Nickelsville has moved. 2 days ahead of schedule.

Thursday 5/12/11 - tents are getting packed

No wonder the atmosphere in Nickelsville was crazy last Thursday when Lynnda and I went there to cook chicken pesto pasta.  2 huge trucks parked in front of the fire station made my heart skip a beat, so I stopped to take a few pics before entering.

Tracy was so nervous she could hardly speak, Richard was busy taking down the tents in the backyard, the cupboards were empty, people were milling frantically, the pasta was gone, and so were the pots, big kitchen utensils or most of them, anyway...  I went out to the truck and asked where the pots are:  Jimbo pointed his finger indicating the stuff behind him, tightly packed: 'there'... Anyway to retrieve them? 'Nope. Like half an hour of unpacking'.  All of this 3 days before move?  I kind of lost it: 'don't you guys need to eat for the next 2.5 days?  What about today's dinner? I thought we discussed it last Monday!' - I started to yell at Richard. Lynnda stayed cool and said: stop it, we will cook in the two pots left, whatever we can, and we can get pasta at Fred Meyer; it's crazy enough without you adding to it. True dat - thank you, my friend, and so we did.

Jarvis and Nate helped us with chopping, and Richard emerged in time from tent packing to deal with garlic - the pesto pasta turned very good, especially that it was fortified with Lynnda's homegrown basil.  A few people stopped to shake our hands and said words like: 'well, if nobody officially thanked you yet, than I am' - I though it weird, only now know why:  all the talk about Sunday service before moving was just that: a talk, they knew we might not see each other for a while...

5/12/11 • Bye, bye pasta and pots. Note Nickelsville's portable container garden in forefront - hope it wasn't forgotten!

The same night there was a concert at Nickelsville.  Friday, the next day the Black Caravan  procession, which I was tempted to join, but got stuck at some other errand.  My heart was heavy all day with concern about the people in Nickelsville, so I resolved to stop by on Saturday afternoon with bunch of shopping bags for the last minute packing. This morning, Saturday, I woke up to an announcement email posted by Ibu Oni last night:

***NICKELSVILLE  MOVED  TODAY**
Our new location is our First Location. We have come full circle!!!
We are at 2nd Ave SW and W MArginal Way SW
7116 W Marginal Way SW


WHEN PEOPLE CALLED COUNCIL PRESIDENT CONLIN THIS WEEK, HIS AIDES TOLD THEM NICKELSVILLE COULD JUST STAY IN OLD FIREHOUSE #39 FOR A COUPLE MORE MONTHS


BUT WE MOVED ANYWAY!
WHY?  LET US COUNT THE REASONS:


1)  Nickelsville isn't an indoor shelter for 99 people; it's an eco-village for up to 1,000!


2)  Every night at old Firestation #39 we were turning people away - a larger site is needed to save human lives!  8 homeless people have already died outside or by violence this year.


3)  Sleeping in the Bay Station for a Fire Truck, with 20 other people, doesn't afford anyone privacy and everyone deserves that - especially families and couples.


4)  Last May, 2010 we were advised to give the new Mayor a chance.
Last August the Mayor's Encampment Panel got started and recommended giving us a permanent site.  7 months ago we were told that the Sunny Jim site would be ready in 5 months.  Now Council President Conlin says he'll decide what to do by the fall.  We think this fall Council President Conlin will say maybe something will be ready next spring.


FOOL ME ONCE,  SHAME ON CONLIN
FOOL ME TWICE,  SHAME ON NICKELSVILLE
WE WON'T GET FOOLED AGAIN!


5) Nickelsville has pets, couples and kids. They all need privacy and simple sturdy sleeping structures.  None of these are possible long term at Firestation #39.  That is why we asked Mayor McGinn on February 22, 2011 to let SHARE and WHEEL take over Old Firestation #39 on May 15th, and begin operating it as shelter.


6)  We told Richard Conlin about this but he ignored Nickelsville.
SHARE/WHEEL told Richard Conlin about this but he ignored SHARE/WHEEL.
Richard Conlin hasn't written us or anyone about working something out.  Richard Conlin hasn't written the Mayor and asked him to keep the Old Firehouse open for Nickelsville or anyone.


7)  Richard Conlin's aides will talk the talk about Old Firestation #39 with any tom, dick or harriet, but Richard Conlin hasn't walked the walk to make anything happen.


8)  That's why we've got to make something happen for ourselves. Richard Conlin won't do it for us!


The Black Cat Caravan (has arrived!)
by Tex Shirey & The Nickelsville Central Committee

While checking the Internet google maps (click here) for Nickelsville's  new location I noticed a blurb in The Stranger's Slog; read it for yourself and don't forget to check the comments - some of our fellow citizens have pretty callous hearts or very weak, prone to propaganda minds; fortunately there are a few sane and sympathetic comments as well - hopefully more will appear as the day goes:


Nickelsville Moves to West Seattle
posted by CIENNA MADRID on FRI, MAY 13, 2011 at 3:53 PM
Nickelsville has moved to 7116 W. Marginal Way SW, two days before their move deadline, according to a press release sent today by the group. Nickelodeons were invited by the city to stay at their old location—Fire Station 39 in Lake City—for a few more months, however, Nickelsville's press release notes that, "Nickelsville isn't an indoor shelter for 99 people; it's an eco-village for up to 1,000!"
http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2011/05/13/nickelsville-moves-to-west-seattle

DON'T FORGET TO VISIT NICKELSVILLE'S FACEBOOK PAGE - that's where the whole communication action is!

