Told you so

So I'd been almost patting myself on the back a couple weeks ago, thinking I'd earned my angel wings and all that...

That sort of thinking never turns out well, does it?

I'd managed to orchestrate a move for one of my most difficult mentally ill clients; he's been living in something like a boarding home situation for about 16 years and has wanted out of that climate for most all of that time. He'd call me multiple times a week with a new apartment he'd found or a new real estate agent he'd harassed into helping him find a place... all of which led to nothing but frustration on both our parts.

See, the thing is, he's crazy and has a hard time hiding it.

He has a small army of social workers that've been helping him to live a somewhat independent life... people that make sure he stays on his meds, washes his self and his clothes, pays his bills, doesn't piss off his landlord too much (that's my job!), etc.

We all sort of doubted that he could live on his own, but that's not our choice to make, is it?

So after years of trying and when things with his current landlord finally reached a breaking point, I located an apartment that met his annoyingly particular needs and begged him to let me do my job and get him into it.

Stay out of it! Please! Don't keep calling them with your craziness!

Instead he'd call me everyday with his questions and his rantings, trying to micromanage a process that he didn't need to be a part of. There were a lot of glitches along the way, but I got him in, got the Salvation Army to move him and donate furniture and household stuff. A success, I thought.

I'd hoped so anyway, with fingers crossed.

The ink is barely dry on our contracts with the new landlord. My phone has been eerily silent... I wanted that to mean things were going smoothly.

Today I got the call that his landlord is filing a notice to cease. This is the first legal step in the eviction process.

After just 25 days.

Can I get an, "I told you so"?

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Most of my mentally ill clients are blessed with wonderful, caring and understanding landlords. The issues they deal with from their tenants are unpredictably varied. I want to be able to draw some conclusion from my experiences, but I'm not there just yet. It feels like the various support systems that are in place to support the mentally ill are not working very well.

Bad bird photo of the week

Scaup taking wing...

So I happened to come across this article about a local duck phenomenon and made it a point to find my way there today, in my traveling from one end of the county to another to see clients. For many years this was THE place to go locally for huge numbers of Scaup, but in the last couple of years, not so much. I'd drive by, over the Oceanic Bridge hopeful, but nothing the last few years.

I found them there today, but completely panicked when they all took off at once from the water...

It was really beautiful, though.

(Darn camera!)

; )

Social work puzzlers

Some things I've been pondering lately, courtesy of my clients:

How can you afford two flat-screen tv's, but not a kitchen table?

Isn't the appointment letter I sent you, a month in advance, that says I'll be there between 9am and 3pm on such-and-such a day enough notice so that you might at least be out of bed and dressed when I show up at your house... at say, noon?

And without some unidentified male hiding from me under the bed?

I hate when they do that to me!

Should I really have to explain to you why it's inappropriate to urinate in public?

Did you imagine, when you said your son was, "away with his dad" that I understood they were both housed in the same correctional facility? Geesh!! You made it sound like they were on vacation together, rather than both locked up on drug and weapons charges.

Did you think I wouldn't figure out that you're sleeping with your landlord in lieu of paying rent? Really?

Really?

I could write a book, I tell ya.

The paranoid poet

Between the poet and the grimacing woman
on a beat-up blue bicycle,
lies a blurred wasteland.

She hasn't always been this person.

Her squalid apartment
the letters scrawled in mad ink
that fizz by themselves in my in-basket

the dreamy smile
that makes her look, suddenly, young.

Walking the tightrope with her
ignoring the drop of the past,
avoiding looking down
to recognize the loss
and spinning, headfirst
into dizzying sadness.

The fear that I, too, might unravel
and spin off into nothing.

- - - - - - - - - - -

CM is a published poet, a librarian in a past life and a client of mine. She recently admitted that she suffers from paranoid schizophrenia and fears that she'll be evicted, now that her landlord knows the truth about her. She insists that her mental illness doesn't affect her ability to write poetry.


