Stories, Comments, Updates, & Wild Tangents From the CAP Executive Director
You can check out her other writing projects (including a new novel!) at www.tkthorne.com
Teresa K. Thorne, Executive Director
YOU NEVER KNOW
By Teresa K. Thorne
There’s a lot to worry about these days.We are worried our investment dollars may not poof back into existence as they have poofed out. A few months ago we worried about inflation and that gas prices were too high; now we’re worried about deflation and that they will go too low.And this is just financial worrying.Pick a subject.We can worry about it. Everyone, except possibly the enlightened Dahli Lama, worries about something, more likely a whole heap of things.You can make your own list, I’m sure.
Worrying must have had some evolutionary value.If we never worried about having stuff in lean times, we wouldn’t have invented grocery stores…or shopping.We plan in response to worry.If junior is smart, how are we going to pay for college?Better start saving early.If junior isn’t smart, we may have to feed him well into his adult life.Better start saving early.
Some worrying is therefore good.Excess worrying, however, causes stress, and stress is linked to everything from headaches to premature death.Early man worried about placating emotionally unstable gods and spirits that rocked the world with floods, drought, earthquakes and fire from heaven. They must have worried incessantly about what they could do about it until they invented shamans to tell them exactly when, where and how much stuff to offer up. Of course, we are way beyond that now.I think it’s been days since I knocked on wood to keep from irritating the gods at something I said.
My grandmother was a Professional Worrier. She was pretty much undiscriminating about the subject matter, but as I entered my teens, she worried in particular that my hair was not stylish, my cheeks were too pale, and my skirts were too long to catch a boy’s eye.She worried I would not marry a doctor and that some illness or accident was bound to befall me, probably at the worst time, which would be before I got married.Most of all, she believed I was oblivious about the importance of these things, and so she carried the burden of worrying about them on her own tiny shoulders.
On one family outing, as we watched my grandfather puttering around the lake in a small boat, Grandma, whose palms had been plastered to her cheeks for the entire thirty minutes he’d been having fun sighed, “I’m so worried about him.”I thought about this.She and I were standing on the bank; Grandpa was several hundred feet away.I had always accepted Grandma’s concern as an expression of her love, but that day I turned to her and asked, “Why, Grandma?Why are you worried?What good does that do?”“Because,” she responded with a look that questioned what planet I was from, “You never know.”
I thought about this.You never know.True.Something could happen.Anything could happen.And then suddenly, I understood.Worrying is magic.If you’ve worried about something, you’ve tipped the scales of fate, you’ve appeased the gods; you’ve knocked on wood.That’s why when you say, such and such could happen, you add a “God forbid” to the end of it.Grandma’s strategy was that you should do preventive worrying to keep something bad from happening.And if you weren’t diligent and hadn’t covered all the bases, something you hadn’t even thought about was sure to sneak up on you and happen.
The Dahlia Llama sees all this in a very different light.He says that if there is a solution to a problem, there is no need to worry. And if there is no solution…there is no need to worry.
I, being my grandmother’s descendant, have developed my own, somewhat less enlightened, but workable, strategy:
Refocus your worries.I like to worry about exactly how I am going to spend all that money should I win a lottery.You have no idea all the problems such a responsibility raises.Recent Hubble photos reveal that somewhere out there two galaxies are colliding into each other.What kind of people are we if we don’t give up a little of our attention to that?And possibly we could worry about starving people in Africa a little more often than when we are admonishing children to eat what’s on their plate.We could worry about the polar bear’s diminishing habitat and our chances for surviving on a planet whose thermostat has gone whacko, regardless of the causes.But most therapeutic, when I get too entangled in all the You-Never-Knows of everyday life, is the scientific proclamation that our Universe is possibly a random bubble among many, and it could pop at any moment and annihilate the whole thing.Now, there is something to worry about!
