~ mondays... proudly brought to you by the same people who brought you 6 a.m., that piece of hair in your scrambled eggs, court dates, and beer farts..
Monday, October 19, 2009
Thursday, September 3, 2009
from another perspectice...
June, 2009
Love in the Little Things
Being a Jesuit Volunteer means taking great joy in simple pleasures: a fellow JV taking your turn on kitchen cleanup after an especially trying day at work, a warm, sunny bike ride after an interminably long winter, or a smile and a word of thanks from one of the patrons at House of Charity. We learn to love these simple pleasures partly because we are called to live simply. After all, I eat shelter food five days a week, share one bathroom with seven other JV's, and have exactly eighty dollars a month to spend on myself. Extravagance is rarely an option.
My work at House of Charity calls me to do more than live simply, however. It has taught me to take great pride in the basic tasks I can perform for our patrons everyday. Scooping stew onto 200 lunch plates, handing out 50 bars of soap, or cataloguing and retrieving countless pieces of mail may at first seem more like mindless repetition than revolutionary social justice work. But if these tasks ever start to feel pointless or mundane, I can come home from work and pick out a line from the "Prayer of Oscar Romero" inscribed on the wall in our living room: "We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something, and to do it very well." Every portion of stew means a full stomach, every bar of soap means a homeless person can feel clean and refreshed, and every letter received holds the promise of contact with a loved one.
All of these simple tasks reaffirm my love for the work I do on a daily basis, but every once and a while it's the little thing that a patron unknowingly does for me that humbles me and serves as a reminder that, in the end, I'm luckier to have the House of Charity than the patrons there are to have me.
At 71, he was dropped off on the House of Charity's doorstep by a family member who, for whatever reason, no longer had the funds or patience to take care of him. His life moves at a snail's pace, one foot in front of the other as his walker inches along. Gnarled fingers meticulously pack his pipe full of tobacco before he goes outside for a smoke. "Don't worry, it's not pot," he jokes. He has all the reasons in the world to complain. He froze in foxholes in Korea while bullets flew over his head. He laid down his life for his country only to be dropped in a homeless shelter 50 years later. But he never complains, all he asks for is a warm bed at night with a few blankets that he can wrap himself in tight to ease the "great pain" he suffers from everyday. He's afflicted with short-term memory loss but has an incredible mind. We recite Robert Frost poems together. He still has many miles to go before he sleeps, "the miles just take longer now" he says. I want to help him in so many ways. I want to give him his health, give him back the last 50 years of his life, take away those terrible memories from Korea that send him into nightmarish flashbacks every time he hears a firework go off or a car backfire. I can't do any of that. It's hard to even fully comprehend his hardship. But one night after helping him get his pajamas on and get into that "nice warm bed," I realize that I have given someone who deserves so much more than he has the one thing he truly needs. And in return, been taught yet another invaluable lesson on the importance of appreciating and loving life's simplest pleasures.
Jon Killoran
Los Angeles, CA
Love in the Little Things
Being a Jesuit Volunteer means taking great joy in simple pleasures: a fellow JV taking your turn on kitchen cleanup after an especially trying day at work, a warm, sunny bike ride after an interminably long winter, or a smile and a word of thanks from one of the patrons at House of Charity. We learn to love these simple pleasures partly because we are called to live simply. After all, I eat shelter food five days a week, share one bathroom with seven other JV's, and have exactly eighty dollars a month to spend on myself. Extravagance is rarely an option.
My work at House of Charity calls me to do more than live simply, however. It has taught me to take great pride in the basic tasks I can perform for our patrons everyday. Scooping stew onto 200 lunch plates, handing out 50 bars of soap, or cataloguing and retrieving countless pieces of mail may at first seem more like mindless repetition than revolutionary social justice work. But if these tasks ever start to feel pointless or mundane, I can come home from work and pick out a line from the "Prayer of Oscar Romero" inscribed on the wall in our living room: "We cannot do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that. This enables us to do something, and to do it very well." Every portion of stew means a full stomach, every bar of soap means a homeless person can feel clean and refreshed, and every letter received holds the promise of contact with a loved one.
All of these simple tasks reaffirm my love for the work I do on a daily basis, but every once and a while it's the little thing that a patron unknowingly does for me that humbles me and serves as a reminder that, in the end, I'm luckier to have the House of Charity than the patrons there are to have me.
