Out of the closet

Like many others, I cannot help but watch TV news/opinion, read news websites and blogs and listen to the radio during breaks from the work day to find out if there is anything new to report from Haiti.

Much like I did with Hurricane Katrina and 9/11/01.

I've come awfully close to tears, then realize that all the cried tears in the world do nothing to help those who inch closer and closer to desperation and chaos.

Acting and speaking contrarily is not rescuing anyone from the ruins, it does not give someone who needs it a few sips of water, a swath of sterile bandage and a five-day supply of antibiotics.

Neither is giving those who are behaving so poorly an even brighter spotlight by grumbling over those words going to inflate a hospital or innovate, then construct, new means of ingress into Haiti.

I will say that after hearing and seeing the babble about the pact, I came as close as I dared to dumping Christianity as my religion of choice. Then, I considered the source and, with each passing day, he has less and less time on this world and has to reconcile himself with his maker sooner rather than later. He and his lot will take care of themselves and are nothing more than a gnat flying in our collective face on a lazy, roasting and damp summer afternoon on the East Coast.

How to be of help from where we are? HuffPo has a link to causecast.org where one can purchase supplies then have them shipped to where they are needed, just as soon as it can be sent.

What are the next steps?

• The Grameen foundation (see the badge on the left) has had a presence in Haiti for some time. How better to help someone by investing in their time and talent and giving them a basic education on personal economics, growing their small business and saving for their children's future.
• Make a note on your calendar to make a second donation to the charity of your choice two weeks from now and, if you are blessed with steady employment, see if your charity will accept a rolling donation, which draws a steady donation from you at regular intervals. Gifts are great, but reliable sources of income are invaluable to non-profit/charitable organizations.
• Clean out your closet.

Huh?

When supplies were pouring into NYC, Washington DC and, later in the previous decade, New Orleans, there were only so many ways to get to the cities and far too many trucks, boats, etc. that could drive/dock and unload. Supplies have had to have been turned away because there was no way to get those supplies to those who needed them.

By cleaning out your closets, you will discover what you need and what you can forego. Once your pile of "what you can forego" is completed upon your closet cleaning, donate what you can do without to those in your neighborhood who would appreciate having those things.

By donating to local charities, the local charities need to rely less on larger non-profit organization and government funding. The funding they receive can then be redirected to provide further aid to the people of Haiti.

It is not important that your box of hand-me-downs gets shipped across the country and through half of the Carribean. You stand a much better chance of having those gifts used where you are then where you want it to be used.

You get a more spacious closet. Someone else gets something so much more.

Rays of sunshine on the Boulevard today

When I stepped out of my cubicle and onto Hollywood Boulevard late this morning to take one of three brisk-paced walks I take each day to clear the cobwebs out of my head, I was greeted at the corner by a young woman (who is hidden behind the folks standing at the sidewalk's edge) with a bright orange flyer full of talking points.

The photo I snapped of the 10 or so young people from across the street doesn't give the best view of all of their homemade signs. You might make out the partial phrase on a bright blue poster board saying "HoNK 4" or the green letters on black background to the far right reading "Stop Ha . .".

These folks had chosen a popular intersection to try raising awareness and to get some horns a-honking in support of defeating legislation pending in Uganda to make homosexuality a crime with much more severe penalties. The bright orange flyer I received pointed out on the bottom that the punishment of death for engaging in homosexual behavior had since been modified "..because of immense international disapproval."

Sadly, the bright orange flyer had no website referenced and, thanks to my superior(?) storage skills, the flyer just could not be scanned so I could post it here. However, one of our local papers did post a brief "story" about today's mini-rally, so I could tell that the students who gathered this morning made quite a trek to get to Hollywood this morning.

As horns from cars, trucks and tour buses blasted off in support of the student gathering and I continued on my quick walk after snapping the photo above, I had to bite the inside of my lip a bit to stop from crying a bit. It gets way too easy to sink into cynicism over how apathetic we as a country seem to others in need outside of the U.S. There are certainly plenty of places and people here which could use our attention, but it is far too easy to think that just one person cannot make any difference, so why bother?