The first goodbyes

• Nickelsville is  MOVING 5/15 & YOUR HELP IS NEEDED!!! - please, read the bar on the right.

Joanna was in the parking lot when I was unpacking my car last Monday and she came up to chat about her big news: the family is moving back to California. 'We gave it 6 months here. It didn't work.  It's hard to survive, and I'm never going to leave California again, as long as I live'. They are going back this Thursday on the Greyhound bus, Andy already has his $280 ticket, and Joanna will get hers and LeeAnn's on Wednesday, when she receives the last payment form Jack in the Box, where she works.  The paycheck will be not enough to cover the tickets, but a charitable organization (Joanna wasn't sure about its name: 'Mother's hand'?) is paying the difference.  What is LeeAnn's reaction?  "She is too little, she doesn't understand, but she is happy to hear that she will see Nana again.  There is much to be said for family support; here we have no family to help us'. Joanna and her family will be staying with her mother or possibly sister once back in California.  Good luck to the 3 of you and sorry Seattle didn't work for you - happy travels home!

T.J. was just leaving Nickelsville and also stopped to chat: 'I'm only visiting here now, found my long last love and staying with him now, in a place near Gasworks park'. She, too, won't be moving when Nickelsville moves, but she will come visit her friends.  In her hands she had carefully wrapped in a tribal blanket a native american flute, that once belonged to her Klinkit father: 'He performed healing ceremonies with it for 20 years'. Can you play it?  'Oh, yah'.  Too bad I didn't know that - love Native American flute playing, but T.J. was saying goodbye now.

Once in the kitchen I found Jarvis cooking on 2 burners already, and he will need the 3rd one for the  rice: long promised traditional red beans and rice and if he doesn't cook it now... Who knows when there will be a kitchen available anytime soon.  He was making a meat version and a vegetarian version - any of the stuff meant for peanut soup would be of use for you?  'Naw, cabbage, zucchini, cilantro or tomato cans don't really fit this traditional southern recipe, I already had and used onions, unless you have the green ones'.  Nope.  'Oh. Any peppers?".  Now pray to me - I have 5 of them!  Jarvis bows and waves his hands up and down: 'You are my Kitchen Goddess, now hand over the peppers!'  After a bit of horse-playing he swiftly and expertly chops them into little bits and throws them into the pot.  Tracy said she will find use for the other veggies: 'maybe I'll cook a cabbage stew'.

With no soup to cook I briefly visit with Julie - she will be moving with Nickelsville - 'I have no other choice'...  Then join Tracy, Richard and Terry at the table; Mike, LeRoy, Jeremy (holding his aching head) and other folks coming in and out. Richard says not everyone will be moving along with Nickelsville: 'some people find it too nerve-racking and/or afraid to be distressed or arrested'.  Tracy is speaking about the upcoming week of cleaning and packing - 'everything in refrigerators has to go, so we can clean them'; Terry mentions trucks showing up on Wednesday or Thursday to haul away not needed stuff.  The atmosphere is palpable with anxiety: Richard tells me to better check with Scott regarding Thursday chicken pesto pasta: 'who knows if the stoves will be there, or electricity and so much is happening now'. (Later checked with Scott: 'stove and electricity will be there, pasta much appreciated, although advisable before 5:15 pm, as at 6:30 Jim Page and Joe Martin will be giving a music performance, complete with a meal of chili dogs - the only meal planned so far; BTW, you are invited to the performance').

About that chili last Thursday: so how much longer did you cook it after Lynnda and I left?  'Well, about 3 hours, but then it was soft and good', said Mike. 'And cookies!  I found cookies in the office, everybody forgot about them, so I brought them in and we had them after chili', added Tracy.

Nickelsville has a facebook page now, please visit:
http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_208520775849543
___________________

While looking for some articles about homelessness to add to this post I came across a promising 2/8/11 snippet about 'Nickelsville model coming to Hawaii?', so I clicked it, and what a load of crap I found there!  Was wondering if it's any good to link to this obvious propaganda, but  was so taken aback by soulless and loathsome attitude of the writer, that thought exposing how some people frame other people's  misfortunes could be quite educating... The author speaks about the 'homelessness industry' - as if he honestly believed there is a manufacturing plant somewhere, cranking up the homeless people solely to annoy the rest of the population and embarrass the politicians.  Yeah, right. And, oh horror,  the homeless are self-organizing in Seattle, instead of waiting for some private corps to run them.    Here is a fragment of this despicable piece, full of arguments no doubt known to people who has been active in fighting homelessness,  but eye-opening to the rest of us:

Seattle’s tent cities are organizing bases for self-appointed activists who use the homeless to extract money and other benefits from various government agencies.  The residents consist predominantly of methamphetamines addicts.  They have also become a factional tool in Seattle politics used on behalf of Seattle politicians who give the organizers money and against those politicians who don’t.  The camps are moved from one district to another to embarrass and extort politicians. 
http://www.hawaiifreepress.com/main/ArticlesMain/tabid/56/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/2505/Homeless-tent-cities-Seattlersquos-decadelong-nightmare-coming-to-Honolulu.aspx