I worry about her a lot, visit her often and get almost weekly letters from her. Once or twice a year, she'll send me a poem. I treasure those.


The man with the "golden voice" has me thinking of such things... I imagine a government social worker, somewhere, cheering him on, knowing this was coming, all along.

- - - - - - - - - - -

Photo from the Howard Finster collection at the High Museum in Atlanta. I was there recently to see the Dalí exhibit and... wow!

Our options have recently changed

"Hello.

You've reached Laura in the Rental Assistance Unit. I'm not able to take your call right now.

Probably because I'm avoiding you.

Before leaving a message, please listen to the following options, as they've recently changed:

If you're calling to request that I send a letter to your foodstamp/welfare worker verifying your rental share, press one (#1) to tell them to get off their lazy butt and walk upstairs to my desk to get it themself. It's not my job to do their job, too.

If you're calling to give me some lame excuse about why you haven't paid your rent in six months and are about to be evicted, press two (#2) and realize that I won't believe a single sad story you'll tell me.

If you're calling me for the fifth time in as many minutes, just hang up and accept that there's a reason I'm not picking up the phone.

Like, maybe, I'm avoiding you.

If you're calling from Georgia and want me to lie to my boss to save your ass, press three (#3) and reconcile yourself to the fact that you screwed up big this time and I won't stick my neck out for you, ever, again.

If you're calling to rat out your neighbor/ex-girlfriend/sister because he/she drives a nicer car than you/has more tv's than you/pissed you off/kicked you out yesterday, please press four (#4) until you're willing to put something in writing and sign your name to it. I love making fraud referrals with a real name attached.

If you're calling to explain to me how you're only "technically" married, press five (#5) and take a deep breath. I've heard it all before and this better be good!

If you make more money than me and still can't manage to pay your rent each month then press six (#6) 'cause, really, I'm a social worker now and should have taken that job on Wall St. instead.

If you're just lonely and need someone to talk to, dial x6023 to talk with Linda who's bored and doesn't have her fair share of nutty clients, frankly.

If you're calling about bedbugs, dial seven (#7) and thank you for the warning before I do our next home visit.

If, however, you're calling to thank me for my compassion and hard work on your behalf, please hold, as your call will be transferred directly to my supervisor."

; )

- - - - - - - - - - - -

TGIF!

We won't pay you, but we'll feed you!

We said goodbye to our student-intern today... Brian is working on his MSW at the school where I did my graduate work and has been with us since September for his first "field experience".

Mainly he worked with Mo, who was responsible for supervising him, but the rest of us had the chance to work with him in the office or on field days... a great guy, but sooo young!

He did a couple home visits with me when my coworkers insisted I have an escort in the bad neighborhoods I visit... we both laughed at the silliness of that, but it was nice to see this shy and soft-spoken guy come into his own with clients. I let him do the work of the visit, be it interviewing the client or negotiating repairs with a landlord, very curious to see if his timidity and lack of confidence would come across so obviously with others...

It didn't! He did really well I think and seemed serious and aloof, instead. There was a good lesson for me in that experience because I often tend to be uncomfortable with playing particular roles in my job; with landlords especially. Rather than laughing and "making nice" like I'm inclined to do in an uncomfortable situation, I could see the benefit of not saying much and just letting the client or landlord squirm and wonder...

;-)

Field experience is so very important in many professions... social work, teaching, nursing. Those of us inclined to that type of work are idealists and dreamers, I think, and the realities of the work can hit hard if you're not prepared for it this way.

Anyway, we sent Brian off with our best wishes and a day filled with food... a spread for breakfast and lunch and finally dessert with cake and ice-cream. We'll miss him!

The Linda Show

"A true friend, regardless of personal sacrifice or embarrassment, makes us smile."
- Me. (I just made that up.)

(Yes, Linda is wearing a hat fashioned from bubble-packing. She does this sort of thing routinely. It's all part of The Linda Show.)

Is it any wonder I love her?