I can tell you ten teenagers made a difference in my life. If only for today. Anyone's guess who else might have noticed this happening today as well.

Waiting for a bus

I had an interesting start to an otherwise routine Monday.

Metro in Los Angeles had a portion of their light rail service closed all along Washington Blvd. for the weekend. The closure was due to end last evening. As what sometimes with any construction, it went a bit past schedule.

The light rail I ride stopped at the Washington Blvd. stop, everyone disembarked and slowly started to queue for Metro buses which arrived every few minutes to pick up commuters from across the street from the stop, then shuttled through four remaining stops in the route.

I could use this forum to grouse about the construction delays, the bumpy bus ride, the 30 minute wait on my still recuperating legs (never mind the rest of the walk and ride to work after the bus trip with stiff joints and sore thigh muscles).

or

I'll write about the mass of humanity shuffling along while others skipped ahead of the queue by skipping into the street only to be abruptly placed back into line by one of the many Sheriff's Deputies keeping the foot and motor traffic running.

I met two teachers while waiting for the bus: one an ESL teacher of adults and the other a literature teacher of high school juniors. We and others around us kept reminding each other that it could be colder outside, it could still be prior to sunrise, it could have been raining.

A large black bird on top of a telephone pole squawking, ruffling its back feathers was causing the crowd around the pole scattering in different directions and the bird was having its . . uh . . morning constitutional.

Each comment, each turn around to view the crowd in front of us and the never-ending mass of commuters from more arriving trains, every wisecrack and passing catering truck with cruel promises of hot coffee on a cold fall morning, elicited laughs, giggles, snorts (from me - freaking deviated septum!) and a far more relaxed atmosphere than it could have been.

So, I got to work 45 minutes late today. I took some comfort that a few thousand others were in the same figurative boat as I was and was grateful to God for all the ways a potential disaster was turned into a chance to interact with fellow commuters and find the basic goodness in most everyone.

Here I am on the evening of June 19

Not in a Raddison in L.A, I'm afraid.  I managed to catch a nasty cold that, like all others, has drizzled into my lungs like so much icing on a coffee cake.  I drip, I cough, I sweat and am now slathered in menthol.

Not much in a darshan mood tonight, I'm afraid.  With any luck, someone has taken my place at the ballroom and is hearing the message, singing the songs, receiving darshan or maybe meeting that someone special tonight over deep fried eggplant and curried rice.

A nasty cold has not deaden my romantic streak, it seems.

Since I'm not receiving the love tonight, I found a couple of stories that moved me in a loving and positive way.

First, a lovely story of prison inmates who are taught how to train puppies as service dogs. The inmates then are given a puppy each to train on how to be a service dog to returning veterans.  Such adorable puppies and dogs, such wonderful things these dogs do to help not only with physical but also heal emotional/psychological wounds one lick at a time.

Your heart not melted yet?  Eyes not filled with a little bit of tears?

Entertainment Tonight has compiled an essential tool for most any kind of gay man to have on hand when times get difficult.  And, with increasing unemployment, dropping wages and health care in a state of chaos, why shouldn't we turn to the ever-so-fluffy world of entertainment for a healthy dose of distraction.  Here you go.  You're welcome !

Finally, I have been rotating through my decent sized library of tunes to rediscover songs I couldn't play enough the first time around and from which I needed a break.  After discovering that my MP3 player's program lets me set the base volume for each song individually.  The song I found and added back to my player was one of those whose volume was way louder than it should be.

A quick fix and the song "Author" by Shimmerplanet, is back on the player and I'm falling for it all over again.  The link above gets you to Shimmerplanet's My Space page where you can check out "Author" and, if you like it like I do, all the big music download sites have this and his other tunes available for purchase.

Better to spend a little now then get sued and, well . . you can see the rest here.

Rest well and happy tonight!

The trail of whacky news leads to my backyard

Most days, nothing fires my creativity.  Somedays, I struggle to pare down the fascinating news down to three stories:

Yes, I know this story is now weeks old, but I saw it in full for the first time earlier today.  Did you know that there are a few states in the U.S. that are charging their prison's inmates a nightly rate for staying in the prison?  Apparently, some prisons have hiked the price of junk food in the snack bars, started charging for regular meals and/or lessened the portion of food served in each regular meal?  The Christian Science Monitor does a good job of sampling the various fund-raising efforts in states that are otherwise hurting for funding to support their state's prison population.

