A Troubling Day: Smoke Signals

Yesterday the smoke continued to cloud our Oakland sky...smoke signals...cries for help from our brothers and sisters in the Northern Valleys. I awoke to news that a 13 year old boy had been gunned down the night before less than five minutes from my home...just up the street- next to a school. A 13 year old is dead. His dreams, his parents dreams for him...are dead. The love and the pain is not.

As I prepared for Urban Mentors' evening group I could not shake the blanket of worry that wrapped me up with concern. I began thinking of all my youth and more speficially all of my youth who do not have stable housing. I began thinking about all of my boys who do not have consistent access or love from their fathers. Most of my youth do not have their dads active in their lives. I currently have youth whose fathers are no longer alive, are doing serious prison time or have been deported...some are just absent.

I remember thinking I was poor growing up. Our family was different from my classmates. We had a small imperfect house. My parents were not as educated as the rest of the Ann Arbor folks I knew. My classmates made sure I knew my jeans weren't "Guess"; my white canvas shoes didnt have the blue "Keds" stamp of approval.  We didn't travel on breaks from school and I spent my senior year spring break scooping ice cream  (working) while my classmates traveled to Cancun. What I did have was two parents who loves me, were home every night and never missed my sports games...even though I was awful at every sport I played. They praised me after ballet recitals...despite my awkward performance. I always had food on my plate and a warm bed that was mine. I never wondered where I was going to go after school or what I was going to eat. I was not poor...we were blue collar. Somehow I believed my classmates when they made me feel like what my family had wasn't enough.  I know better now.

As my youth head to school each morning they carry much more than their backpacks. They carry heart break, the anxiety of unknowns, generational dreams lost, the burden of issues we havent fixed as a society. They face unsafe unpredictable streets on their way to poorly funded schools. Our world promises them if they do the right things everything will be okay.  Our youth know that is often not the case for the people they know and love and it might not be true for them

These same youth who carry so many burdens, show up at everything Urban Mentors does...they show up and lead and serve. They give back. Many show up to help with the younger youth a second night a week. Yesterday one of the youth who is currently homeless showed up at my apartment at 3 PM...way before I expected anyone, because he had no place to go. Atleast two nights a week we can be his safe place to go. We are working on raising money so we can offer our youth stipends, and small jobs so they get more face time with adults while developing work ethic and earning some much needed money.

Every youth needs to be "swooped up" by additonal adults who become a part of the village caring for them. I remember the adults who swooped me up when I needed to not get lost in the mix. We will swoop these youth up and do everything we can to love and look out for them.

Last night I ended my evening talking to "Platinum"...my homeless neighbor of many years. She is currently living in a tiny tent with her only true family member- an intense chihuahua, outside my apartment. She is not always lucid but last night she was grieving for her boyfriend who had been hit by a train a couple years ago. A man I have known of in the community most of my Oakland years. I wonder when it was that people gave up on them...when was it that someone didn't step in when they were most vulnerable. I thought to myself  "NOT OUR BABIES."   Together,  as volunteers and parents, we need to be a village that "swoops them up" and does all we can to make sure they are not lost; that their dreams are not lost. Lord give us clear vision so we can see every smoke signal our youth send out. Let no cries for help go unheard.

My Friend, East Oakland

The sun is shining and I'm sipping not quite warm enough coffee, avoiding blow drying my damp hair and I'm overwhelmed with both the love and the worry my friend East Oakland creates within me.

This September will mark 13 years of my love affair this this community. I am what one might call a "relocator" . I moved here from a city called Ann Arbor...a safe college town known for being a liberal safe Midwestern town with more diversity than most of it's surrounding cities. However most folks there surround themselves with friends who look just like them and live just like them. (what a waste of diversity if you ask me! But you didn't...so shhhhhh Jaime! )

I moved here to do a one year urban volunteer program (Mission Year- look it up, www.missionyear.org). About three months into a year of service and learning about justice, I knew this place was home.

I hear others talk about my friend East Oakland with fear,even disgust, but most often its just with misunderstanding. It's an "outsiders looking in perspective". My perspective it that too...no matter how long I live in East Oakland I will never be from here. I will be Jaime Taylor, a Midwestern daughter of a factory worker and mother who did various jobs but shines working with alzheimer's patients.  I will be Jaime Taylor the girl who loved ballet but was too awkward for it. Jaime Taylor who has to watch other people clapping in order to clap on beat . Jaime who loves photographing people.  I will be Jaime Taylor a progressive Christian from Christian parents who give everything they can to love people around them. I will be Jaime Taylor a girl who grew up around a lot of mean rich folks but wasn't rich herself. Wait a second...I was and am rich. I have always had my basic needs met, I was blessed with a parents who put my needs before theirs...I have always been surrounded by laughter and down to earth people who knew brand clothes and fancy things didn't define a life well lived. I have always been surrounded by folks who make you better just by being near them.  Forgive my language....but DAMN I'm rich.

Anyways...I'm still rich living here. No I can't pay all my bills every month, and I have no health insurance...but I am surrounded my strong down to earth people who allow me the privilege of living INSIDE their East Oakland and they take care of me as though I was born here. I am blessed to walk alongside youth each day who share their worlds with me and love me as though we are blood related. I am blessed with neighbors who are spicy, dramatic and full of life...and FULL OF COURAGE. They endure but still laugh and celebrate. 

I live where all the crazy stuff you hear about happens too...but I see with the eyes of a friend, watching her friend go through ups and downs. I am on this ride with my friend. I hope that this is they perspective of East Oakland I bring to this blog.

Here is my first rambling blog...probably has typos and errors that will bug you. No worries...that won't change. :) Happy Thursday.