|
|
|
|
When You Start the Day
Sara Alexander, MFT
When you start the day you just don't know what will be good or bad, what will please you, or bore you, what make you cry, or throw you into a state of utter fascination.
When Shawn Talbot from the CAMFT office called about a month ago and asked if we, SFCAMFT, were interested in staffing their booth at the May 21 NAMI fundraising walk I shuddered. There would be no chapter meeting before that date. I already had more than enough to do in the biggest volunteer job of my life, not to mention my work and the rest of my non-volunteer life. I already had plans to spend that day in the country with friends. By repeatedly pounding the E-list I found three volunteers, not one more, and no one foolish enough to coordinate. But it still seemed like a good opportunity for the chapter and I have trouble saying no to good opportunities. And....I want to be a good President.
So the morning of May 21st I, not a morning person, drove myself and quite a few cartons of CAMFT literature, refrigerator magnets and chip bag clips to Golden Gate park at 7 AM.. The magnets advertise Therapistfinder, the chip bag clips say "Healthy Minds Matter". And there were speakers bureau brochures and Therapistfinder brochures and SFCAMFT membership forms and Therapist magazines and little individually wrapped packets of brightly orange colored peanut buttered cheese crackers (my personal contribution). We all headed off to Speedway Meadow on perhaps the most perfect spring morning I can remember.
By the time I located our booth for the use of which CAMFT, like the other organizations, had donated $1000 to NAMI, my fellow volunteer Eric Denner was there, having arrived on bicycle from Potrero hill. Go Eric!!. We set up our booth, and then........well, not much happened at first. The sun crept slowly higher in the sky. The dew on the green green grass evaporated. A few lost-looking NAMI walkers wandered by hoping to locate their groups. The sound of Bagpipes floated our way interspersed with the occasional snippet of rock and roll music. Although this NAMI walk may have raised more money than any of the other NAMI walks in the US, there were less than 2000 walkers. NAMI, if you don't already know about them, is an awesome grassroots self help and advocacy organization of family, friends and "consumers" of mental health services for people with severe mental illnesses. It provides education and support, combats stigma, encourages funding for research, advocates for adequate insurance, housing, rehabilitation, and jobs . You can learn more about NAMI at their eloquent web site: WWW. NAMI.ORG and you can learn more about the SF walk, and see photos, at WWW.NAMIWALKSFBAYAREA.ORG.
Finally a young man walked towards us. I could not tell if he was a client , which I will now refer to as "consumer", as NAMI does, or a provider of mental health services. With him, and each subsequent visitor, I had to think hard for questions that would point me in the right conversational direction, questions other than "Are you mentally ill?" I'd ask "What group are you with today?" or "Is there any way I can help you?" (One woman said "Help me find a husband so I can divorce him".) This man, our first visitor, said he was from Cafe Phoenix at HireAbility, which I knew to be the cafe/food service training program run by the community mental health organization RAMS. I know because I have been a member of the board of directors of RAMS for several years, since my dentist talked me into it during a vulnerable moment when he had a drill in my mouth.
First he asked if we needed some coffee and told us about their refreshment stand at today's event. Then he went on to proudly explain that he had finished the "barrista" training and was now in the "back kitchen". And then he described his personal passion for composting, and how he wanted the Cafe Phoenix program to compost, and how Daniel Michael's, the program director, might let him do that and how eventually, one day, he hoped to have his own composting business. He was excited, inspired, and proud. I was moved, and trying to wake up.
The sun glinted across the meadow. More walkers trickled in, a few at a time. A woman named Mary Souza stopped by, from St. Jude's church in Cupertino. She was representing the church's Social Outreach and Restorative Justice programs. I was thrilled by the idea of Restorative Justice, but didn't know quite what she meant. She asked if I had seen the Frontline show (I hadn't) called "New Asylums", about the half million mentally ill people now serving time in America's prisons. (You can go to WWW. PBS.org if you are interested....or google New Asylums). And so the morning progressed. A small parade of men and women from the Bay Area who worked with or for places I had never heard of stopped by. Programs I was glad to learn about. In exchange for our literature and magnets and chip bag clips we received a wonderful education about Bay Area mental health and good works communities that I never knew existed.