So, in conclusion, we can deal with the You-Never-Knows with constructive worrying, preventive-magic worrying, no worrying, or refocused worrying.And I’d like to offer just one more practical strategy in how to deal with this whole problem.Think of all the things you don’t have to worry about.I’m sure you can make your own list, but I’d like to remind you of this one:If you return to your car in the gloom of day’s end to find your battery dead, or your tire flat, or that you’ve locked your keys in the car, or you can’t remember exactly where you put your car….CAP will be there for you.
Not to worry.
“CAP GRANDMA”
Leaders sometimes appear in unexpected guise.“Grandma” Becky Davis would not have earned a second look had you noticed her on the street.You would’ve seen only a thin homeless woman with stringy, steel-grey hair and a bag on her shoulder.If you looked closer, you might have deduced a dose of Native American heritage in the straight back and the strong cheekbones. Grandma had no income, but the bag she carried held an assortment of food.Everyone on the street knew about her bag.If folks were hungry, they could reach into “Grandma’s” bag.If they had extra, they put something in.
If you followed Grandma “home,” two years ago, you would have found yourself in strange camp on the outskirts of downtown where a few people huddled around a fire.When Grandma grew tired, she bedded down in the shelter of an abandoned tractor-trailer cab.It reminded her of younger days when she drove an eighteen-wheeler across the country.She was also an honorary member of the Hell’s Angels.If you watched her giving another homeless person “what for” for slipping off the wagon, you’d understand that she could still hold her own.No drugs or alcohol were allowed in her camp.She, herself, had been sober for seven years, though she had her vices—smoking and a virulent sweet tooth.
She started drinking after her first husband died.When her second husband tried to kill her, she took a long, hard look at herself in the mirror and realized she was doing the job for him.She left him. . .her home. . .and her addiction to alcohol.
If you saw Grandma on a downtown street in midwinter, you might have wondered why she didn’t stay in a shelter or join her daughter in Georgia.It seemed bizarre that this elderly woman preferred a rat-infested shell of a truck cab to a roof and heat and regular meals.What was true, but harder to understand, was that when you have nothing in the world but the clothes on your back and your ability to make small decisions—when you can come or go; who your companions are; when you eat and sleep—those choices become precious to you.When you have little control over your life, small freedoms define your sense of dignity and self.Grandma’s daughter had her own problems as a single mother struggling to raise three children, and Grandma refused to add to her burdens by revealing she was homeless.
When Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans and the coasts of Mississippi and Alabama, CAP collected more items than the refugees here needed and started sending donated supplies to the coast.Volunteers from the community came in to help sort and pack.One of them was a thin woman with stringy, steel-gray hair and a bag on her shoulder.She said, “Those people down on the coast have it worse than I do!”And she worked all day and came back the next day…and the next.When the relief operation expanded to a warehouse, she gathered other homeless people she trusted, brought them in, and assigned them duties, but woe unto those who came to our door with any type of scam in their hearts.Grandma did not tolerate fools.Eventually, she earned the warehouse keys and the title of Warehouse Manager.She wore her red “CAP volunteer” T-shirts with pride almost every day for two years, explaining CAP services to anyone who asked …and probably to several who didn’t.
Grandma shared her idea about implementing a transit program she’d encountered where a homeless person looking for work received a two-month bus pass, free of charge. After those first months, if he’d found a job, he repaid the price of the ticket, so another person could use the pass.Sort of like Grandma’s food bag.
It took two years to get Grandma a disability check and housing.With the first income she’d had in a very long time, you might think she would buy herself something, but what she stubbornly insisted on was taking the people who had helped her to lunch.
Despite her years of sobriety, the damage to Grandma’s liver finally caught up with her, and she was in and out of the emergency room many times. To the medical staff’s surprise, the parade of visitors to her room included parking enforcement folks, homeless people, fellow hurricane relief volunteers, and CAP officers.Along with flowers and potted plants, several “illegal” milkshakes somehow slipped through security.
Each time Grandma returned to the hospital, she had to endure painful procedures, but she never lost her spirit.If you could have seen the woman who sat so straight in her bed, her face a road paved with life’s lines, you might have seen the ghosts of Native American ancestors who sat with her.You would understand that courage and determination…and leaders sometimes appear in strange guise.