At 71, he was dropped off on the House of Charity's doorstep by a family member who, for whatever reason, no longer had the funds or patience to take care of him. His life moves at a snail's pace, one foot in front of the other as his walker inches along. Gnarled fingers meticulously pack his pipe full of tobacco before he goes outside for a smoke. "Don't worry, it's not pot," he jokes. He has all the reasons in the world to complain. He froze in foxholes in Korea while bullets flew over his head. He laid down his life for his country only to be dropped in a homeless shelter 50 years later. But he never complains, all he asks for is a warm bed at night with a few blankets that he can wrap himself in tight to ease the "great pain" he suffers from everyday. He's afflicted with short-term memory loss but has an incredible mind. We recite Robert Frost poems together. He still has many miles to go before he sleeps, "the miles just take longer now" he says. I want to help him in so many ways. I want to give him his health, give him back the last 50 years of his life, take away those terrible memories from Korea that send him into nightmarish flashbacks every time he hears a firework go off or a car backfire. I can't do any of that. It's hard to even fully comprehend his hardship. But one night after helping him get his pajamas on and get into that "nice warm bed," I realize that I have given someone who deserves so much more than he has the one thing he truly needs. And in return, been taught yet another invaluable lesson on the importance of appreciating and loving life's simplest pleasures.
Jon Killoran
Los Angeles, CA
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
when big boys don't follow the rules
been thinking bout this... jails are full of boys that didn't learn to follow the rules and that have confused fear with respect. there are lots of reasons for this.... hmmm... as a society i think we have become desensitized and the line in the sand for what is ok keeps getting pushed back.... its like you can't unknow what you know... i hope this makes sense. so once you know something after awhile it becomes comfortable.... like loses its shock value... and what wasn't ok becomes ok ~ including breaking the rules.... can you see where i'm going with this? now thru all of this, we have exposed our young men to the likes of bad boys and glorify men from the other side of the track and wear their gang-history like a badge of honor... what's with that? yeah, they made it big but they glorify violence and the gangsta shit... these are men that at one time in their lives used fear to get what they wanted... and boys see that and want that "respect," only its not respect... its fear. don't get me wrong, i don't believe in censorship but it makes me wonder where we're going as a society if this is the kind of art that's created... i dunno... guess i'll have to think on this a little more...
Monday, June 29, 2009
my brother & Jesus
so my brother says to me the other day...I was reading the Bible the other day, and I have some good news. I love reading the Bible because it is the word of our Lord revealed to us through his only begotten son, Jesus Christ, who died for our sins and saved us.Saved us from what, exactly, isn't clear, because I think God was the one who was going to punish us for our sins in the first place. And since Jesus was God, does that mean God died to save us from God punishing us? It's all twisty. I prefer to believe that Jesus saved us from vampires. It clears up the confusion. Jesus fought a bunch of vampires and saved us. That's why you don't see any vampires these days. Well, you see fat guys in velveteen capes with runny make-up lisping in food courts, but it's not the same.
being what he's supposed to be
So my lovely-queen-in-training of a daughter has been at her dad's for what seems like eternity (it’s actually only been about two weeks) and I have been left in charge of her four-legged best friend, Kipper. Kipper-the-ho-dog-little-artichoke-puppy-scrumpkins. I am still trying to get used to being left with my charge and without the lovely-queen-in-training who normally does all the Kipper-the-ho-dog-little-artichoke-puppy-scrumpkins' caretaking. Every morning she shuts the bathroom door, makes sure there is no panty-buffet left out for him, and checks the house for no-no’s if I’m running late and am rushed with oh-my-god-I’ve-got-a-meeting-first-thing-today!
The lovely-queen-in-training has her morning routine of his care down to an art form. I, on the other hand, do not. Never mind that we’ve had him for 8 years and she was only 2 when he came to lay claim to us as his humans or the hours of showing her “nice puppy” or “Miyana, don’t kick the dog cuz I swear if your ruin that dog, I’m going to have YOU put down!”
Adjusting to her being gone is taking a little time and as a parent I have discovered I am not infallible. I have my faults and yes, I do screw up sometimes.
This morning I rushed out the door, but not before taking Kipper-the-ho-dog-little-artichoke-puppy-scrumpkins out to do his business, making sure he had food and water, and there was no panty-buffet for him. I went to work, went throughout my day, and followed by the gym and home to the precious pup.