;-)

Are you lucky enough to have an office clown for entertainment on late afternoons?

World AIDS Day/The Mask Project

In an effort to raise awareness of issues surrounding HIV/AIDS, housing, poverty and justice, clients and supporters of The Center in Asbury Park participated in a mask-making project that resulted in an amazing array of one-of-a-kind works of art.

During the face casting process, each *face donor* was asked a series of self-reflective questions; the answers were then used by the artists to depict the face of the person. Found objects were used to decorate the masks as a way of mirroring the experience of homeless persons who make do with the resources available to them in their daily travels.

The masks were auctioned off tonight as part of the local commemoration of World AIDS Day and I stopped by to see the exhibit. I'd been hearing about the project for months through a couple of my clients... some of whom *donated* their face for a mask... of the 60 masks, this was the only one I thought looked familiar.

;-)

Were you aware of anything happening in your community today to commemorate World AIDS Day?

A video about the project is available on YouTube by clicking here.

The king is dead* and the chessboard reshuffles uncomfortably

Dear Powers-That-Be,

First off, can you just concentrate your energies on leaving well-enough alone, please?

You know, like, if it ain't broke, don't fix it?

We'd been at it this way for many, many years before you found yourself promoted and will be left with the legacy of your poor decisions for many, many years after you retire.

(We all might sympathize with your unspoken desire to leave some mark before you fade away into the sunset, but screwing around with a unit that for years has been a *high performer* makes no sense. We're not doing it wrong, for godsakes!)

Secondly, if you must insist on change for its own sake, please respect us enough to ask for our input. We and our clients will be directly affected by your penny-wise and pound-foolish decisions.

And if you think, as you seem to, that our clients don't need the direct, hands-on services of a social worker, well... it's been entirely too long since you've done fieldwork yourself.

Spend an afternoon with one of us on Bangs Avenue, dodging stray pit-bulls and drive-bys and the young mom who finally finished school and wants to work at home as a daycare provider. The state won't certify her there, though, (all those bullet holes in the siding) and she's got no money to move with. Plus there's her severely handicapped son who gets excellent services in his current school district.

Or on Springwood with the elderly lady who's days away from being put out of her house because a bank foreclosed on her landlord. She's got nowhere to go and I needed the time this week to wheel and deal with the bank to get her a cash-for-keys offer so she'll have money for a security deposit on a new place.

Instead you sent me to training to learn to do my secretary's job.

(As if I have the time to wear any more *hats*.)

Maybe sit at my desk for a day and explain to any one of my mentally-ill AND chemically-dependent clients (who call at least once a day, by the way) why I can't be there to help solve their current life-crisis-of-the-day because I'm too busy filing and making photocopies of contracts and chasing down repayment agreements because you insisted we don't need a secretary to do those things.

Oh and Mr. G. is off his meds again and dumpster-diving for leftovers. Maybe his Food Stamp worker will handle that.

(If building management doesn't evict him first for being a nuisance.)

You can't insist that we're doing a good job and then assiduously go about dismantling us.

(Jeesh!)

Please don't insult us or our clerical staff by acting as if we're all interchangeable and replaceable. I know as much about bookkeeping as Louise knows about social work.

(I take that back. Louise could do my job in a minute, but you'd have to pay her a lot more than you do now.)

Lastly, don't you dare mess with our Christmas Party.

Sincerely,

A chessman; a mere cog in the wheel

*Phil is fine. The rest of us, without him, well...

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Tuesday staff meetings do this to me. I apologize.

That sixth sense

Do you have it?

;-)

Maybe you call it intuition?

You know... that little tingle in the pit of your stomach... that something mysterious outside of normal perception?

I do, at least... I think it to be true. I hardly pay enough attention to it, to that part of myself that tries to warn me of something bad looming on the horizon, but I'm trying to learn to trust what my gut seems to sense, somehow.

Flaky and weird, yes, I know.

A most recent example... yesterday. Before the fire.

