Updated Post
April Showers
This month has so far brought some very pleasant surprises and welcome opportunities as well as a few unpleasant and unwelcome ones too of course.
Poetic Justice
The first and second days of April brought e-mails from a friend that resulted in my obtaining copies of older stock of my poetry once again. This was very unexpected, yet highly satisfying.
Sterling Experiences
Then, that same second day (Wednesday, April 2, 2003), after eating a good lunch and just before nearly walking out the door of the Full Ladle Kitchen, a soup kitchen held at Christ Episcopal Church in Montpelier, I was introduced to five Sterling College students who had been volunteering there as part of their senior year community service learning project requirements.
During the time we had to talk together, each of these five college students expressed a strong willingness to learn more concerning homelessness and about people living homeless in Vermont as well as a desire to do something meaningful to bring attention to homelessness in general. Sterling College is located in Craftsbury Common, Vermont.
Honorary Homeless First Timers
They mentioned wanting to become homeless for a twenty-four period so they could get a small look for themselves of what it may be like for someone who is actually living homeless.
Of course, each of them well understood that their experience would not be the same as it is for someone with no safe, warm and dry place of their own to stay and sleep as these students have themselves.
For my part, I was more than happy that someone had such an interest and welcomed working with them by offering information, guidance and assistance as I may be able to provide.
Vermont Homeless Journal
In this regard, as these Sterling College students also expressed an interest in blogging concerning these matters as well, I created the Vermont Homeless Journal multi-blog: i.e. a team blog, blogged by different people.
Invitations have been sent to each of these five individuals to become the very first team members of this particular blog.
The Vermont Homeless Journal (VHJ) is the Web log (or blog) of a group of individuals residing, schooling or working in the Green Mountain state who are focused on ending involuntary homelessness and securing the affordable housing in the state needed to help do so.
A Night Out
One Friday afternoon (April 11, 2003), a little more than a week after our first having met, found each of the students begin their 24-hour experience of homelessness first-hand.
They came by the Another Way Drop-In Center for the free weekly Friday evening community dinner. Much time was spent in deep conversations between them and several people attending the Another Way meal.
Each of them wearily departed the drop-in center later for their night out on the streets of Montpelier.
Saturday morning, shortly after Another Way opened up, they came back, very tired and in need of coffee, warmth, additional human contact and telling about the experiences they had during their night out.
Two of them, Marie Fisk and Alyssa Remy-Powers, have begun to briefly blog on the Vermont Homeless Journal about their experience(s).
Basic Outdoor Survival Skills Training
Before they left the drop-in center that Saturday, the Sterling students asked if any of us would be interested in learning some basic outdoor survival skills.
As I am severely lacking in many of these life skills, this was something I had been hoping for, but had not mentioned. So I told them it was certainly welcomed by myself and I thought there would be others also interested it doing it as well.
One of these same seniors came by again during this past Friday (April 18, 2003) night's dinner at Another Way and brought another student who had not been by before and is not a senior either.
They are interested in putting together a day, plus a night out, where some of us can learn these skills. We intend to communicate further concerning this and plan it out. As their college semester ends soon, the intention is to hold it in about two weeks or so.
The timing is really perfect too. For more on that read the segment "Going on the Road" available later on within this specific blog post.
The Liz Murray Story
Earlier this month I twice watched a movie made for television really worth watching, when it initially aired in a back to back showing.
That movie, Homeless to Harvard: The Liz Murray Story, airs on Lifetime cable television again tonight (Sunday, April 20, 2003) at 7:00 P.M. [et/pt] as well as on Wednesday, April 30th at 9:00 P.M. [et/pt].
It is one of the best made for TV movies I have seen in quite a while. Even better that the docu-drama tells part of a young person's story from a perspective and in such a way as usually never gets told, especially through such mediums as TV movies.
Stranded in Central Vermont
The first Monday of this month (April 7, 2003), I and others in the Central Vermont region were left stranded by Wheels Transportation with no warning and little or no options for getting from place to place.
Word is that hopefully in three or four weeks, if nothing comes up to bog the plan down, something may be in place for the short-term and possibly the long-term as well.