Grandma knew she was dying.She had income now and could contribute, and she returned to Georgia to be with her daughter and grandchildren.She wanted the youngest to have some memories of her.If you had looked down and seen Grandma during the last days of her life, you would have seen a thin woman with steel-grey hair and a straight back, spending time with her granddaughter, teaching her that if you carry the bag for other people, someone will put something in it and someone will take what they need from it.
Random Thoughts about Art
Art.A confusing topic.One of those boxes you open only to find a smaller one inside and a smaller one inside that.What exactly is it?
I don’t know, but I know it when I see it.If I like it, I’ll pay money for it.If I don’t like it, it isn’t art.
Well maybe I’m not the most qualified person to give a definition.Let’s see, Ambrose Bierce, a famous19th Century writer, defined painting as “…The art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather and exposing them to the critic.”
Okay, well … there’s art and then there’s “good” art and then there’s “bad” art. I wonder how we can tell?Oscar Wilde offered this yardstick-- “Bad artists always admire each other's work.”
Maybe we should turn to the dictionary.
Dictionary.com says art is:
1.
the quality, production, expression, or realm, according to aesthetic principles, of what is beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance.
All would agree such a definition applies to the treasures in our wonderful Museum.But if that is our only definition, perhaps we are missing something.Leonardo da Vinci, himself, found cats and human feet to be masterpieces.
Perhaps we should let our definition out of the box of our preconceptions.If art is “what is beautiful, appealing or of more than ordinary significance,”I wonder…what would be beautiful, appealing, or of more than ordinary significance to you, if you were… a CAP working downtown every day?
Maybe :
The way dawn blushes the sidewalk before you or ignites Wachovia’s tower of black glass
Perhaps, A stranded motorist who looks up from her punctured tire, her smile painting your shoulders with an invisible Superman cape. And how appealing are the voluptuous curves … of an ice cream cone from Chic-fil-lay?
Surely, beautiful is the flutter of color frothing in clay bowls on the Harbert Plaza, the scarlet lights of the Alabama cutting a deep vertical in the dark, or a friend walking your way.
And what could be “more than ordinary” than catching a glimpse through McWane’s pane— a child’s wonder at a water spume spinning a suspended ball?
Is art limited to the realm of eyes? Perhaps the hum-spin of your bike wheels and wind silking your cheeks.
Each downtown season must express its own sublime: Spring’s cherry blossoms feathering third avenue; Summer bees in the crepe myrtles; Autumn gold firing Bradford pears; And an extraordinary winter where McWane’s water-fire-steam tower freezes into stillness as a fairy ice fountain.
Mr. da Vinci said, “There are three classes of people: those who see, those who see when they are shown, those who do not see.”Perhaps we can learn something from the Master.Perhaps we need to open our eyes to cats and feet, and free art from the box in which we have carefully wrapped it.
IT’S YOUR CALL
Our city has awesome potential.It is heartbreaking that we must struggle to realize it against the cancer of crime that threatens our growth and health.The power to stop its spread, however, is in our hands.If even half of those who have knowledge about a crime would report it, we could liberate ourselves and our communities.
Why don’t people report information about crime?There are two answers:Peer pressure and fear.Fear of speaking up is understandable.Pointing a finger at a community on the other side of town is not the same as pointing at the drug house next door.The latter carries a risk, the risk that your neighbor will learn you were the person who reported them.
Still, isn’t the risk justifiable when the failure to take it means the ultimate capitulation of everyone’s safety, the deterioration of your world?It is the very neighborhoods which bear the risk of retaliation that are most likely to see their neighborhood destroyed.
CAP is partnering with the community and other organizations to motivate and empower people to safely report crime. Those partners include Crime Stoppers, the Chamber of Commerce, FBI, the City of Birmingham, Birmingham Police Department, Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department, FBI Citizen’s Academy Alumni, Association, and many more.
The focus is on youth because they know a lot about what is happening.Also, they are often vulnerable to the fear and peer pressure of a “don’t snitch” culture.It is natural for youth to band together against perceived authority. It is also to be expected that a culture which has learned to survive by avoiding police has trouble finding the trust to make them partners.How can we challenge and empower people to do that?