A routine home visit with a not so routine client of mine. Legally blind and bi-polar. She's not particularly communicative. Odd, most people would say.

Thank heavens she wasn't at home when the fire broke out.

She's okay!

This is, after all, the type of thing that would have my name in the paper, under an ugly large-type block headline.

We did paperwork and then I did my inspection of her apartment. There's a whole laundry list of things I'm to check for. Safety is foremost, but there's also cleanliness. Just two things stood out: her stove didn't work properly; two burners were dirty enough that they wouldn't light and she needed to do a better job of cleaning up the bird seed her pet parakeets were throwing everywhere. I made a note on my report and suggested that she clean the stove and vacuum her carpets better.

Almost on my way out the door, I backtracked to check the smoke detectors. They're high on my list, but often overlooked unless they're chirping away annoyingly with a spent battery. Her smoke detector (one, only) seemed okay, but I couldn't test it properly, even with a broom, because it was detached from the ceiling, for whatever reason. I tried like hell... even stood on my tiptoes, but couldn't get leverage on the thing.

Bugged me. That feeling, you know, the one in the pit of your stomach...

First thing this morning my intention was to call that landlord and get him out there to fix the darn stove and smoke detector...

Before I even sat down at my desk, the phone was ringing.

As usual.

A detective from the AP police department. There had been a fire... paper was used to ignite a burner (and discarded carelessly in the trash.)

My client had wandered out to the store after cooking lunch without realizing there was a fire brewing in her trash bin.

?

A neighbor heard the smoke detector going off, though. Called the fire department.

My client's ok. Her birds aren't. My name won't be in the paper, at least.

Check your smoke detectors! Every month!

Photos from Jasper Knob overlooking Ishpeming Michigan. For any of you rock-heads, Jasper Knob is a bald-topped hill composed entirely of jaspilite (banded hematite and jasper).

The flower salesman

I know the faces of most of the homeless in the town where I do my field work; many have sat across the desk from me at one time or another and others I just recognize from seeing them around town.

But I was caught by surprise with his flower-laden hands; the roses stolen, I'm nearly certain, from a streetside bush. "I love your hair!" he shouted at me as he crossed the street while I got in my car. Polite to a fault, I smiled and thanked him and closed the car door in his face.

Then I realized he meant to give me some of those flowers. Or so I thought.

;-)

Inwardly cursing my good manners, I rolled down the window and smiled some more and listened to his story. Because there's always at least one good long one. Something in my face brings out the storyteller in people.

Really, I think I must have *I'm a social worker. Tell me every last one of your troubles, please!" stamped across my forehead in ink that everyone but me can see.

Turns out he's a Vet that lives in a tent in the woods beyond Deal Lake in Asbury. Has a small army of children that eat up the majority of his VA pension with child support. His mind is still mostly somewhere in Vietnam, as he referred over and over to what his Captain says, as if that weren't forty-some years ago.

I'd guess it was about 10 minutes into our conversation, when he wanted money for the freely offered roses, that he regretted ever throwing a compliment my way.

Cast aside was the smiling white lady who might have money in exchange for a sad story. She was replaced by the social worker with suggestions for where he might find a place to stay for a while, a list of phone numbers and more unsolicited advice than he cared to listen to.

I left him finally with my business card, some change from the bucket I keep in the car for tolls and a bit of inside information that might just make some real difference in his life.

The application list for rental assistance opened in Asbury today. Only today. People wait for years on those lists, wait for decades for the list even to be open. Most people find out after the fact, when it's too late. Many of the people who need rental assistance never read a newspaper where the announcement and application are published.

I told him to take the money I'd *paid* him for the flowers and buy himself today's paper so he could submit the application right away and have it postmarked in time.

He thanked me and ambled away across the street, not realizing I was watching him from the intersection while I waited for the light to change. He crossed Main St. and went straight to the liquor store with my money in his pocket.

I'm hoping he bought today's paper and not a bottle.