On positive note and to balance the crap above I also found an article in 2/2/11 Seattle Post Globe, truly informing about issues of being homeless; enjoy:

David Bloom, one of the early organizers of the Center, says the trend Cole forecasted has continued unabated and is anything but encouraging. “Since 1980 in Seattle, the growth in numbers of homeless people has continued to outstrip our capacity – some would say our willingness – to provide shelter for those who need it,” Bloom said.
“Despite many caring and creative efforts to develop more shelter and more affordable housing, we’ve witness growing numbers of people who are homeless on any given night,” he explained. “That number is now approaching 10,000, while it was less than 1,000 at the time of the first One Night Count – a tenfold increase.”

http://seattlepostglobe.org/2011/02/03/seattle-homelessness-a-long-standing-problem-with-no-easy-solution-in-sight

Thursday: Chili and Andrea's well passed exam

• Nickelsville is  MOVING 5/15 & YOUR HELP IS NEEDED!!! - please, read the bar on the right.

Tracy pre-soaked 5 lbs of mixed kinds of beans a night before, and Lynnda pre-cooked ground beef. I got to Nickelsville an hour earlier than usual to meet with Glen, who is kindly helping me create a facebook page for one of my blogs - that was good for the beans, as they started to cook before Lynnda got there, but not good enough after all:  later, after total of 2.5+ hours of bean cooking and what we presented as finished chili, Mike pronounced them as undercooked still - and so we left it on a small flame to hopefully finish after Lynnda and I left.  Perhaps today I'll find out if it was ever soft and done.

Small cooking note:  Lynnda and I differ on chili cooking methodology - she believes and has experience of no harm in putting beans and tomatoes together for cooking, while I believe (and have a sad experience of it) that acid in tomatoes may stop some beans from ever cooking soft, therefore tomatoes should be added after the beans are completely soft.  Well, they WERE soft enough for me (I like beans in my chili still intact) when we added tomatoes after more than 1.5 hrs of cooking time, but apparently general taste for beans in chili is way softer than mine, so we may find out the about the tomato/bean theories...  I should remember to ask today.

As you can see Garrett and Richard are the real chefs; Mike (in the middle)  is just sitting, and  like a good overlord doing nothing but smiling:)

When Glen and I went to the nearby library (Nickelsville internet connection is too weak) to tackle the facebook issue,  Garrett and Richard set out to chop the mountain of onions, green peppers, also garlic and cilantro and open cans of tomatoes..  By the time we were back the bowls of chopped veggies were almost ready and Lynnda appeared with Thursday usual: a mother/daughter production of many cookies - THANK YOU LYNNDA AND BROOKE!  As usual the cookies traveled to the office, so nobody mistakes them as appetizer.

Lynnda also brought 2 big bags of tortilla chips which we planned as chili companion, but as the beans took seemingly forever to cook, the chips started to disappear while guacamole dip and salsa miraculously appeared as a companion to them:)...  Having nothing to do but season and watch the beans slowly simmer, Lynnda and I cooked 2 lbs of rice to go with chili instead.  Before we left Nickelsville  - the darned beans still cooking and not soft enough -  Lynnda set out in the bowl another chili companion she brought:  shredded cheese.  Wonder if the cheese lasted  - I can easily imagine that someone creatively made nachos from remaining chips and cheese while waiting  for the beans in chili to get soft (at this point I can only hope that Lynnda's bean/tomato theory was right, and mine was wrong).

Andrea got 90% on her exams!  While we were cooking, a migraine stricken Jeremy (he ended up at ER the night before, but only slightly better now) kept coming to the kitchen to anxiously watch through the window for his wife Andrea: she had one of the final exams that day in the vet school she is attending, and Jeremy was hoping to see her coming off the bus home and to find out how she did.  When she finally appeared the whole kitchen was pregnant with expectations and we were all delighted to hear that she aced the exam.  BRAVO ANDREA AND CONGRATULATIONS!

Butoh dance in Nickelsville

• Nickelsville is  MOVING 5/15 & YOUR HELP IS NEEDED!!! - please, read the bar on the right.

Thank you Sheri, Mary, Will, Joan, Doug and Helen + David and Herbert (music and lights) for sharing your talents and giving us a  night of wondrous art of butoh dancing!

(Click on pics to see  larger version)

Last Saturday the dancers came about an hour before the performance to set up music, lights and prepare the stage:  they put yellow tape on the floor, creating 6 lines, then they disappeared to change and get ready.  5 minutes before the performance Julie read and introductory note about butoh and then the music started.  Each of us probably saw what our senses prepared us to see but here is my short description (not a dance-trained eye)...

