a different story, some details seem to repeat themselves to a startling degree. And it's the one identified in the title. One person who I was able to help find a job remains gainfully employed and has been living indoors for over a year now after what I estimate to have been about fifteen (15) years of living outdoors. Addiction is a big part of his story - not for him, but rather for his mother, which resulted in his living outdoors before he finished high school. Two others who are also now gainfully employed were in foster care. The reality is that foster care doesn't prepare children for life. The commonly accepted stats are as follows:

- nationally, 20% of those who age out of foster care live outdoors within their first four years afterwards. in CA, the percentage is almost 31%;

- nationally, approximately 29% of youth without housing between the ages of 13 and 25 have spent time in foster care;

- 61% of the homeless who were in foster care are likely to be incarcerated, vs. 46% of homeless youth who were never in foster care;

- 47% of all former foster care youth who've lived outside also did so with their biological families vs. 9% of non-foster youth;

I tutor, so this resonates with me. A lot of the time, the main thing I have to do is give a student the confidence that they can do the work. So I can see that a lot of these kids might not know how to go about reaching goals, but a lot of them won't even be motivated to set goals because they don't believe that they might reach these goals. 

I suppose that this is about my thinking about exploring what I can do to help improve things, but also for any of you reading this to consider if this motivates you to try and make some sort of positive impact in the life of a single kid who might be capable of great things if they had a meaningful support system.

Social Capital

It's a phrase I discovered only recently, in the context of research done by someone named Jacqueline Mattis at my alma mater (University of Michigan Ann Arbor) which she titled: 

Exploring Love and Transformative Engagement in the Diaspora (ELATED)

Looking into her research, I am now better able to verbalize one of my goals if not the primary goal for what I do, which is facilitate the growth of social capital among those who live outdoors. While Mattis' work concentrates specifically on African American and diasporic communities, there's significant overlap as many in those communities live outdoors as well as she (taken from Jacqueline Mattis, PH.D. | U-M LSA Center for the Study of Black Youth in Context (umich.edu)) "examines the extent to which, and ways in which, various domains of religiosity and spirituality (e.g., people’s self-definition as religious and or spiritual, involvement in formal and public aspects of religious life) inform such positive outcomes as forgiveness, empathy, compassion, altruism, volunteerism, and community involvement among those who live with the challenges associated with urban life."

These outcomes can be categorized as results of social capital, a term coined by Alexis De Tocqueville. L.J. Hanifan described it this way in 1916, contrasting it to material goods:

"I do not refer to real estate, or to personal property or to cold cash, but rather to that in life which tends to make these tangible substances count for most in the daily lives of people, namely, goodwill, fellowship, mutual sympathy and social intercourse among a group of individuals and families who make up a social unit.… If he may come into contact with his neighbour, and they with other neighbours, there will be an accumulation of social capital, which may immediately satisfy his social needs and which may bear a social potentiality sufficient to the substantial improvement of living conditions in the whole community. The community as a whole will benefit by the cooperation of all its parts, while the individual will find in his associations the advantages of the help, the sympathy, and the fellowship of his neighbours."

Social Capital is a major goal, but this cannot be accomplished with first facilitating a sense of community, which is a goal of serving a weekly dinner at the park. The meals are simple yet nutritious, The tactical goal is ensuring that people are nourished physically, while the tactical goal is to recreate the environment most commonly associated with the traditionally family dinner with the goal of building a sense of community.

Mattis' research has prompted me to reevaluate my approach. Mattis' faith is a factor in her research as she attempts to measure/document the correlation between Social Capital and faith. While I profess my faith as motivation for what I do, and we used to conduct a Bible Study after dinner (we were holding such a study when I was attacked and had a branch of my carotid severed by someone wielding a box cutter - but that's another story documented in another blog of mine), we no longer do anything overtly faith based (and one of our volunteers is an avowed atheist - but we're working on him in our own way), I'm beginning to feel like I need to make this overt in certain ways I have yet to determine. But it occurs to me that within a faith based perspective, I would be looking to facilitate fellowship. But that also means I would be overtly evangelizing those who come to dinner. 

