Footwashing on the bus, neighbors, neighborhoods, visions

Walls, probably not graffitied

From the prompt for the most recent Wednesday FCNL silent meditation 

“Amurallar el propio sufrimiento es arriesgarse a que te devore desde el interior.”

“Don’t construct a wall around your suffering. It can eat you from the inside.”

-Frida Kahlo as translated by Larissa Gil Sanhueza

To wall off your own suffering is to run the risk that it will eat you from inside.

RantWoman who can always find reasons to fuss with words even when or especially when she really likes a quote.

There was a message referring both to walls and to boundaries. RantWoman promises to sit with that distinction along with requirements and gifts in different measure in communities. Oh hell! RantWoman is likely to have a lot to say. For one thing, RantWoman has the kind of God that can also just blow apart walls sometimes. That can be a little awkward, for instance if someone's house is involved. In any case, first RantWoman wants to post and not lose sight of some meditations related to homelessness.

Digression for Footwashing?

From the other night's meditation, RantWoman have you considered footwashing?

On the bus? I think that would be weird. Sometimes I am willing to go there about that weird, but not today.

Okay virtually?

Ummm, how about it's obvious a lot of people just are not at their best and part of holy week is about people not living up to who they hope to be. What needs to happen to draw out...?

God only knows but the best RantWoman can do is more email, more blogposts. HOLD THAT IN THE LIGHT.

(Footwashing? RantWoman what ARE you talking about?)

Homelessness, part n+1: PEOPLE unhoused

Recently there was a forum on Homelessness at UFM. There is a video. RantWoman has seen the video and mostly likes the forum fine, thank you very much. Probably RantWoman could ask permission to post. There was no ask, though, at the beginning about anything but recording, readers are just going to have to live with RantWoman's filters or RantWoman's incurable insistence on augmenting other people's filters. Should RantWoman also jump op and down about how much SHARED discernment matters, shared carrying of concerns? Okay, JUMPING UP AND DOWN.

As someone who has long history and many reasons to travel in the area, from the perspective of public right of way, RantWoman feels goddamn entitled to offer her point of view. RantWoman of course would prefer that her opinions have nourishing ripples, but for now that might have to be acts of faith. Okay, RantWoman has been trying to say the same things for years and some related community presence things as well. Like one logical thing to do after the first very thoughtful round of property discernment report would have been to try some of the informal gatherings RantWoman suggested as described below.

RantWoman being faithful to that Light does not mean RantWoman has been clear about what steps would be next. Scratch that: RantWoman has multiple times suggested things like a potluck series with some kind of discussion and research theme, maybe open to the neighbors like all the new residential nearby. Instead RantWoman gets "no we can't figure out how to work with you on committees (Because no one has tried and people keep going "oh WOW!" after they fail for months, urk years trying to figure out some version of why RantWoman wouldn't / couldn't do as asked.

Cue one voice growling in email "You are not welcome here." 

Which you do you mean? RantWoman? People living unhoused and being represented in hostile terms in certain U district fora?

Sure. How many times has RantWoman said God keeps sending people with disabilities and telling us all to work it out. How many times in the Bible do people run away from God? And is that almost always a fools errand only because if they succeeded there would be no story?

What? You think that "not welcome here" comment is original? You think that's the first time anyone has said that to RantWoman? You think it's going to be the last? 

Can we maybe just stick with the video for now?

RantWoman's account of history:

One caretaker had a leading about allowing people to sleep under our eaves. That actually provided some more eyes on the property at night. There was also an experiment about a portable toilet across 40th st. That caretaker moved on and the next caretaker drove taxi at night and did not feel the same call to relationship with homeless neighbors, a call not particularly in his job description anyway. The end of people sleeping under our eaves involved police encounters, drug issues, and probably unmanaged mental health issues. 