The artists  appeared on the side and proceeded in a mannequin-like state to dance their way each into separate line, every performer in a sort of non-descriptive trench coat and each carrying a suitcase.  What followed was a fusion of modern dance and theater influenced by the Japanese culture: 6 stories and 6 lives told sometimes waltzing happily, sometimes whirling half-crazily, sometimes hopping in bewilderment, sometimes  stooped in pain, and sometimes contorted or curled in a fetal position.  Sometimes twisting, leaping or treading solo, and sometimes  getting involved into dance of lives intermingling - looking casual here, accidental or purposeful there.  We found out the things the dancers carried in their suitcases, as each of them opened his or her and used the content to create another persona, perhaps from a different stage of life:  green tutu-like skirt, white caftan, makings of an eastern warrior, red high heels, dramatic kimono, an umbrella. The suitcases also carried the gifts for each other between their shared lives and even presents for the audience - we enjoyed being suddenly pelted with candies....

After the performance the people of Nickelsville were invited to ask questions, and I learned quite a bit from them, too, as naturally sum of collective knowledge and understanding is greater than individual one.   All in all it was a a fantastic, delightful and  thought-provoking performance which was very well received by the audience, in particular  by 4 y.o. LeeAnn, who not only sat quietly through the entire rather adult-addressed form of  theater, but after the end she enthusiastically joined the troupe.

LeeAnn joins the troupe

Sorry that my pics are lousy, I blame it on a camera which doesn't handle darkness well, as I am a perfect photographer:).  Not.

Artists and some of the audience

Check out music from Glen Still - Spoken Word & Monday usual: peanut soup

• Nickelsville is  MOVING 5/15 & YOUR HELP IS NEEDED!!! - please, read the bar on the right.

• Another song from Glenn Still for your listening and thinking pleasure above. 

• One thing about blogging:  noticed that unless the post is made close to the time it describes it's almost impossible to come up with anything but bland platitudes:  the fleeting impressions are gone and so are the observations made in that time.  Unfortunately, I waited too long to write about last Monday and now my head has something like this to say: came, cooked and left:(....  I know i talked to a few people about how did the Easter egg hunting/barbecue go, but can only report 'fine', as all the details left me, except that it wasn't raining....

I briefly talked to John of China, his going back home now moving from April to May - last week he missed his wife's birthday and was pretty dispirited about it.  Have you called her? 'The day didn't start in China yet, waiting for her to wake up'...  Jarvis is out of Nickelsville, and in Tent City3 now.   Mike was making sure that we have everything we need for cooking, and Richard went through the veg donation pile to see what could be salvaged.  That last task was somewhat depressing,  the produce is likely donated the day of or day after 'sell date';  some of the things are half rotten already and if you leave them for another day or two, the entire content of package is one smelly mess.  I once volunteered in the food bank doing the same sorting job every week and thinking that in a perfect world it would be the poor people getting wonderfully fresh and nutritious produce that they desperately need, and the rich and healthy would have the job of sorting out the leftovers to see what could go well with their caviar and shrimp.   

All I have is pictures of Monday chopping team - by now it is quite easy to find a whole group of people doing this communal task of making gigantic pot of soup.   I know I enjoy this time together, when we talk and laugh and chop.

4/25/11 - Tony, a.k.a. L.A, Richard, Terry and Patricia - soup prep

4/25/11 - Tony a.k.a. L.A.  and Richard

• Tomorrow is butoh dance performance in Nickelsville!  Hopefully I'll be able to post some pics.

__________________________________________
• An item I found in Seattle Times, published 4/25/11:

Seattle homeless man and dog live in rowboat
By ERIK LACITIS
The Seattle Times


Under the concrete pillars of the Highway 520 bridge, anchored in a foot of water, William Kaphaem and his dog, Lulu, live in an aluminum 14-foot rowboat.


They seem to have found peace at the edge of the Arboretum.  Kaphaem has rigged the boat so it's covered by a 20-by-18-foot brown plastic tarp, with a few feet of headroom. It seems to blend in with the muddy bottom by the bridge posts of the Montlake Boulevard East exit.


You wouldn't even know there was somebody inside unless you yelled over the noise of the rumbling cars and trucks above, "Hey, Three Stars!"


Kaphaem, 51, says he has Mohawk ancestry and so he prefers to be called by that name, which reflects the outdoors.   Hearing your voice, Kaphaem - Three Stars - will lift up the tarp that serves as his cocoon.  "Actually, a lot of light gets through," he says.
The rest is here....

Check out the comments under the article, too -  I find them more interesting than the article itself: some positive, but some complaining about the writer's trespassing privacy of the man:
I do not believe you should have published this article. He was doing just fine without any help from you.  Now he has officialdom looking into his situation. The state will want to charge rent for him anchoring on state property. The Coast Guard wants ot know what he is doing with waste. That will be the end of that.


I certainly can identify with complainers, since this is the very issue I struggle with on this blog - how to write about the homeless people without bringing an attention they might not wish upon themselves: which details are ok to share and which are too private - thanks people of Nickelsville for teaching me some of that!

Thursday: Chicken Rice Curry and Easter prep

• Nickelsville is  MOVING 5/15 & YOUR HELP IS NEEDED!!! - please, read the bar on the right.

Easter egg painting - 4/21/11

When Lynnda and I got to Nickelsville last Thursday, the Easter preparation was in a full swing:  Joanna was leading a session of egg painting for kids and a man from the neighborhood was there too, to talk about Easter Sunday egg hunting and barbecue in the nearby park.  Later in the afternoon Monte from Tent City 3 came over with a woman who brought stuffed bunnies for the children - Nickelsville looked like any home full of youngsters preparing for a day of fun and sharing.