It does beg the question: What happens when an inmate has no source to tap for money to pay the nightly usage fee, buy food or otherwise pay for their keep?  Outside of prison, when one cannot pay the rent, the property manager can evict the tenant.  Might inmates strapped for cash have their parents, spouses, brothers and/or sisters tapped for cash to support the inmate in the prison?  If someone other than the inmate is directly funding the inmate's stay in prison, what new rights does the . . uh . . patron (?) have? 

If I had to pay for a relative's stay in prison, shouldn't I have the right to ship my inmate relative to a cheaper prison?  Would married inmates face a greater percentage of divorce to cut the tap off to the state for the inmate's stay?  What about the victim(s) of the inmate's crime? If they still want justice for their attacker/thief, perhaps they could chip in to cover the tab??

The endless meandering imagination of a liberal like me can take this argument to the Nth degree.  The depths of ridiculousness . . just no end.

**********************************************************************************

A pair of men from Britain have been languishing in Santa Ana City Jail since July 2008. (Santa Ana, CA -- in the middle of Orange County).  For what reason?  Have they been charged with something? They can't afford bail?  Is the City Jail pitching in to keep a tight hold on detainees in the War on Terror ??

I'll quote the author of this article from the L.A. Times, Dana Parsons:

The men, known as the "heretical two" to supporters, aren't in U.S. custody because of their world views. Nor have they committed any crime in America. Their lengthy detention is largely the product of the asylum-seeking process that Sheppard and Whittle brought on themselves when they entered the country. They and their original attorney acknowledge that motions they filed helped prolong the case.

They were 
convicted in Britain of "disseminating hate speech" on a website one of them ran.  The men figured they could receive political asylum in the U.S. as our country is well known for supporting free speech.

The L.A. Times does a good job of bringing the facts on this.  So, now for my righteous liberal indignation for the ugly words and thoughts these two decided to spew on line:

What a bunch of hooey!  That's right.  Hooey!!

It may turn my stomach to read/hear the absolutely nutty ravings of people who seek to blame everyone else but themselves for their own perceived misfortune.  That said, I would rather be free to read/hear those nutty ravings.  Short of their diatribes encouraging violence and vehement, in-their-face ugly words in the faces of those these "writers", I say let them at a keyboard.  All the better to see them with.  

The article writer seems quite doubtful their stint in Jail is due to end anytime soon.  11 months could well turn into several years, unfortunately.  Should the U.S. give these two political asylum?  Well, yeah!  There is some measure of difference between posting ones thoughts on-line and the horrors physically brought on others in recent years based on twisted beliefs.

***********************************************************************************

and, finally . . in my backyard, sort of:

One of the newest medical marijuana dispensaries in California will be opening in Whittier, CA!  Seems the city's Planning Commissioners saw fit to go counter to the City Council's vote in April 2009 where

 " . . the council by a 3-2 vote asked staff to draft an ordinance banning the medical marijuana dispensaries. Councilmen Owen Newcomer and Bob Henderson were the dissenting votes."

In what has traditionally been a conservative corner of Los Angeles County, the City Council couldn't even get unanimous consensus on this issue.  My guess is that this more a function of the state of the economy rather than a genuine concern for those who were prescribed marijuana for treatment of their ailments here in our fair city.

I'm going to go ahead and give some of the credit for this moderate shift in the city government's mindset on the grassroots group which started months ago (and who, sadly, I have not met with for a couple of months now.  I knew something had to give when I started a full-time job working away from home again).

Soon enough, when you need to smoke 'em, you'll soon be able to get 'em . . locally . . uh, as long as the Council votes to OK this next month.  Who knows?

The trail of whacky news could continue to wind about for some time to come.

A meditation

Ooh, if this was only the type that involves incense, a tranquil forest retreat and slow, deep Shiatsu massage at the end.  Maybe next time.