What I came home to was garbage all over the floor. I had cleaned leftover take-out out of the frig and Kipper-the-ho-dog-little-artichoke-puppy-scrumpkins had found his way into discarded popcorn-chicken. Oh, did I fail to mention that I had also taken the garbage bag out of the pooch-proof garbage can and left it sitting on the kitchen floor bag open?
“AAAAARRRRRGGGGGHHHHH!!!!!!” and Kipper slinks out from under the end table to puppy-jail under Miyana’s bed. Self-exiled. I had not uttered a single word (ok, a sound, but not a word). I clean up the mess, take a deep breath and attempt to coax him out from under the bed. I messed up. I am the human and it is my responsibility to NOT leave an open garbage bag out. Some may say “WHAT?!?! But he got in the garbage!” Alas, he did but Kipper is doing what Kipper is supposed to do ~ be a dog. He is supposed to sniff stuff out, chew on what smells tasty to him, and be the dog. It’s what dogs do.
Mentally ill individuals aren’t much different. They’re supposed to do stuff that makes me go “Whaaa??” with my jaw hitting the floor and question my own sanity for doing this job. My clients are supposed to make me think for that brief moment, “What in the hell where you thinking?!?” and take it back immediately because the people that I serve do not think like you or me. They believe in logic where I’m the co-anchor on the Today Show and we’re getting married and throwing a couch off of a third floor balcony makes perfect sense.
So today I’m not going to be mad or frustrated with the dog. He was being a dog. And tomorrow when I go back to work I’m not going to get frustrated and remember that the clients I serve are doing what they are supposed to do.
Friday, May 15, 2009
You know that you're a social worker when...
You know that you're a social worker when...