Mike P. making a fruit salad - 4/21/11

Lynnda  has been going an extra mile or 2 for her days in the camp lately:  her last Thursday's production involved not only Brooke's cupcakes (this time decorated thoughtfully decorated with Easter-colored jelly beans - THANKS AGAIN, BROOKE!), the curry/chicken soup/stew but also what looked like a result of a small fruit-stand robbery:  bags and bags of fruit she found on sale somewhere.  She had Mike P. devoted to chopping them all afternoon, before she sprinkled them with fresh lemon juice and mixed into delicious salad - the most popular food item on the menu that day, as everyone is obviously craving fresh fruits in this cold and rainy spring.

Paul with cabbage and cilantro - 4/21/11

The chicken curry soup/stew:  while Paul and Richard were dicing and slicing onions, carrots, garlic, cabbage, potatoes, turnips and cilantro Lynnda and I threw a 2lb bag of brown rice into a boiling water and let it cook for about 15-20  minutes before we started to add the other veggies; we also raided the freezer, which is now overstuffed, and must be emptied before the move on May 15th - we relieved it form a bag of frozen carrots and several bags of broccoli/cauliflower mixes.  When the stew was not far from ready we added a huge pot of chicken in curry sauce which Lynnda precooked at home.  On the end we decided it wasn't curried-out enough, so we threw in about 1/3 of a huge curry container content, some hot pepper flakes, lemon juice and of course what crowns nearly every of our kitchen soup inventions:  natural vitamins in the form of fresh garlic and 2 bunches of chopped cilantro + some green  parsley we found in the kitchen wanting to be used.  For the sake of accuracy I should add that for broth we used chicken and beef bouillon cubes + powder of several Knorr onion soups, but you can simply use salt.

______________
Homeless in Seattle:  Here is a link to Seattle Community Network webpage on Homelessness: it contains various info and resources for the people who might find themselves homeless on the streets of Seattle - I should show it to Julie and ask her if perhaps we could review all those links (I found some of them broken and outdated) perhaps Nickelsville already has a better list?

News from T.J. and Julie + Monday usual

• Nickelsville is  MOVING & YOUR HELP IS NEEDED!!! - please, read the bar on the right.

T.J. in Nickelsville's kitchen - 4/18/11

Monday a week ago I added some (about to go bad if not used) mushrooms into the soup and asked Tracy to alert T.J. not to eat it, since she is highly allergic to mushrooms.  Tracy responded   that T.J. is very sick, 'on a bed-rest, not eating anything, too weak to eat or even walk'. The following Thursday I saw T.J. walking around the fire-station with a puppy in her  hands - she said she is slowly starting to feel better, but only last Monday I saw her feeling well enough to participate in Nickelsville's life again - she came to the kitchen and did the stack of dishes.  Over a week ago, when  her condition was the worst she went to hospital to get some help, but the hospital refused to admit her, claiming  that her awful condition requires longer care, therefore she is not an ER candidate.

T.J. might have had a mini-stroke, or temporarily collapsed lung  (she said it happened to her before), but our 'best in the world' medical care had no place for her in the system and turned her away because she is uninsured and requires longer  treatment than emergency solution (I personally saw this great logic employed many times when my uninsured son was refused medical care while suffering attacks of chronic illness - the reason I'm mentioning this is to highlight the fact that it is 'normal'  in our world of for-profit healthcare - according to government statistics 40 thousands people die in America each year due to lack of access to medical care + think about those countless that our government didn't track).  Will picked T.J. at the hospital waiting room, and cared for her with other friends in Nickelsville: he stayed by her bed at night watching over her, and over the course of several days slowly put some fluids in her and fed her with chicken soup he bought for her, and when she finally regained a bit of strenght he  helped her to get up and walk again.  T.J.  told me how grateful she is to Will and her Nickelsville family for being there for her when she needed their support - I'm honored to put it on the record here.  Some day I should find out and  post more about how Nickelsville residents cope with medical issues...

Also, update on Julie, the former paralegal - a good update, too boot: Julie became a step-mother or an auntie for 4 adorable puppies when her friend (a dog-breeder) suddenly became homeless - the experience was therapeutic, because in puppies' company she found out she can be alone again as a human (Julie is recovering from a bad relationship, effects of which sent her into being homeless).  Julie also found her calling: advocating for the homeless - her skills already made her one of the arbitrators on the site and as self-proclaimed workaholic Julie gets involved in many administrative duties as well.  She thinks those new activities + first hand knowledge of the issues facing people that are homeless + passion  for the subject could lead to paying job in the field and to being self-supporting again.  May those wishes come true for Julie very soon;  she quipped that her new field of expertise will definitely be more joyous and good for her heart than being paralegal:)...


Mike and Richard are the new kitchen coordinators and Richard helped with chopping veggies for soup, as always, and so did Ramone and  Jeff, who chopped fast and fine but left to see a friend before the soup was ready (I think Jeff is new at Nickelsville or perhaps he is just never around during soup-time).  For the last two weeks in order to continue the 'Monday usual' tradition I started to bring peanut butter along with the veggies,  because we finally depleted Nickelsville's seemingly vast supplies of it and apparently, some people were not too happy about it:  2 people recently stopped by the kitchen to ask similar question: 'So, what goes into peanut soup?  you just open a jar of peanut butter and it goes in?'  Yep.  They both walked out without continuing the conversation, perhaps preferring jars of peanut butter over peanut soup...