Answers come, I suspect, in the form of angels sent to us unaware. So often we're upheld by giants of Kindness and Hope, by the kind of people who you pass on the street and feel sorry for because they are poor or uneducated or unable to speak much English. Together with the burden of all the sad stories I hear, I like to imagine the benefit of understanding and knowing deeply that true treasures wait here, that a certain kind of strength and confidence resides in the exact places and in the very people you’d least expect.

His rose, suspended in a small ceramic vase on the fridge, will remind me of that for the next couple days.

First steps

We have a student interning with us for the summer... a sweet girl from my alma matter who I got to drag along on field visits with me today.

I have to give her credit... so far she seems unfazed by anything she's seen. What she's heard about during downtime late on Friday afternoons hasn't scared her off, either.

I admit to being careful in the selection of clients we saw today; I don't suppose I needed to do that. But some things and some clients just make me too uncomfortable to have to deal with, without a student watching every bumbling move I make.

:-)

So rather than treating her to the guy who routinely answers the door in his underwear (!) or the lady in the house without a single place to sit or any of the really shady parts of town, we met with mostly regular clients and one who likes to talk. Alot. About everything imaginable. Inappropriate things, even.

It was fun. She barely raised an eyebrow.

No more work!

Yesterday was Administrative Professional's Day - were there flowers and chocolates for your staff?

We have a luncheon planned on Cinco de Mayo for our secretaries; once things have settled down and everyone is back from vacation.

Today was Bring Your Kid To Work Day. I wish I'd known ahead of time and could have brought my camera in to share pics of all the sweet little ones who were hanging around the office with us today. Sally's daughter colored pictures for each of us that said, "Go! Go! Go! You're doing a great job! Keep it up!"

;-)

Sweet.

Tomorrow I'm recording my voicemail message that says that I'll be out of the office until the fifth of May and to call poor sweet Rosie in the meantime with any emergencies. I hope my clients behave while I'm away or I'll owe Rosie big time.

A week of Tuesdays

Glass art on display at Hot Sand on the boardwalk at Asbury Park

I often have to walk off the workday on Tuesday. Tuesdays feel something like setting up your desk for the day on a subway platform in Manhattan; at midday I tried a few laps around the building in an effort to get my head straight... it didn't help much, unfortunately. The end of every month tends to be crunch-time for me anyway, but whisper the word vacation and any facade of controlled chaos just falls away.

It feels almost wrong to vent about it here, but the first round of *bumping* that I'd mentioned in this post will take effect on the first of May. Sadly, a social worker with 24 years experience in my unit will be bumped to a downgraded position in another agency. We'll have to train the person that's taking her job, and a couple of us are consoling ourselves with thoughts of how we might best do that.

*insert evil grin*

She's a nice-enough lady, but it's been decades since she's been expected to have any real client contact. People in my profession get promoted so they won't have to deal with clients anymore, sort of like school teachers becoming administrators so they won't be expected to actually teach. I imagine she'll adjust soon enough, or maybe just retire a bit sooner than anticipated, but picture someone straight out of a Little House on the Prairie episode walking the streets of the South Bronx. That's a bit of an exaggeration, but you need thick skin to do this job well and you also need to project a bit of an edge when you're out there with clients and I have a hard time seeing anyone doing that in a twin-set and pearls and kitten heels. It should be amusing to watch, at least.

I'm working late more often the last couple months and today's rain had turned to sun and then back to thick fog and drizzle by the time I found myself walking the boardwalk early this evening. The bit of color on display there was a welcome distraction from an otherwise dreary sort of day.

A quotable client

Outside a client's house, the yard consisted of dirt, cement and a dog on a tie-out chain.

Friendly-looking for a pitbull, his tail was wagging and he smiled as I approached to pet him. Ever the cautious dog lover, I asked my client if he was friendly?

"Oh he's friendly, but not like that."

;-)

That has me laughing, still, a week later.