Francisco

 A couple of posts/articles from the online publication Pasadena Now prompts this post. The article reported the results of an area poll which revealed that voters have very little faith in local government when it comes to addressing the issues associated with homelessness. The people polled revealed a consensus belief that the causes of homelessness fall into four categories:

- mental illness;

- addiction;

- those choosing not to work and being homeless as a result;

- those affected by the economy;

While I am in some ways encouraged that the people polled understand that not all the people currently living outdoors either have mental or addiction issues, my personal experience tells me not to assume that any of these four categories (which each have a certain level of validity) apply to any given individual. 

The other article was in response to the unseasonably warm weather we're currently experiencing and how that has resulted in a drastic increase in the local mosquito population. This was reported as a health concern as mosquitos are capable of spreading a number of diseases which were listed, including the West Nile virus, for which there is no cure.

These articles converge in the personage of someone named Francisco, whose last name I never learned. Francisco was maybe 5' tall and spoke with an accented lisp, which made it difficult to understand him. Like many Mexicans, he'd found work in various roles in the restaurant industry, and we had a number of enjoyable conversations about food and cooking. In addition to his culinary depths, I discovered a very curious intellect; when prompted, he'd talk about whatever free lectures he'd attended on the USC campus that week, on topics ranging from physics to literature. I began to look forward to seeing him every week, and I found myself lamenting how his speech impediment and his overall appearance probably led people to believe that he was dim-witted and uneducated while he was probably more intelligent and competent than the majority of coworkers I've had.

Unfortunately, Francisco contracted the Nile Virus and he was hospitalized for a number of weeks, and he passed away about a month after being released from the hospital, and I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I'd completely forgotten about him until I saw the reference to the Nile Virus. So this is as much a reminder to myself as it is about letting other people know who Francisco was, and when it comes to understanding the causes of homelessness, each individual has their own story or as therapists might say, the causes are overdetermined.

 

Sympathy, Empathy & Compassion

I am cross-posting this entry from another of my blogs,

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 I've chosen to make working with the homeless an essential part of my life, and I imagine that people who know this make basic assumptions about me and my motivations, and people might use terms such as compassion, sympathy or empathy. And those terms would be apt, but those terms should not be used interchangeably. I will summarize/plagiarize the differences as they've been explained to me as follows:

Sympathy are the feelings one has in response to someone else's situation. And you see it commonly expressed as follows: "I'm sorry for your loss." The thing is that it's about one's own response and otherwise does little to alleviate another person's suffering..

Empathy is feeling what another person is feeling. And some people who are suffering can benefit more from empathy than sympathy, but it's been suggested that empathy can be taken too far such that it can lead to tribalism among those with shared experiences, which can involve "good" feelings such as joy. I confess that I might have reacted this way in how I appreciate certain interests. 

Compassion drives a desire to help people who are suffering in some way. Some would claim that compassion take sympathy/empathy up a notch, but I'm not yet convinced that this is so, perhaps because I've observed some who've perhaps only wanted to appear compassionate. But to be fair, compassion does seem to play a factor in avoiding the development of tribalism out of empathy. 

The overall point is that it's my take that anyone who seeks to help other people should be influenced by a combination of all three of these motives, and my life experiences have enabled me to do that when it comes to wanting to help the homeless..

History

I'm embarrassed to realize that I have no official history of how all this got started, so here's a brief summary:

A group of younger adults from Christian Assembly Church in Eagle Rock began feeding the homeless on a weekly basis some time around 2010. I was invited to join the group. At that time, dinner generally consisted of bags of salad combined with pre-made (and then sliced) fried chicken tenders, tossed with ranch dressing. I managed to persuade a few members of the group to try their hand at cooking, and we began bringing food cooked at home.  

Initially, I saw it as a challenge where I gave myself a limit of $20, and based in part of what others were bringing as well as based on what was on sale that week at the grocery, I would then figure out recipes to use the ingredients I had purchased and make dishes that would supplement. for a while, we were fortunate enough to get donated frozen pre-grilled chicken which I would thaw and use in various ways. but for the most part, food and supplies have been funded out of my own pocket or from the occasional casual donation. 

Things changed dramatically and a lot of people left the group in 2013 when something rather unexpected happened one night in March; I was attacked at the park by someone wielding a box cutter who managed to sever the anterior branch of my carotid. Fortunately I was only four blocks away from Huntington Hospital, and by keeping pressure on the wound, I was able to get into surgery about 12 minutes after I'd gotten stabbed. I was uninsured at the time, but fortunately the California victim fund intervened and resolved what would have been a $118k hospital bill. I was in ICU for the better part of a week, but was back at the park the following week, hoping to carry on business as usual (in reality, I slept about 14  hours a day for the next 3-4 months), but we as a group never talked about the incident. 