For a while now, I have also been feeling stranded here in other ways too. One of these ways is that I have not yet been able to find a place of my own to rent and live.
This despite having a tenant-based rental section eight housing choice voucher since last autumn (2002) (and this is my third such voucher since 1997).
My current experience of being homeless, in various forms, this time around is going on six (6) years come this summer.
There have been many long moments when I have been deep in thought about what I might do or at least what my possible options are concerning changing either this or my relationship to it.
Among my private thoughts have been ones of taking to the road again and possibly moving to someplace else.
Going on the Road
Just this week, when hitching a ride back into Montpelier from a place I had been staying at the time, a friend came driving along and picked me up.
This individual got talking about how they were moving to Montana, making the drive out there come the first week of June (2003).
After speaking with them about it, I offered and they accepted my going along and helping them with the driving. This way they can get there more safely and not be all alone for the entire trip.
My plans at this time are geared toward merely getting us there. While I have little intention of staying in Montana long, anything is possible as I am not planning where to go next, until after we arrive and only once I am able to rest up a bit.
It is possible that I would return to Vermont in short order or I could head somewhere else and look for a place to rent if anything is available for what meets my long-term needs.
Alternative Mental Health Links
About two weeks ago, a dear friend, well-respected peer and hard working activist, who lives in the upper reaches of the western coast of the United States of America (USA), e-mailed me with a request to do a search and come up with a list of alternative mental health links.
Deciding it was better to create a Web page that can be managed and updated much more easier than some e-mailed list, as a part of Norsehorse's Home Turf, I created a Alternative Mental Health Links page.
This is a links page concerning information about alternatives to the traditional, medical model-based, mental health system.
Included within these listings as well, will be links to certain Websites, articles, reports and other informational pages determined to be of related interest concerning these matters.
Freedom, independence and self-determination
As it states on the Alternative Mental Health Links page, [f]reedom, independence and self-determination are radically liberating ideas!
The very nature of independence as well as self-determination would seem to dictate not merely having freedom of choice, but rather also includes the freedom and the right to ensure one's self-defined and self-expressed wishes, choices and decisions are not defined, limited, narrowed or controlled by outside influences, no matter how well intended or well meaning.
Each person needs to do what is best for themselves and, as such, they are the only one who actually knows what that is.
Which means that, like most anything else in this life, when it comes to mental health "treatment" or other such matters, save (i.e., except for one's retaining their own) true freedom of choice, there are truly no absolutes, nor should there be any imposed on any person(s) by anyone else.
For what it may be worth, that is my opinion anyway.
Vermont Homeless Awareness Project
This past week also found myself creating the Vermont Homeless Awareness Project blog.
The Vermont Homeless Awareness Project is a Web log devoted to creating and promoting greater awareness concerning homelessness in Vermont, the needs of people who live homeless or marginally housed in the state as well as the need of securing the affordable housing that will be required to help meet the housing needs of people who are homeless or otherwise in need.
There has long been an obvious as well as urgent need for creating and promoting a greater awareness concerning homelessness as it is experienced in Vermont, the needs of people who live homeless or marginally housed in the state as well as the need for securing the affordable housing that will be required to help meet the housing needs of people who are homeless and otherwise in need.
While the Vermont Homeless Awareness Project may appear to have much in common with the Vermont Homeless Journal (VHJ), including their ultimate goals, VHJ is more of a journal of some of those working together concerning these matters, whereas this particular blog is focused more on creating awareness by other means: e.g., providing a variety of information, alerts and links concerning homelessness and affordable housing in Vermont.
As the blog evolves, it will become a multi or team blog, blogged by different people as well.
Looking Up & Gazing Ahead
As there are a good six (6) weeks before the rubber hits the road for the trip out west, the rest of this month looks very good to me and I am really looking forward to what comes next during the month of May as well.
Things may be looking up for me, it seems anyway. The fact is however, that I am certainly beginning to look upward at the sky once again and gazing toward the horizon more often than had been the case in a long while.
Note: Post updated on Sunday, April 20, 2003 at 10:42 P.M. [ET]: Slightly edited, mostly for minor corrections and for purposes of clarification.