After the dust settled from ending the sleeping under our eaves arrangement, UFM made arrangements with SHARE as space for 20 people at night. UFM was one of the only if not the only congregation where people slept in the worship space and being part of the group that slept at UFM was greatly appreciated. Friends also learned something about the SHARE community from regular interactions including reports every six months at Meeting for Business. UFM charged SHARE for costs and probably could have charged more. One of SHARE's metrics was "cheapest bed nights in the city. People close to SHARE talked about members of the community who would get up very early because they had a place where they could shower before getting to a janitorial job at say 5 am. Should UFM have been subsidizing employers who don't pay their employees enough to live on even if employee motivation is a positive?

SHARE/ WHEEL still exist and can be found with a search engine. The SHARE WHEEL website also has information about the Wednesday vigils in memory of everyone the King County Medical examiner reports as having died outside. RantWoman thinks that is enough said. 

RantWoman thinks the transition to collecting rent and providing sleeping space for even more people thought Operation Nightwatch was certainly more financially sound than the arrangement with SHARE. RantWoman thinks the amount of work and wear and tear was probably greater than expected at first glance. RantWoman was uneasy wanting to rely on a longterm rental stream depending on a continuing flow of homeless people but did not think quibbling about Operation Nightwatch was going to solve that. RantWoman has complicated opinions listed blow about renting to Facing Homelessness. Rent is rent and RantWoman still stands by a concern voiced in one of RantWoman's trademark worst business meetings ever about services to people with disabilities. RantWoman would never mind hearing about how that works on the UFM campu. Since that business meeting, thanks to other activity in the U district, RantWoman has asend of Facing Homelessness activities in more physically accessible places.

People wondering why RantWoman WILL NOT SHUT UP and will not sign onto guidelines which seem derived from efforts to silence her are asked please to hold this story. And people who are so sure they know more about how to be a blind person in meetings that RantWoman need to be held in the Light DOUBLE. 

Okay. It's spring. Maybe RantWoman just needs seasonal turning over of manure so that new things can flower?

Finally RantWoman in the first person email about the forum, 

--I was glad for the question about language.

--I think the comment about we need housing not just socks was important.

--If FH wants to have a hygiene center, they should figure out how to
fund and staff it.

--I think it would be interesting to see whether anyone besides me
might have a leading to push a conversation about public restrooms and
access to water in the UFM part of the U district I cannot take this
one on by myself but would love to cheerlead for someone else.

--I hate all the pollution of handing out water bottles and there are health issues with refilling water bottles but I wonder whether there could be some kind of tank available while FH is open

--(some comments about police based on the video ) ...relations between SPD and community are really bad and
there is a lot of blue flu and the city needs not to be sweeping and
spreading misinformation anyway. EXCEPT, I also get pissed off when
people block sidewalks with their tents. That is a safety hazard for everyone.

--I have other reasons to travel in that part of the U district besides UFM so Friends should expect that I will continue to voice opinions about public right of way, traffic accident hot spots, and
multiple other pedestrian concerns.

Snippets from email 2

The whole topic of homelessness around UFM frustrates me because UFM has such a reactive and hit or miss approach.

I wish UFM had a vision about changes coming to neighborhoods nearby including Eastlake, the U district, places along the Light Rail Wallingford. What would be opportunities for communtiy growth?

I wish there were space in the UFM conversation to listen to voices in Meeting who can talk about affordable housing development and voices who can talk more constructively than some of current rhetoric about asking police to do things that should be funded for other people to do.

I wish people at UFM had a vision of talking about all this as part of continually building community. But in the meantime one of my mantras near every light rail station in my regular travel orbit is "Safe continuous travel networks for all modes."

Oh and I wish there could be better conversation about rezoning Seattle. The facing Homelessness approach of putting one homeless person in each block of residential neighborhoods is inadequate to deal with growth. Also isolating homeless people one per block is a mixed blessing. Space can be a good thing, but so are relevant support networks. So I am skeptical.

That's a lot of "I wishes." And (another comment important to communtiy life but not helpful at this point in the blogosphere.)

Please hold sensible discernment in th Light.