This change is hard, bro...

4/25


Just a brief moment before heading downtown for another legal issue. My neighbor Ric would have come down to be with me but had to be out of town. It's getting frustrating. Get back to the church and Danielle has more bad news. It's begining to feel overwhelming. She looks at me...sometimes I feel like someone's out there just looking for things to do to us....like it's organized... 


That's how a lot of our church members feel, I say. Sometimes it feels like God must be angry at us. (Not my theological position, just an occasional emotional experience.) It will take everyone, everyone, to get through this. 


Coming back late at night after extended conversations with RL and David S about necessary repair work. And Steve about where this is headed. 


I get asked about my 1927 Washington Redbirds hat (my hometown's years as a Cardinal farm club) and my Homestead Grays jacket. (Thank you, Jim...) I tell the stories.


It's been a long day.


4/26


An older woman, dainty, somewhat patrician, wearing a large sun hat, like from ’20’s England or Gatsby Long Island, a surgical mask lowered like a scarf, is visiting with Danielle. She’s been here before.

On the street, Dave and Donna are on their way to do laundry.  It's a beautiful day.

I see Marty and stop to talk. He tells me his father used to work out his sermons as he waked about. Me too, I say. Says his father didn’t like Billy Graham so much but favored Bishp Fulton J. Sheen. And I remembered his radio show. He asks me about the insurance situation, goes on to remembering the visigothic architcture of CCNY rise. Well, maybe just gothic, he says. He says it was made of hewn stone, not so easy to construct.

He tells me about his five credit seminar. You must have been a scholar, I say. A scholar, yes. In China, they would have called me a schorar. That’s a joke...Speaking of jokes...and he tells me his old joke about ...in the spirit in which it was given...I first told you that 22 years ago, he says.( see http://west-parkpress.blogspot.com/search?q=in+the+spirits ) Ah but I failed....absenteeism...

It is a wide ranging conversation. Oil and gas in Wyoming. Just think what might be there in Yellowstone....I get these brochures about investing...I ask if he has invsted. He tells me his money is in Iraqi dinars. He’s been holding them for three years...waiting. But not from Saddam Hussein’s time. He did 9-11, you know...

Well, not exactly, I say. Wasn’t he part of the Arab triumvirate? he asks. Uh, what’s that? Ah well, maybe not...

I tell him it’s been a good conversation. Yes, he says, a good conversation. A lengthy conversation. Just right. And another beautiful day.

Indeed, I say.


KT is back from New Orleans, walking down the street after a rehearsal with RL in the chapel. Anxious to hear her road stories.

A columbarium salesman comes in to visit. He’s got a wry sense of humor. Was here several years ago. He’s looking for the right wall. We could maybe do 70 niches. Presale. No risk.

Meet with Rev.Mary and Steve. Lots to talk about. Getting impatient with internal politics in different parts of OWS life. But so it is in the church as well. So unnecessary. 

Several of our coop members have emotional issues to begin with. Here at West-Park they have found a place of safety, security, stability. And now it must end. Signs of heightened anxiety everywhere. In such situations, it’s easier to believe there’s a secret plan or bad guy(s) rather just the vagaries of life. Small conflicts get blown out of proportion. We have to find a way to lift up what has been good here. 

As Teddy said, For me, for many of us, this coop became our Occupy, this effort to build a community. It was worth it. The t-shirt work, that was good. Got some people working instead of spanging (spare changing in OWS lingo). This change is hard, bro...