Elders

January 21, 2015

The transparent liar Ed Lee has done it again: first by throwing elderly and disabled people of color under the bus with an unreasonably harsh policy of punishing fare evasion; and then by pretending to be a hero by agreeing with the SFMTA’s recent proposal to extend free Muni to elderly and disabled patrons as it has previously done for the city’s youth.

“You are a good daughter, so of course we will rent to you “ I was houseless with my mama at the time, we were living in our car and had been turned down for every apartment we tried to get. This moment came back to me when i had the honor of meeting good daughter, granddaughter and mama, Lisa Gonzales, whose entire family was facing eviction from their mission district home of several generations..

I asked my wife Kathy Galves, “What happened when King Ambulance took me away?” This is her response:

"When the ambulance attendant asked Bruce what hospital did he want to go to, he said "Saint Francis."

Before they took Bruce away, they asked me, "Were you coming with him?"

October 7, 2014

It would seem that common courtesy and respect to elders is a thing of the past.

In my most recent travels I have noticed more and more, as I greet strangers, especially youth of color, that they rudely ignore me and even stare at me indignantly.

A colleague of mine, Norma, actually overheard a white woman tell her children “Oakland is a dumpster. Oakland is part of California, but it is the worst part because all the poor people from all over the world come to Oakland.”

June 17, 2014

I heard a young girl crying hysterically outside of my home, which kicked my maternal instincts into overdrive as I rushed to her aid. "They shot me with them BB guns!"

"We may encounter many defeats but we must not be defeated." ..Maya Angelou The Art of Fiction No. 119, the Paris Review