I spent some time dealing with the event and I've blogged a bit about it online (samstabbed.blogspot.com). The short version is that my perspective was that this was an act of a person who had been traumatized by a personal incident or series of incidents, was in pain and had displaced their anger and I happened to be the target. Being able to depersonalize the attack had a profound effect on my ability to avoid taking offense at a lot of things. 

I'm into food, know a bit about the restaurant industry, and I liken what I do to the concept of the restaurant staff meal where the low man on the totem pole has to make do with the ingredients he/she has, and create a meal to feed the staff. but there's more to staff meal than that, and many a cook has moved on when the staff meal has failed to provide a sense of community. When people come to dinner, they're welcome to sit, chat, not have to worry about being harassed by anyone else there or by the police (who know who I am and are generally supportive of what I do - even though I have no permit), etc. It's about creating a place where you can sit down and have a family-type meal. The food won't be fancy, but it's generally tasty and nutritious. I'll cut and paste part of a recent email to new volunteers who started bringing food to the park as well:

1) I would love to have more volunteers (post quarantine) come regularly and engage in normal meal conversations with those who stay and eat. I've come to see this as being very much like daily staff meal at a restaurant - the meal is a result of whatever ingredients are available - in my case, on sale at Super King supermarket. But it still should be tasty, nutritious, and be comforting enough that people engage in regular conversation at the table. When staff meal doesn't hit all the buttons, people quit and look for jobs at other restaurants.

2) There may come a day where we expand so that it's no longer practical, but I'd prefer to see relatively little pre-processed food. It's convenient, no doubt, but I believe they're made to be addictive, which is an additional burden I'd rather not expose people to. I get that time is a concern, and I'd like to keep a supply of items I can offer when we do run out of food, something like cheese/crackers or peanut butter/crackers.

3) I choose to keep the meals fairly humble (though one Hispanic told me my beans are as good as his grandmother's) - we had a source for frozen pre-grilled chicken that I'd thaw and slice to make a grilled chicken salad with a lime cilantro dressing, that rivaled what you might find at local restaurants, but that brought a crowd that included a local family who'd drive to the park, monopolize the picnic table. cut in line, eat and go home. I want to minister to the folks who really don't have any other recourse, and are grateful for what we serve.

There's a regular named Daniel with whom you may be familiar. Back in 2017 when I was spending a lot of time at the Pasadena public library, whenever he saw me, he'd run over to Ralph's buy a bag of beans and a bag of rice and give it to me at the library; he was perfectly happy eating beans and rice, and he was willing to donate as long as I prepared it.

When I joined, the meal typically consisted of bagged salad, chopped up pre-made fried chicken tenders and ranch dressing. I encouraged a number of the guys to start cooking and I provided some simple recipes. eventually I overheard someone say that the food got a lot better after that older Asian guy joined the group. that was nice to hear.

4) Everyone is welcome, but we set the rules. If people can not show common courtesy/respect for others, they may receive a meal, but they must leave and eat elsewhere. I also prefer that people come and get their meals themselves but I do occasionally allow for people to take two plates, one for themselves, one for someone else.

Folks who try to manipulate/game the system (mainly trying to get special treatment) are to be politely refused. Last week we had someone who saw an unopened case of water and wanted us to open that pack even though we had other bottles of water available. When he was told no, not until the other bottles were given away, he began trying to give the other bottles away to people who already had water. when I then put the water in my car. He pouted, said something about showing my true colors, and left his plate on the sidewalk and left.

We had a bully try and intimidate me into serving him and his wife. everyone else got worried he was going to attack me, but when he said he'd back, I told he'd be welcome, as long as he observed basic rules of courtesy. He never came back.

For the most part people are well behaved and pretty respectful, especially if they've heard how I'm still doing this despite nearly getting killed by a crazy lady in 2013.

5) Nutrition/health is a priority, which is why we offer only water in hot weather, no carbonated beverages.  We had one lady who was seriously diabetic request soft drinks, and one kind-hearted volunteer bought 4-5 bottles. After that person's initial response: "what, no juice??!!", that volunteer visibly deflated, and that same day that lady chugged a half bottle of salad dressing. 