Thanks to now having a normal 40-hour-a-week with a daily 2 1/2 hour round trip commute, I have precious little time weeknights to scour the 'net, looking for news that grabs my attention and rattles me enough that I can't just post a mildly snarky comment on that site itself.  Since I'm using public transportation for the daily commute (that's old-school for "going green", btw), I'm saving my pennies to get a new computer (the one I use is fast approaching 7 years old) and some kind of matching PDA I can take with me on the commute.

So, while I await a leapfrog of technology into the 21st century, I just started my now weekly trip through the blogosphere and found a post by one of my favorite writers, Susie Madrak. You'll find a clip of testimony given to the Senate this past Wednesday from a journalist turned TV writer regarding the state of "professional journalism".

I'll distill it:  pretty bleak.

Be that as it may, the last century is full of industries who were on the brink of death when someone found a way to revive/reinvent themselves.  My best guess is that the Huffington Post is in the best position to become this century's NY Times.  Maybe The Mudflats as an adjunct to the Anchorage Daily News and Juneauempire.com ?

So, where do I see myself in all of this?  No Journalism degree and nothing in my resume suggesting a career sniffing out big stories.  I've enjoyed my forays into protest and civic involvement; however, I really love snapping photos of my new work neighborhood (Hollywood CA) and fishing around the 'net for my favorite tunes.

So, maybe no Pulitzer, Peabody or six-figure book deal in my future.  Then again, the majority of writers never receive awards or live in the lap of luxury.

Please knock first before entering the . . uh . . room (?) as I ponder the direction of this blog this weekend.

What is really underneath it all ?

At the risk of sounding completely out of my mind, I'm developing an odd insight into how most everyone lives their lives every day.

There are the everyday choices each of us makes (blue socks or brown with this outfit?, sandwich or soup?  Letterman or Leno?) and there is the underlying set of emotions that cradles every decision we make (brown socks look better with this suit, soup as it is cold outside, Leno 'cause he's got that really cute actor on tonight).

I'm going to apply this over-simplified notion to all of the news about mass murder in the U.S.   I cannot begin to know what decisions each of the men (and it's overwhelmingly men who perpetrate this) made that led them to think that committing the acts of violence they did was the only way to fix whatever was going wrong in their lives, so my whole "everyday choices" thing only works subjectively.

So, it comes down to what these men were experiencing in their emotional lives that led them down the path toward this tragedies.

It was quite clear with the man responsible for the murder and mayhem at Virginia Tech years ago that he was losing the battle with mental illness.  As to what others in the past weeks were struggling with emotionally, it is anyone's guess.  Little is known about the most recent incident in Pennsylvania, but in time more will be revealed.  Whether what is reported sheds much insight into that man's psyche is anyone's guess.

Surfing the 'net, I stumbled onto an article which helps me understand the psychology behind these acts a little bit better. So, there may not be too much any one of us can do for some who find themselves in these situations.  The "sense of 'doom and gloom' that pervades the cultural atmosphere" cannot be all there is to understanding recent events.  The expert cited in the above article went on to say:

Usually there's a rigidity in that person (who kills) and an inability to really process stress.  They absorb it. They can't digest it.  They want structure, they want answers, and things are not that clear for them."

I have to admit, I'm at a loss for answers and there's a good deal of fuzziness about all the goings on in our country these days.

So, it's back to me to find the context in which to view these shootings and to ask myself why I haven't done what these men have done and why I cannot imagine me perpetrating this kind of violence while these men found themselves having arrived at the decision to do so.

Maybe the answer is really back at the start of this post.  Maybe admitting I'm a little out of my depth is exactly how I avoid all the sad decisions that lead to tragedies like we've seen on the news these past weeks.  I could site my faith as my strength; however, I find that same connected feeling when I go to the political grassroots meetings every month.  I get the same feeling of assuredness when I march amongst hundreds or tens of thousands in the past months and chant out my frustration, anger and sadness.

And, when I try to reach out and give permission to everyone I know to feel as they feel and let it out in health ways, maybe I'm becoming part of that same net I feel under my feet as I try to figure everything out.

Last week I reminded all who read this to laugh sometime during the week.  What I ask now  may be tougher to do: 

choose to admit you're out of your depth

OR 

be a part of the "net" in someone's life

(doing both is OK, too)

A sign of things to come or a reflection of California's current economic state?