We can lay the case at their feet, at your feet, because it is everyone’s responsibility.This is the message:“It’s Your Call.It’s Your World.”You will reap what you sow and what you fail to stop others from sowing.It is your neighborhood, your friend, your brother, your mother, your sister…your child who will pay the price for your silence.
We can also offer this—a way to make the call anonymous, guaranteed.No phone traces, no tricks, no police coming to your house, no court.You never give your name or any information about yourself, only a code number.Anyone can make the call or go online through a secure coded system.But ultimately, it is your call.You have to make the decision because, “It’s your world.”
Some people sing in the shower or leave their clothes on the floor.Such habits are only irritating to other people.Emmy award winning script writer Merrill Markoe, once said, “Like magic, when you live by yourself, all of your annoying habits are gone.”Mark Twain’s Pudd’nhead Wilson cogitated: “Nothing so needs reforming as other people’s habits.”
I think body parts have habits.My feet, for instance, know how to walk downtown from just about anywhere to the corner of 3rd Avenue and 18th Street North--CAP’s home for over a decade.I find myself having to stop them from treading that path and turn them toward their new home at 1704 5th Avenue North.That is my responsibility as driver.Fortunately, I live alone in my body-house, so I find this habit more amusing than annoying.Also, I love our new home.We have space here we’ve never had--a locker room for the guys to change in, a break room, a dispatcher area, a reception area, a lady’s bathroom!Not that I blame my feet.The CAP office next to the Alabama Theater was a wonderful place.Interesting things happened near the backstage door.We had great neighbors.
I suppose there is always a bit of sadness when you leave a place behind, wondering if your memories will fade, if things will be the same when you return or…if you will be different.
The other day while my mind, the driver, was pondering weighty matters, or more likely just elsewhere, my feet took me back to that corner.And it did look different.I could see the new stairwell that came through my old office—the reason we had to move.My eyes played with the sight the way your tongue will explore a loose tooth.That stairwell wasn’t supposed to be there.
Our new office used to be a doctor’s office.We’ve had a few confused patients wander in and they probably felt the same way about us.
I know that as time slips by my feet will turn by habit onto 5th instead of 3rd Avenue and allow the driver to think about more interesting matters than where she is going.Already, this new place is home because CAP bicycles and vehicles are parked out front, our dispatcher Thomas’ voice welcomes me as I open the door, Laura is sitting at her desk, the locker doors are clanging, and Ray and Calvin are bantering.Not all habits of other people are annoying, and like author Lois Bujold once said, “…home is not a place, it is people.”
LAW & ORDER
If you watch Law & Order, you know the police side of the equation involves figuring out who the bad guys are and catching them.It makes all the effort, risks, and even the boredom worth it when “another one hits the dirt.”Sometimes it even happens in 60 minutes or less.
But in real life, even when the Law side is successful and the jury finds the bad guy guilty and the judge sentences him to jail, he doesn’t always stay there.Our prisons in Alabama are full and even the chief of the state’s largest department can’t do much about that.His job is to prevent crime where he can and put folks into the system where he can’t.There is nothing so frustrating as having someone you arrested show up, like a ghost on Poltergeist, back on the street, sometimes even an hour or two after you put him behind bars.
This Law & Order thing is more complicated than TV makes it.So, what’s a chief to do?With the above challenges and a personnel shortage to deal with, I imagine Chief Roper will be looking for partnerships, and that’s what we’re about!Like the CAP Rap:
City Center crime is down real low,
We’re always on the scene.
BPD and CAP will help by any means.
The police side of this partnership is obviously critical.With their backing, CAP is able to augment their eyes and ears, handle minor incidents, and help keep the downtown environment cleaner and safer.Last year, CAP responded to over 12,000 calls for assistance.We directly assisted police officers and firemen on 300 occasions.In addition to 2,000 miscellaneous types of assistance, we removed 400 pieces of graffiti and helped 4,000 stranded motorists.Our presence discouraged panhandling and other crimes, and we were often able to connect the homeless and mentally ill to resources and help.