I took off across the meadow for the Cafe Phoenix booth. Their "consumer" staff was adorable, shining with a pride that is hard to describe, and utterly disarming. I was happy to score a tall, cheap and tasty cup of steaming hot java. "Can I tempt you with something else?" asked the nervous, pleasantly zany guy manning the urn, after I'd paid for my coffee. "Oh, but I don't want to tempt you, I don't want to be like...like... the snake in the Garden of Eden," he said. "Ohhhhh...I shouldn't have said that, should I?". I ignored his disclaimer and off we went, riffing up a storm. "I never found snakes that tempting," I replied, "and I never, personally, could make the link between snakes and temptation." "Yes", he said, "I can see your point, maybe a weasel would have been better." I wasn't so sure if I found weasels appealing, but this conversation was totally appealing. For me a good, zany, conversational exchange is, well, like religion or love or something like that. By now I was so in love with the whole Cafe Phoenix staff that I had to buy something more. Manning the pastry box was Kavoos Bassiri, the indefatigable RAMS CEO, wearing an apron, working non stop, looking ever so much like the EverReady bunny. Although truly a genius at program management, he was unable to tell the custard raisin Danish that I craved from the apricot jelly one that I didn't. We were quickly rescued by a "consumer" staffer who could.
Moved to tears by my experience of the Cafe Phoenix staff, I made my way back across the long and still sparkling meadow. I thought about my 42 year old nephew, with severe schizoaffective disorder (for want of a better way to describe the devastation of his emotions and/or his mental synapses). He lives in Florida and has never found his way back into the work force since he quit his job about five years ago. I wished that he lived in the Bay Area. I wished he could go to HireAbility. I wished that he could be as happy and engaged as my coffee server, as the back kitchen composter, as the woman who knows one pastry from the next. I wished that he had access to the services that he needs, to restorative social outreach, to restorative work training, to whatever restoration of his derailed life might be possible.
The bagpipers were now resting next to our booth, weary from parading up and down in their kilts and knee socks and funny hats. They were ten members of the Irish Pipers Band, and were volunteering here at the request of one of their members. I heard them tell stories of previous events. Meeting Ronald Regan when Queen Elizabeth came to SF and then discovering the joys of hanging out at Red's Java Hut. More and more walkers were arriving in the meadow and at our booth as the 10 AM start time approached. MFTs took home membership forms. I heard about yet more Bay Area treatment programs I had never known existed. I met Telecare walkers from Fairmount Villa, and other acute patient programs. I met a lawyer from LA who represents therapists and managed care. I met two walkers from what once was the Murf (Mental Health Rehab Facility) and is now the Behavioral Health Center. "Long term lock down", said Eric. "Very long term, very lock down". These staffers were particularly taken with our Chip Bag Clips that said "Healthy Minds Matter". "Our patients (they didn't call them consumers) will like those", they said. "They don't know what to do once they've opened a big bag so they always eat the whole thing". We had been shipped quite a few and I encouraged them to take more. So they did. And then more. "You're sure you don't mind?, they asked again " I didn't. I was a woman on a mission: to distribute an uncountable number of gross of clips and magnets. And so they took more. And then ...well, more. God bless the mental health workers. God bless the residents of Murf, who now will know what to do with their partially eaten bags of chips. And God bless the CAMFT marketing people.
The meadow was abuzz with walk teams in brightly colored and variously titled T shirts. I made a final circle of the field just before I had to leave. Dede Ranahan, the coordinator of the NAMI walk was at the mike on the tiny stage dwarfed in one corner of this huge Speedway Meadow. The SF NAMI walk had raised more than $250,000, more than any other first year NAMI walk, possibly more than any other NAMI walk in the USA. Dede cried when she announced the largest single donor: Dixon Financial Services, INC. contributed $15,000. Walkers paraded across the stage. Groups lined up for "family photos". Mental Health workers, "consumers", friends, and families, side by side, grinning and grimacing together.
There were the "We Support the Synapse" walkers. And the "We Are Family" walkers. There was the "Brain Trust" team (UCSF nurses and doctors) and the Loving You Walkers (Marin NAMI). And my personal favorite: the "Never Walk Alone" walkers. I was moved to tears once again and then I dashed for the car to meet my friends just as everyone started their 5K trip through Golden Gate Park. I was sorry to go spend the day in the wine country. Sorry I wasn't walking with the NAMI walkers.
Eric reported that the second shift did show up, Adele Brookman and Karen Rogers and her husband. Adele said a lot of people came by. She never heard a single bagpipe. They gave almost everything away. They made "trick or treat" sacks out of the plastic CAMFT logo bags, filling them with all the printed materials and gift items and - to those who would take them - peanut butter crackers. She and Karen got to hang out, discovered they were neighbors, and talked about topics big and big: Like: to medicate or not ....and ....nature or nurture?