Carousel

The Carousel at Asbury Park

Today was daffodil day in this part of NJ... and the forsythia has plans.

Spring almost!

An interesting day in the field with clients... I saw the spoon man (how many of you can say you know someone who collects wooden spoons?!?), plus I got a kiss on the cheek from the sweetest little old Italian lady.

;-)

(There are rare days when I think I have the best job in the whole-wide world.)

Tell me what you really think

Hm. In the last week at work, I've been told the following:

"That is none of your business and you really need to learn your place."

and

"I feel really sorry for you that you hate being a social worker so much that you have to be so rude. You should find a new profession. In fact, I'll suggest that to your supervisor, too."

and

"Your caseload must be really high that it takes you a whole day to return my phone call. Maybe you need an assistant."

That last one, finally, hits the truth.

I do need an assistant to return ridiculous phone calls for me, soothe the nerves of needy clients and do all the godforsaken paperwork that justifies my seat at this desk. All that crap handled by someone else and out of my way, I'll have plenty of time to:

Tell them only what they want to hear

and

Do all the stuff they seem to think is my responsibility, rather than doing a thing for themselves.

Heaven forbid!

I've been at this far too long to be as surprised as I am by the hostility flung my way on a daily basis. I guess I'm just surprised that I'm surprised anymore.

Is it Friday yet?

On notice

Everyone (!) at my job was officially notified today that for reasons of economy and efficiency we are subject to layoff effective May 1, 2009.

Well.

The fact is that within our agency (Planning and Resources, Social Services, Mental Health and Addiction Services, Office on Aging, Office on Disabilities, and Veteran's Internment) ten positions are being abolished. Ten people (some of whom are my friends! and have worked there for 20+ years!) received individual notices of layoff today. We all received a general notice of layoff or demotion because of the kooky way that civil service works...

If someone has what's called displacement or *bumping* rights, they can exercise that right against another employee's position in order to remain employed. The *bumped* employee may also have displacement rights and cause the layoff or demotion of another employee in a lateral or demotional position. Sort of a domino effect from top to bottom.

So while my position or that of anyone else in my unit isn't in jeopardy, there's the chance that any of us could be bumped into a lesser position (if we're lucky) or bumped right out the door if there isn't some other unfortunate soul with less seniority.

Makes for great morale and a pleasant work environment, really.

Image lifted from here.

Wordless Wednesday

Snowy boardwalk reflection at Asbury Park

A first step

I'd intended to share pics of iceboats this weekend at the river or maybe to celebrate the snow that's been falling all day, but instead...

This story has been heavy on my mind and heart all day. The victim was nameless when the story first went to press this morning, but later in the day he was identified and I recognized a connection to one of my clients and before the workday ended I found myself meeting with a policeman to share next of kin information.

Sad.

I'm bothered by the things I left unsaid last week in my rant about the homeless. I spoke mostly from a place of frustration, rather than from that place in me that works everyday with the poor and that sees the things they really lack.

A job, a home, a purpose to their day... society can provide for those things in some form or another, but...

There's no way to counter the lack of a loving family to go home to or someone that smiles just to see you come in.

There's no way to replicate the feel of a warm-mittened hand in yours on the walk home from school.

There's no way to know what a kiss in the morning, coffee brewing and the newspaper waiting might do.

I'm not foolish enough to believe that love is the only answer. I know enough about the circumstances that lead people to find themselves in this situation. I understand about addiction and mental illness and the kinds of holes in a person's spirit that a job or a handout can't fill.

But we can try, can't we? To take better care of the people we love? To look out for our neighbor? To hand over a dollar or two for the man begging outside the coffee shop, without worrying that he'll use it, instead, to buy a bottle?

The need is overwhelming to those of us who stop to consider it, rather than just shutting down, or shutting it out entirely. It's easy to forget, I think, that the answer needn't be yes or no, all or nothing.

It's painful to see the need of others; even more painful to be helpless to fix it. Admitting to that is the first step, I think.