1. You think $40,000 a year is "really making it".
2. You don't really know what it's like to work with men. (ok... maybe not all...)
3. You know all the latest lingo for drugs, where to get them, and how much they cost.
4. You've started a sentence with 'So what I hear you saying is...'
5. You've had 2 or more jobs at one time just to pay the bills. (not really, but I've thought of it)
6. You tell people what you do and they say "that's so noble".
7. You have had to explain to people that not all social workers take away kids.
8. You use the words 'validate,' 'appropriate' and 'intervention' daily.
9. You spend more than half your day documenting and doing paperwork.
10. You think nothing of discussing child abuse over dinner.
11. People have said to you "I don't know how you do what you do".
12. You've never been on a business trip or had an expense account.
13. You know a lot of other social workers who have left the profession for another.
14. You've very familiar with the concept of entitlement.
15. Staying at a job for 2 years is 'a long time'.
16. Your phone number is unlisted for good reason. (as well as facebook and myspace)
17. Your professional newsletters always have articles about raising salaries...but you still haven't seen it.
18. You've very familiar with the term 'budget cut'.
19. You can't imagine working at a bank or crunching numbers all day.
20. You've had clients who liked you just a little too much.
21. Having lunch is a luxury many days.
22. You've been cursed at or threatened...and it doesn't bother you. (does M.O.A.B. mean anything to you???)
23. Your job orientation has included self defense.
24. You have the best stories at any cocktail party.
25. Your parents don't know half of the stuff that you've dealt with at your job.
26. You know all the excuses clients use for a failed a drug test by heart.
2. You don't really know what it's like to work with men. (ok... maybe not all...)
3. You know all the latest lingo for drugs, where to get them, and how much they cost.
4. You've started a sentence with 'So what I hear you saying is...'
5. You've had 2 or more jobs at one time just to pay the bills. (not really, but I've thought of it)
6. You tell people what you do and they say "that's so noble".
7. You have had to explain to people that not all social workers take away kids.
8. You use the words 'validate,' 'appropriate' and 'intervention' daily.
9. You spend more than half your day documenting and doing paperwork.
10. You think nothing of discussing child abuse over dinner.
11. People have said to you "I don't know how you do what you do".
12. You've never been on a business trip or had an expense account.
13. You know a lot of other social workers who have left the profession for another.
14. You've very familiar with the concept of entitlement.
15. Staying at a job for 2 years is 'a long time'.
16. Your phone number is unlisted for good reason. (as well as facebook and myspace)
17. Your professional newsletters always have articles about raising salaries...but you still haven't seen it.
18. You've very familiar with the term 'budget cut'.
19. You can't imagine working at a bank or crunching numbers all day.
20. You've had clients who liked you just a little too much.
21. Having lunch is a luxury many days.
22. You've been cursed at or threatened...and it doesn't bother you. (does M.O.A.B. mean anything to you???)
23. Your job orientation has included self defense.
24. You have the best stories at any cocktail party.
25. Your parents don't know half of the stuff that you've dealt with at your job.
26. You know all the excuses clients use for a failed a drug test by heart.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Harm Reduction
OK... most people are gonna get pissed when they read this just not understanding what is behind addiction. I've worked with "chronic homeless street inebriates" ~ the polictically correct term for homeless street drunks... you know, the ones that sleep under bridges, in alleys, behind dumpsters. these were people that survived sleeping in homeless camps out in the freezing winters ~ sub-zero temps in the dead cold of alaska, been in treatment on average of 5 times in their lives, drinking alcohol for 25 years and homeless for 10 years. i've seen what works.... you bring these guys into a program and tell them they have to stay sober they'll take one look at you, say "fuck that" and walk out... they've been out there already... they're not ready to quit cold turkey... same goes for addicts. piss you off yet? read on.
Definition of Harm Reduction
Harm reduction is a public health approach that aims to reduce drug-related harm experienced by individuals and communities, without necessarily reducing the consumption of drugs.
Harm reduction strategies meet drug users "where they're at," addressing conditions of use along with the use itself.
PRINCIPLES OF HARM REDUCTION
Harm reduction is a set of practical strategies that reduce negative consequences of drug use, incorporating a spectrum of strategies from safer use, to managed use to abstinence. Harm reduction strategies meet drug users "where they're at," addressing conditions of use along with the use itself.
Because harm reduction demands that interventions and policies designed to serve drug users reflect specific individual and community needs, there is no universal definition of or formula for implementing harm reduction. However, HRC considers the following principles central to harm reduction practice.
* Accepts, for better and for worse, that licit and illicit drug use is part of our world and chooses to work to minimize its harmful effects rather than simply ignore or condemn them.
* Understands drug use as a complex, multi-faceted phenomenon that encompasses a continuum of behaviors from severe abuse to total abstinence, and acknowledges that some ways of using drugs are clearly safer than others.
* Establishes quality of individual and community life and well-being--not necessarily cessation of all drug use--as the criteria for successful interventions and policies.
* Calls for the non-judgmental, non-coercive provision of services and resources to people who use drugs and the communities in which they live in order to assist them in reducing attendant harm.
* Ensures that drug users and those with a history of drug use routinely have a real voice in the creation of programs and policies designed to serve them.
* Affirms drugs users themselves as the primary agents of reducing the harms of their drug use, and seeks to empower users to share information and support each other in strategies which meet their actual conditions of use.
* Recognizes that the realities of poverty, class, racism, social isolation, past trauma, sex-based discrimination and other social inequalities affect both people's vulnerability to and capacity for effectively dealing with drug-related harm.
* Does not attempt to minimize or ignore the real and tragic harm and danger associated with licit and illicit drug use.
Why ? THE NEED FOR HARM REDUCTION
It is clear that most current approaches to drug use and drug-related problems help only a tiny fraction of those individuals who use illicit drugs. Drug-related problems continue to baffle communities across the country, leaving them feeling frustrated and hopeless in their ability to respond to the harm they experience in any effective way. Harm reduction works to redress the following injustices, among others:
There is a shocking lack of basic services that, if in place, would significantly help reduce drug-related harm. Many locales throughout the United States still have no needle exchange programs or over-the-counter sale of injection equipment as an HIV prevention measure, for example, and there are no methadone maintenance treatment programs at all in nearly one-fifth of the United States.
A lack of universal health care and a movement toward privatization and managed care threaten to reduce or eliminate altogether some of the few therapeutic services--particularly drug treatment--that currently do exist for users of illicit drugs.
The federal government spends approximately two-thirds of its drug intervention dollars on incarceration and prosecution and only about a third on drug education, prevention, research, and treatment combined.
Most therapeutic services for drug users, including drug treatment, are designed to serve the priorities of providers instead of the needs of consumers. Drug education and prevention campaigns are largely ineffective, attempting to scare people away from using drugs instead of equipping them with accurate information about drugs and drug use, including their adverse and harmful effects.