A tent city in California's state capitol, Sacramento?

The story has been told on Oprah and a photo version of it is on the MSNBC website.  In the interest of being impartial, here is a version of the story as told from the English point of view.

While the photos and video tell a very dramatic story and February's unemployment figures are like icing on a really lousy cake, here's a little perspective.

As of 2007, the population of Sacramento, CA is just over 460,000.  A close comparison population wise in California is Fresno, roughly in the center of the state, at a population of 470,000.

From the National Alliance to End Homelessness, 2007 estimates of the homeless population in Sacramento (city and county) was 2,452.  In Fresno, the number was 4,247

As far as foreclosures, which is likely to generate some percentage of newly homeless, RealtyTrac now lists over 4400 properties in Sacramento as "Pre-foreclosure" and over 7200 properties as "bank owned".  In Fresno, over 2600 properties are listed currently as "Pre-foreclosure" and nearly 3600 as "bank owned"

While the articles I found about Sacramento estimate 1200 live in the tent city at the outskirts of the city, I could not find current estimates for Fresno, if a tent city has even been permitted to stand.  If one exists there, it is likely a couple of hundred people are living in that tent city.

So, what does all of this mean?

First of all, California is one of five states which is experiencing the highest percentage of foreclosures.  Further, our state's unemployment rate is now over 10% (San Diego county is doing better than the rest of the state - - scroll 2/3rds down the article for the entire state's latest unemployment numbers).  With figures like this, residents feeling the need to move into vans, tents, etc., is not as surprising.

While at least one charity has been providing assistance to those living in tent cities, the state is just now getting over the budget drama and is not in the best position to provide help.  The Recovery Act and the U.S's upcoming fiscal year budget will provide some assistance with getting as many as want to return to apartments/houses.  

However, as we all have heard these last few months, do not be surprised if this situation gets worse before it gets better.

My continued civics education . . .

. . . and I got dinner served to me at the same time.  Civilized indeed.

Last night's meeting was a continuation of the meeting I attended last month which sprang from Organize for America.

The good news is we have a very solid political grassroots action group rolling along!

The challenge?  Somewhat like what happened last spring within the Democratic Party, we have a lot of strong personalities with different agendas.  While the group is well aware of this, the act of merging everyone's passions into one united goal will be a delicate one.

First up was reports from those in the gathering who had attended the City Council meeting earlier this month and had done some research and follow up to see if the issues addressed were going to be on an upcoming Council meeting agenda.

Long story short: City Council meetings are not ongoing dialogues between Council Members and the city's citizens.  The only way a citizen's agenda gets folded into the Council Meeting's agenda is by having City Hall staff bring agenda items to the City Manager who will add it onto an upcoming agenda.

So, the easy way of affecting change just slammed into a brick wall.

To have any hope of affecting change, the group agreed that efforts need to be grown outside of the city's political structure (perhaps the word "grassroots" in the group's title should have been a clue).  To that end, with City Council elections scheduled for April 2010, the group will find others in the city who are trying to cultivate Council candidates (our group has three people who are "exploring" a run for the council).  There are either two or three of the five seats on the Council open in 2010.  My bet is we will have to whittle down many more candidates to find the best two or three to run "as a slate".

If the various progressive-leaning groups in our city can come together, we all stand a better chance of having our ideas represented on the Council (as it stands now, clearly none of the Council Members has any interest in doing things differently) once our candidates are elected to the Council.

Nothing like having your own pipeline to the Council to get your agenda added to the Council's business.

Now, the great big fallen tree in the middle of the road:  How to upset the status quo and change the Council's composition from representation of the largest voter block to representation of the city's entire population?

Right now, the Council oversees the city "at large" -- all five members address the entire city's issues.  While running candidates "on a slate" gives us a better chance at changing the Council, there is no guarantee that any or all of our candidates will win the election.  So, we discussed how best to change the "at large" to a district system.  