Thursday: Lynnda's Tex-Mex chicken soup

• Nickelsville is  MOVING & YOUR HELP IS NEEDED!!! - please, read the bar on the right.

• Lynnda got sick with that nasty bug going around, but she still pre-cooked the chicken in the broth, soaked 3 lbs of beans overnight and delivered it all to Nickelsville with bunch of red peppers and huge bag of frozen corn + jar of Tex-Mex seasoning and instructions on how to assembly the soup.  She also brought Brooke's cupcakes, which Jeremy promptly hid in the office, so nobody mistook them for appetizers :)...

Glen the poet shredded the chicken which we added to beans cooking with onion and carrots. Richard and Nam were chopping veggies - Nam not too successfully, as he didn't sort out bad veggies from good ones in donated bags that were lying around for a few days; my assumption that everyone is good in the kitchen turned out wrong - Nam said (afterwords) that he is 'lousy' at kitchen tasks as I took his bowl of chopped veggies to the compost bin:(..  We added a package of broken into small pieces linguini pasta for volume, found some frozen veggies, then threw in chopped fresh peppers and a bag of corn.  Tex-Mex seasoning and a head of chopped fresh garlic (Richard's steady job) was just what the soup needed for finish - wonderful smell had people commenting well before we were done cooking. Along with the first bowls ladled out, Jeremy assembled Brooke's cupcakes on a big tray - THANKS, BROOKE!

•  The date for Japanese butoh dance performance has been fixed for Saturday, April 30 at 7 PM. It'll be private event just for Nickelsville residents, titled: IMPRINTS, collective and individual images and stories of our lives we share with our bodies in motion.  THANK YOU ALL SIX DANCERS, and especially Will, who created this beautiful poster for the occasion (click on the pic to enlarge):

•  Mental chew for today:

Tent Cities in America - compilation of links, videos, articles about homelessness from Squidoo - a popular publishing platform and community that makes it easy for you to create "lenses" online. Lenses are pages, kind of like flyers or signposts or overview articles, that gather everything you know about your topic of interest--and snap it all into focus. This one is about homelessness:

This is the most desperate our citizens have been since the great depression. Tent cities are springing up everywhere.  People are simply not able to support themselves right now.  What are we doing about it?

I am seeing a lot of blame, but is that really helping? Do we really think it is helping these people to make it a poltical issue?

It is a humanitarian issue.

Let's get down there and help our neighbors, folks.

More here...

Check out music from Glen Still - Spoken Word

Glen did email me his poems, his photo and his bio - all below.  He also sent a link to his website which contains awesome songs for a free download (sample above).

"I infiltrated the homeless [part one]"

I got my orders in the spring of 2008

But before that date

I was going through every intel scenario

That you could throw down my throat

I stepped outside my porch

Looked up and down the block

Saw the U-Hauls drive off

Towards something desperate

Telling the kids in the backseat

To just hang on

Ma’ doing her best to convince the family

That it would be alright

Me, myself and I were preparing for a mission

I was a bit skeptical

About how it would all fold out

Knowing that I would love my dogs

Until they were gone

Knowing that they would never last

As far as I had to go

One got contagious to the China strain of poison

I watched her die everyday

Skinning out into bones

With me there

Nothing I could do to save her

I just bit my lip

Wanted Wal-Mart to fold into ashes

If I ever thought of planting a bomb

I did then

But I never did

She died on a stainless steel table

At a Veterinarian

That took her in without charge

Administered that sweet syringe

That took the last of her life

Before she left

She looked up at me and smiled

I said it then and I meant it

"I'll see you on other side"

And somehow - I know I will

The only other life that I knew as home

Died in my arms

On a dark dark road along a river

Somewhere south of the city lights

Of Ashville North Carolina

I was holding her leash

As the first car propelled her into the air

The tug at my hand

Told me instantly that she would be dead

When I covered the few footsteps

Just to get her into my lap

She died there

Me crying like I’ve never cried before

When she died

I knew then and there

I had infiltrated the homeless

Glen Still [The Seattle Sessions - 4.3.2011]

"What It’s like to be on Welfare"

First and foremost

I’m protected

Not like you

On the street

Trying to forget the way it use to be

I'm stable

With 100 plus billion dollars

Coming down the pipe

Into my coffer

I got a lobby

While you wait in the lobby at DHS

I just whisper and suggest

And what I want

Reveals itself

If I want land

I got a politician

That will reach out and grab it

Build a factory for me

No dues paid...

Just payoffs

If I want cheap labor

I got so much in foreign countries

Little girls and boys underage

Barely able to lift this capitalist bag

Upon their shoulders

But they never falter

‘cause I got the prime minister

And dictators in  just about every country

Paid off and delivered

Until they figure out

They could pull on the chain

But then I send in the Military

I can never allow that!

Like Noregia and Qaddafi

And all the others that have been like Blackwater

They storm troops

Into slave factories

A phone call from me

Demanding

-Kill every mother fucker

That thinks about forming a labor union-

Need I say more?