Current drug control strategies criminalize a huge proportion of the country's population. Since 1980, the number of adults incarcerated in state and federal prisons, local jails, and on probation or parole has more than tripled, with one-third of this expansion due to an increase in the number of drug law violators put behind bars. Women, African-Americans, and Latino/as have been disproportionately affected.
The HIV epidemic has killed hundreds of thousands of people in the United States and continues to rage on. Swift public policy changes and the implementation of critical services could have prevented an untold number of deaths and HIV infections among injection drug users, their sexual partners, and children.
Definition of Harm Reduction
Harm reduction is a public health approach that aims to reduce drug-related harm experienced by individuals and communities, without necessarily reducing the consumption of drugs.
Harm reduction strategies meet drug users "where they're at," addressing conditions of use along with the use itself.
PRINCIPLES OF HARM REDUCTION
Harm reduction is a set of practical strategies that reduce negative consequences of drug use, incorporating a spectrum of strategies from safer use, to managed use to abstinence. Harm reduction strategies meet drug users "where they're at," addressing conditions of use along with the use itself.
Because harm reduction demands that interventions and policies designed to serve drug users reflect specific individual and community needs, there is no universal definition of or formula for implementing harm reduction. However, HRC considers the following principles central to harm reduction practice.
* Accepts, for better and for worse, that licit and illicit drug use is part of our world and chooses to work to minimize its harmful effects rather than simply ignore or condemn them.
* Understands drug use as a complex, multi-faceted phenomenon that encompasses a continuum of behaviors from severe abuse to total abstinence, and acknowledges that some ways of using drugs are clearly safer than others.
* Establishes quality of individual and community life and well-being--not necessarily cessation of all drug use--as the criteria for successful interventions and policies.
* Calls for the non-judgmental, non-coercive provision of services and resources to people who use drugs and the communities in which they live in order to assist them in reducing attendant harm.
* Ensures that drug users and those with a history of drug use routinely have a real voice in the creation of programs and policies designed to serve them.
* Affirms drugs users themselves as the primary agents of reducing the harms of their drug use, and seeks to empower users to share information and support each other in strategies which meet their actual conditions of use.
* Recognizes that the realities of poverty, class, racism, social isolation, past trauma, sex-based discrimination and other social inequalities affect both people's vulnerability to and capacity for effectively dealing with drug-related harm.
* Does not attempt to minimize or ignore the real and tragic harm and danger associated with licit and illicit drug use.
Why ? THE NEED FOR HARM REDUCTION
It is clear that most current approaches to drug use and drug-related problems help only a tiny fraction of those individuals who use illicit drugs. Drug-related problems continue to baffle communities across the country, leaving them feeling frustrated and hopeless in their ability to respond to the harm they experience in any effective way. Harm reduction works to redress the following injustices, among others:
There is a shocking lack of basic services that, if in place, would significantly help reduce drug-related harm. Many locales throughout the United States still have no needle exchange programs or over-the-counter sale of injection equipment as an HIV prevention measure, for example, and there are no methadone maintenance treatment programs at all in nearly one-fifth of the United States.
A lack of universal health care and a movement toward privatization and managed care threaten to reduce or eliminate altogether some of the few therapeutic services--particularly drug treatment--that currently do exist for users of illicit drugs.
The federal government spends approximately two-thirds of its drug intervention dollars on incarceration and prosecution and only about a third on drug education, prevention, research, and treatment combined.
Most therapeutic services for drug users, including drug treatment, are designed to serve the priorities of providers instead of the needs of consumers. Drug education and prevention campaigns are largely ineffective, attempting to scare people away from using drugs instead of equipping them with accurate information about drugs and drug use, including their adverse and harmful effects.
Current drug control strategies criminalize a huge proportion of the country's population. Since 1980, the number of adults incarcerated in state and federal prisons, local jails, and on probation or parole has more than tripled, with one-third of this expansion due to an increase in the number of drug law violators put behind bars. Women, African-Americans, and Latino/as have been disproportionately affected.
The HIV epidemic has killed hundreds of thousands of people in the United States and continues to rage on. Swift public policy changes and the implementation of critical services could have prevented an untold number of deaths and HIV infections among injection drug users, their sexual partners, and children.
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