In an attempt to illustrate how "at large" elections versus election by district could change the composition of a Council, here's a couple of home-made pie charts.  Whip cream and/or a la mode optional:

I'll confess these charts are oversimplifications.  There is also the issue of drawing up districts to begin with (who decides how to this and how often) and gerrymandering is also a concern.  However, continuing the city governing structure as is assures that nothing gets changed.

Changing the city to district representation could get done either by ballot initiative or by suing the city to coerce change by insisting the current construct does not fairly represent the city's residents.  No harm in pursuing both avenues at the same time and we have many other cities to use as a model for how to successfully district the city.

We meet again at the end of March.  It still amazes me how much things appear to be changing in such a short amount of time, by political standards.  Regardless of how all these efforts turn out, watching and participating in the process is helping me understand how a government works (or does not, in some cases) and will let me experience just how much change people are willing to accept.

Photo from the barrio

and I use the word barrio with affection.  I've lived in this neighborhood around 20 years and, in all fairness, it is far nicer than it used to be.  I used to have to stay away from windows after dark for fear of being hit by stray bullets.  Nowadays, I haven't heard so much as a backfire in years.

However, it seems there's still a small problem with graffiti (and there are still pairs of shoes hanging from a neighborhood power line - it's best to steer clear of that block after dark).  Thankfully, finding graffiti removal phone numbers/websites is fairly easy.

Since this sign is on my usual walk route, I'll let you know if/when this sign gets cleaned or replaced.

Here we go again in the U.S.A

I list The Mudflats as a blog to check out not only because whomever writes this blog is quite talented, but also because what is happening in Alaska, traditionally a "red state", gives me a good idea how other "red states" in the union are handling the "you are on your own" attitude of their state's government.

Please check out a statement released by Bob Pope, who announced last week his intention to see the Democratic nomination for Governor in 2010 regarding what is happening in a remote village in Alaska

A quick glance at the blogs and media groups who have reported on this story shows me just how much the Republicans in this state genuinely care about their state's citizens, no matter where they are.  My hope is that Alaskans remember who responded to their requests for help and who turned their back on them come Election Day in November 2010.

Meanwhile, please click here -- this blogger lists some groups to whom you can reach out if you can spare something to help out.

I love a parade!

I have been to quite a few parades.  The first I remember was Fasching in Wiesbaden, Germany as a ten-year old.  That one set the bar quite high for other parades to meet.  I've been once to the Doo Dah Parade in Pasadena (I'm still cleaning bits of tortilla out of the oddest places) and have gone to a bunch of Pride parades in West Hollywood.

Today, I marched in my first parade -- the Whittier Christmas Parade.

I was so proud and happy to march with the Whittier chapter of PFLAG in its first time being represented in this parade.  The staging (waiting for the parade to star

t moving) part took quite a while.  The parade was scheduled to start at 10 am and, because of our group's placing in the parade, we did not leave our staging area until 11 am.  There were around twenty of us marching, just dressed in warm and comfortable clothing with most of us sporting rainbow-colored ribbons either pinned to lapels or tied somewhere on our clothes.

This being the first time any LGBT-affiliated group had marched in this parade, no one knew for sure how anyone in the parade and those lined up and 

down Greenleaf and Mar Vista would react to our presence.

Like most of the other community groups, we waived to all, put on big smiles and wished everyone Merry Christmas as we walked along.

I had to bite the inside of my lip at one point to prevent tears from falling.  I could barely utter a word to anyone watching the parade.  Save for two people who let us know their displeasure at our presence, everyone involved was either quiet or was warm, friendly and excited.  Others in our group told me after we finished marching the parade route that they noticed some whom we passed were whispering to each other.

I cannot wait until next year's parade and will do what I can to talk everyone I know into participating with PFLAG, should PFLAG choose to

 march again.  The thousands participating and watching the parade saw a group of happy, proud people and a group that easily fit in with all of the 

marching bands, floats and other community gro

ups.

I'm posting my first picture in this blog.  My talents li

e in words, not in taking pictures.  I was just happy many of my pictures were free of my finger blocking the lens!  This photo does a good job summarizing how w

ell we were received.  Most in our group were handing out candy canes (as were most of the other groups) to parade watchers.  We had a happy group awaiting candy as I snapped this photo.