(Wal-Mart - Your Fiend-ly Neighborhood Store

Neal Stephenson was right

Look into Corporate Sub-Division ruling over the world)

So baby,  this is corporate welfare

All the subsidies

All the rivers that were once clean

All the air that we can’t breathe

All the seas polluted

All the dying of nature

Everything I put my hand to

Dies

And i don't respect it

I'm a capitalist

A welfare client

A contingency

Under Cover

Because I’m a lazy fuck

And my goal is to make you want to work

For just about nothing

To lift that heavy load

While I demand that you pay

Into that 410K

That won’t mean shit when you need it

Because I’ve got politicians

That will allow me to fold it up

Just when you really thought

I’d pay you back

For that 20 or 30 years of indentured servitude

You serve the corporate welfare system like a

Stupid mother fucker

Like a sheep don’t keep up on the details

Like an uneducated imbecile

Like the slave that we expect you to be

Now here’s a lesson...

Never expect a handout

Unless of course you sit on a corporate board

Wear a $5000 suit

We ain’t like you

We're a class above you...

And we're always figuring out ways

For you to give us more

Of your fucking money!

Glen Still [The Seattle Sessions April 4, 2011]

Glen Still, who originally came out of the Southern California area, is a spoken word artist and poet in the true sense of the word.  His commitment to the arts has taken him around the country mesmerizing his readers with the clear and dead on observations of an artist at the top of his game.

Glen’s creativity is not exclusive to his own work; he is also one of

the original founders of 10K Poets Zine, a group of artists dedicated to spreading the word and sharing unique, eye opening views that annihilate the stagnate, tried and true visions the average person has become stymied under. In addition, Glen has blazed a new trail with such work as, “A True Liberator”, “I Have Found” and “She’s My Religion”. His body of work breaks through the boundaries too often seen in the world of writing.

When Glen Still is not writing or performing his own work, he uses his time motivating and supporting the typically struggling artist and creating venues and avenues that allow them to get their work out into an often difficult and brutal arena, making him not just a great artist, but a humanitarian as well in a world lacking humane traits.

For more on Glen Still, visit his website at:

http://www.reverbnation.com/glenstill or add him on Facebook at

www.facebook.com/glencstill

About Garrett + Monday usual

Monday usual being West African peanut soup - everybody seems to remember by now what Monday usual is and it is expected like Wendy's weekday special, and that is a good thing, I hope. No problem finding helpers, either, although a gripping film-drama played in TV room had Ramone too transfixed to chop, so I had to nudge him every so often. Richard and Taco smartly left the TV room to chop without visual  distractions: Richard in his usual zen-meditative way till he is done (he has a way of timing it with when it's needed to finish the soup), and Taco in a fast and furious manner: 'and what's next?'  Turns out Taco worked in restaurants and has speed-chopping in his blood.

Over a bowl of finished soup I met Glen Still, a spoken word artist, a poet and a musician  originally from California, currently working on a book about homelessness.  Glen noted that the last blog post included poetry and shared some of his very interesting own; he promised to email me a few of his poems, so hopefully the next blog post will be featuring his work.

After soup and with my laptop in hand I started to look for Garrett to write down his story.  Garrett lead me to a cozy back room,  equipped with a beautiful bright red sofa and hopefully, said Garrett,  WiFI as well (connection rather spotty in the building).  Surely enough my laptop registered 'Home' network, which Garrett said I could join without special password.  Now we were in business:  here is Garrett, in his own words:

• Garrett – Nickelsville resident

I was a computer network engineer for 18 + years, also independent consultant, once earning $100/hr

Garrett in front of Nickelsville's entrance

When the economy dropped from underneath me, all the contracts that were plentiful at one time, dried up. To make a long story short, I lost my wife, my home, my dog and cat, and now I’m here.  I would encourage everybody reading this to donate to this worthy cause.  


When I was employed and still a network engineer, I used to watch on the news the tent cities; I used to tell my wife that I want to buy a trailer, and I wanted  to configure that trailer with wind generators and solar panels and battery back up.  


I wanted to pull that trailer behind my jeep and take it to the various tent city sites, to supply both free energy and WiFi Internet access to the individuals in those tent cities. 

That was my dream.  Then I lost my income, but it is still my dream, because I have not given up. I’m determined to give something back to society because much has been given to me.


Now the journey begins.  Getting back on my feet, reestablishing myself, being an example and making a positive change, that is what I encourage everyone to do.   God bless…

Garrett was born in Tampa, Florida, and grew up in Compton, CA. While 5 years in the Navy he traveled to Japan, China, Diego Garcia Thailand and various other countries.  After an honorable discharge from Navy he traveled a couple of years around Brazil from Rio to Salvador Bahia, to learn the culture and the language.  After returning to US, Garrett eventually settled in Seattle, where he met his wife – he has been a Seattle resident for 15 years.  The distress started 2 years ago, and about a year ago it affected his marriage…  After his marriage broke down Garret lived downstairs (garage level), while his wife occupied the main part of their house. The couple was unable to meet mortgage obligations, and Garrett left so his wife could rent downstairs and be able to pay the mortgage….
___________________________________

•  And here is voice of a fourteen year old Troye Sivan (hails from South Africa, but calls Perth, Australia his home), who shares Garrett's dream of helping the homeless:

Troye Sivan’s first original song, For Them, focuses on a very urgent issue: the homeless children around the world. Written specially for Troye by British songwriter Anthony Johnson, it has powerful lyrics and bring us an extremely important message...  More at Troye's website (click here).