To state it another way, my concern is enabling poor eating habits that lead or contribute to dis-health of any kind. That's not to say that we won't offer an occasional indulgence of some sort. but I've had people ask just for the dessert in the past, and that makes me concerned. Ditto when it comes to things like pizza and fried chicken - OK as an occasional indulgence, but to be avoided as a regular entree. I met one person who used to come to dinner regularly, and he told me that he'd gained 100 lbs after living on the street, and he attributed it to all the free pizza and fried chicken that was typically available. Most of the food available to the homeless are in the form of massive preprocessed carbs. Hence my emphasis on the kale salad which has become quite popular.

6) Everyone who shows up gets a meal. It's more difficult to be fair when food comes in finite/fixed portions, like a chicken drumstick, a sandwich, etc. Now people do understand that food is likely to be gone at 7:30pm when we start serving at 6:45, but the reality is that most people are not there when we start serving; they tend to wait to see if we're serving before they become visible. 

Later in the month, most folks who get G.R. (general relief) are tapped out and more people tend to show up compared to the 1st week. Some groups don't even offer food the first week of the month because the numbers tend to drop drastically, but we're committed to every week, though to be fair I often prepare less the first week of the month,

7) My meals are typically centered around salad, rice, and some dish that goes over the rice. Sometimes it's as simple as rice and beans, but various versions, Cuban/Spanish/Mexican style, or chili. The rationale is that rice & beans provide the essential amino acids the body can not produce. The salad has become a litmus test which gives me some insight into an individual's state of mind.

I used to make pork chili verde a lot since pork leg at $.99/lb is quite affordable. ditto with ham after the Christmas holidays/Easter, but a fair percentage of the homeless choose not to eat pork and will forego the dish and eat just rice. if I do make it nowadays I also make beans as a protein source for those who don't eat pork. 

Chicken is also affordable, but unless boneless, we have a problem with limited number servings. So chicken ends up being a flavoring agent and served de-boned.

Having said all this, if there's  something you'd want to contribute to replace/augment/complement what we're doing now, I'd love to hear about it.

In cooler weather, my 10 qt electric pressure cooker has been great for making a lot of chicken soups/ vegetable/noodle/pasta e fagoli, etc. probably not so practical during the summer months.

I am all for people being what God made them to be: if you're a baker and want to contribute dessert, that's great,  I am not a baker, though  I found a chocolate chip cookie recipe that uses garbanzo beans in place of the cookie dough and mixed in the chocolate chips. I served them once and no one noticed that I was giving them protein. that kind of thinking I love to see.

Basically, I want to serve stuff that's simple but homey: maybe a salad, bean soup and crusty bread that has the potential to reach people emotionally. beans and rice is a popular staple in Spanish speaking countries, I've looked at various ethnic recipes and tried to duplicates the flavors. I want to emulate an oasis; folks who show up know that they won't be hassled by other homeless people, by cops (who know who I am and what I'm doing). A few homeless have told me that it's as much about having a conversation with a real person since a lot of the homeless have their issues.

With the appropriate funding, my long term goals include expanding to address needs as we discover them through our interactions with people who come to dinner; we currently serve meals on Tuesday nights because no one else in the Pasadena area serves food on Tuesdays so at present we really don't see a need to expand to serving food on other days as much as looking into hygiene/sanitation options; for example, most public restrooms close by 8pm (and ever earlier due to quarantine/curfew impositions). and right now, with the libraries closed, people have nowhere to recharge their phones.  staying clean and having clean clothes to wear is an issue. the short term goal is to form strategic partnerships with existing organizations such as shower of hope which offers free showers at two locations in the Pasadena area on Wednesdays 

Actually, one of my passions is social dance: ballroom, salsa, swing, tango, etc. I've danced competitively as well as in a few films and TV shows. I'd love to get a group of people right after they've showered and offer a dance lesson as a means of fostering community, socialization skills, etc. I had once contemplated getting a PhD in marriage  family therapy specializing in using partnered dance as a means of exploring & communicating relationship concepts. Working out why a dance move doesn't move might be conflict resolution at its finest.

So for now, we turn no one away that wants a meal, and we try to identify those who want and need the kind of help we can offer, and the first step is providing a sense of community so that they don't feel like they're all alone. Hopefully, my example will be meaningful for those who are bound by fear (and to a large degree, self-sabotage) and show them that it's possible to make better choices that will turn out well.