More than 1,200 calls CAP responded to were requests to remove trespassers from businesses.Although our enforcement powers are limited, the uniforms that CAPs wear and a bit discussion generally has the desired effect.CAPs handled most of those situations without having to call the PD, which meant police officers were able to take other calls, respond to them quicker, or stay on patrol in their area.It’s a good partnership, but there are some steps we can take together to make it better and stronger.
“BPD and CAP will help by any means”…because we realize that we share the mission to “serve and protect” and the goal to make life better for those who live in our community.
A Mystery Story
I’d like to tell you a story.A true crime story.A mystery.But it’s not a “Who-done-it?”It’s a “What-did-it?”
The tale takes place on the dark and steamy streets of the Big Apple. The year is 1992 and crime rules. Drugs, prostitution, robbery and homicide.If you drive a car, hucksters may jump on your hood as you wait in traffic, act like they’re cleaning your windshield and intimidate you into giving them money. A parked car has a good chance of being completely stripped in minutes. A walk is an invitation to be mugged, possibly in plain view of bystanders… who rush by, ignoring what is happening, afraid to get involved. Let’s skip ahead five years in our story. It’s 1997 in the same city.Serious crime is down 62%.That’s worth repeating.Crime is down 62%. Maybe crime was down all over and this was part of a general trend. Makes sense, right? Not so fast. Crime stats show that while drifted down in the U.S. as a whole,..it plummeted in New York. Here’s where we need some clues: One is “The Broken Window Theory.” It says that one broken window is a signal that no one cares and leads to more broken windows.Other signals of disorder-- trash, graffiti and quality of life crimes like drinking in public or panhandling lead to Disorder which leads to Fear. This causes a drop in morale in a neighborhood, resulting in crime and ultimately, Urban Decay. Another theory, “The Tipping Point,” holds that social trends can act like a disease epidemic. Something small in the right place at the right time can tip a disease or social trend that was held in check right off the charts. New York’s amazing crime decline began in the subway. The subway tunnels had the reputation of a primal jungle. Robberies, rapes, and assaults were far too common. There wasn’t one subway car anywhere on the line that wasn’t covered with graffiti. It was an ugly mess and New York needed a hero.Enter William Bratton, the new head of the transit police, and a disciple of the Broken Window Theory.To everyone’s surprise, William Bratton’s first order was not to go after the robbers and muggers, but to clean all the graffiti on the trains and subway walls.Then he demanded that the transit police arrest all the turnstile jumpers. Minor offenders sure, but Bratton had them lined them up against the wall just the same, handcuffed together and hauled off in paddy wagons.The result? Turnstile jumping went down significantly.So didrobberies and assaults on the subways. Mayor Giuliani hired Bratton as police commissioner of the NYPD. In the face of traditional police logic, he focused on street level crimes, hucksters, trash and graffiti.And what do you think happened? Yep.Crime down 62%. Now we know What-did-it to New York’s crime rate.But wait. There’s more to the story. We’ve seen how little negatives, like broken windows or cigarette butts can cascade and lead to crime and urban decay. We’ve seen how removing those negatives by cleaning up trash and graffiti and cracking down on quality of life crimes can send crime plunging. So, what happens when we throw little positive things into the picture?Is there also a cascade effect when someone plants flowers in front of their business, creates a piece of public art or a greenway? Aren’t these things tipping points too? We think so. They help create a sense of order and spur confidence that says someone does care…someone is watching, which leads to a flourishing urban environment We are all part of making little things happen everyday. Not just CAP and ONB but every single person. What you do or say can be a tipping point, up or down.It can change the course of a life, a community, a city.Make it count. Mystery solved.
Solving Crime; What Works? Calvin & Ray Laura & Katrina Downtown Cool Are We Done Yet? Working in the Theater District A Day in the Life of ACAP The Beast Take a Moment Crazy in Birmingham Art in the City Sex, Murder, Death Confessions of an Ex-Cop