•  About the new sponsor of Nickelsville: it's JAZZ WITH JUSTICE:  a progressive organization of legal professionals without a website, Peggy and Scott said, hm.  Googling it seems to suggest that it's a national movement of lawyers with conscience - I found JAZZ 4 JUSTICE, and several similar names tied to bar associations around the country - looks like grass root, not a top-down type of organization.  Thanks whoever you are!

Thursday: Cookies, lazanki and poetry

T.J is back - a couple of weeks in Montana was enough for her to decide she didn't fit there:  seems a bit too far from civilization for her liking.  What about your boyfriend?  'He is not my boyfriend, although he likes to say that he is; he likes it in Montana, so I helped him to pay for necessities and came back here'.

Thursdays in Nickelsville:  Lynnda bakes cookies or brings Brooke's cupcakes since she started coming over a month ago - by now that feature also must feel like 'Thursday usual'; last thursday delicious chocolate cookies.  I keep wondering if making things 'usual' is bringing comfort or discomfort if one is homeless; there is certainly some level of comfort when we create routines or traditions, as there is a comfort of things repeating themselves in the ever changing storms of life.  But if you move often like Nickelsville does, or if you are there only a few weeks like some do, is 'usual' maybe just a burden if so fleeting?  I mean, perhaps it is better not to expect routines than later miss them?  I guess I should ask people of Nickelsville what they think about it. (Note to self: also ask about who the new sponsor is).

Lazanki with cabbage and sauerkraut

Lynnda now plans Thursday meals, but was out of town to plan ahead, so we turned to an easy comfort food, lazanki - a recipe I brought along from my old country.  It's a close cousin of lasagna, but more-leftover based and not requiring special type of pasta; basically it's just any short pasta mixed with onion, cabbage and sauerkraut, everything else added is optional -  tomatoes, cold cuts, sausage, etc.   When we were  looking for kitchen assistants in the nearby TV room, one man (he and I never met) turned directly to me, smiled and  said:  'I want to chop for you';  Ramon's simple statement  had such a comical effect (obviously intended) that everyone burst out laughing and in no time we had a small army of chefs slicing and knifing fast and furiously.

While noodles were cooking in one pot, we fried onions and sausage in a small amount of oil in another pot, then added some water and two chopped heads of cabbage + some extra veggies we found lying around; when this was cooked (10-15 minutes) we added industrial size (5lbs) can of diced tomatoes, then same size can of sauerkraut, salt and hot pepper flakes and cooked some more.   Jarvis offered his help with just perfect timing:  combining the content of two big pots was a big man's job, and so was the job of mixing it.  Well, even Jarvis couldn't do the mixing because by now the restaurant size spoon was too short to reach the bottom of the huge vat the noodle dish was in.   So Jarvis divided the noodles again between the two pots, mixed them separately and again combined.  As if on cue Richard showed up with  his expertly fine-chopped 2 heads of garlic;  we turned the stove off and added it, along with chopped parsley and cilantro (not needed, but a nice vitamin injection to go with any meal).

Dana, a new kitchen manager, had a huge apple cobbler (made from scratch!) in the oven when we arrived - it was done and cooled by the time lazanki were ready and she was serving it with ice-cream for a dessert;  it was scrumptious.

Garret with a bowl of lazanki

Before leaving I asked if anyone feels brave enough to have their picture taken for the blog - that is how Garret and I met; Garret said he doesn't mind sharing his story either, because anyone can become homeless anytime and knowing something about it beforehand  might come helpful.  He also added that that if we humans keep on the direction we are going, pretty soon Nickelsville's experience will be sough after type of organizational knowledge and skill (paraphrasing here, didn't record or wrote down his exact words). Garret said he is a network engineer, and interested in collaboration on this blog!  So next time my laptop goes to Nickelsville along with the soup ingredients.

Seattle has one of the best in the country homeless people's paper called Real Change -  it offers an interesting mix of local and international politics, cop-beat regarding homeless people, philosophy and even poetry - my personal favorite to start the reading with.  Below is what I just grabbed from their on-line edition - I do not know who Mac Crary is, but I like his the images he creates a lot (google turned up a vet with disability, originally from Pittsburgh,  a poet who currently lives in Seattle, not sure if the same person):

Poem: My Girlfriend

Jun 23, 2010, Vol: 17, No: 26

Tennis shoes suspended in space
dangling from telephone wires
absolutely delighted deaf Jeannie.

It was as if some perfect stranger
had sent her an extra-terrestrial postcard
and she had fallen immediately in love.
I, her boyfriend, was put aside
to her rapture.
Try though I would, I could never make her laugh that way.

As we walked down the north side of the riverside
Ray said to me behind her back in sign language,
“She’s beautiful!”
Coming from Ray that really meant something.

—Mac Crary

If you read that far, here is your dessert (4/12 is 50th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin's  flight into the outer space):