Life As Performance Art 125

Today, after my last client, I will be having my first visit to the dentist in well over a decade. Now, before any of you, Gentle Reader, start to tut-tut, shake your heads, wag your fingers and nag and lecture at me about waiting so long, and maybe I'm afraid of the dentist and other assorted nonsense and lies, let me make a few things perfectly and painfully clear. First of all, I am poor. Working poor. Low income worker. Except for one year working in a homeless shelter, I have never been paid a living wage in my life. Not for not having worked hard enough, nor for not having tried hard enough. Life is not always fair, and because of circumstances beyond our control, not all of us are going to make it in life. Does this mean I'm lazy, or that I haven't done anything useful in my life? Well, here is an abbreviated version of my CV, and I will let you be the judge, Gentle Reader. Even with token assistance from my father and from the government, I was not able to make it through university. There was no family home to shelter me, I had to work and struggle to pay rent every month, eat, and, not having credentials or other connections I was not able to source decently paying work. I was not able to fit post-secondary education into the formula because I was too tired at the end of the day, as well as too broke. What kind of work have I done? After six years of crap labour and service industry jobs, I worked mostly in home care from age twenty-four till my early forties. I was caring for frail, chronically and terminally ill seniors and other people, providing palliative care, and four years of this in the Downtown Eastside Of Vancouver, aka Canada's Poorest Postal Code, while also working in street ministry to very vulnerable and marginalised youth, AIDS sufferers and survival sex workers of all gender identities and sexual orientations and other populations, often putting at risk my own health and safety in my service of God through serving the most vulnerable, despised and misunderstood people in our city. Following some very difficult years in my forties, I have resumed in support and care services, working with people living with mental illness, for just a little bit above minimum wage, because our employer doesn't particularly value us. So, I haven't worked hard enough? I have worked so bloody hard for so little, and now I face a retirement in poverty. No value in my work? Where is my reward? I have no dental insurance, there is no dental coverage in this great land of ours for people on low incomes, and dentists seem to universally agree that the teeth are not part of the human body, the government of Canada agrees with them, therefore dental care is not covered by our otherwise generous medical services. In other words, if you are poor and have a toothache, you had might as well consider yourself shit out of luck. By the way, I am going to be particularly unkind in this blogpost, and no one is going to leave this page unscathed, so Gentle Reader, beware. I work for our public health care provider, but they are too stingy and callous to include dental coverage to their contracted employers (so fire me! Truth hurts, eh?) To the Anglican Church, where I am a still-reluctant member, I have this to say. You people represent all that is selfish and hypocritical and obtuse in organized religion. Everyone in my church knows that I am on a low income. They also know that I am having toothaches. None of of them have come forward to offer me any sort of help or support in paying my dental bills and there happen to be a lot of very well-incomed people in my church. How's that for Christian love? And as for our government, they would rather pretend that people like me don't even exist. They have woven this glowing myth about Canada the generous, Canada the land of opportunity, Canada the great white multicultural whatever, but they are embarrassed by our existence, the working poor, because our very lives and hardships in keeping body and soul together in this great hypocrisy called Canada gives the lie to our glorious global reputation. Even Colombia, a developing country fresh from a half century of civil war, offers subsidized dental services for basic care. Here in Canada, all I can do is cope between visits that I can't afford to pay for, which means that I have to stagger the dental appointments and care because I simply cannot pay for all the work that needs to be done. I have suffered from crippling toothaches all my life. I have also had a lot of extractions of teeth that might have otherwise been saved had I the money to pay for extra and more expensive care. Yes, eating is difficult for me, since I have lost most of my molars. None of this is likely to change, and I don't expect help from any of you, because, frankly, I am not persuaded that anyone would care enough. To all of the parties I have named here, my employers, my church, and my government, shame on all of you, and a pox on you and on your houses!

Life As Performance Art 124

While walking in the forest yesterday, I noticed all these different trash cans with labels. The red ones are for, what is politely called, dog waste. This left me thinking of all the plastic bags that get used by dog owners. For some reason I can't find the cipher for Vancouver, but there are approximately, in Canada, eight million dogs, or seven million too many of those barking shit machines (I am not a dog-hater, more a dog-owner hater. Dogs are okay, it's their codependent humans that need help!). When you consider that all those dogs have to be walked every day, that means once a day, every dog has to have its shit picked up, and that presumably almost all the dog owners will be using plastic bags. So, let's say, that every day in Canada, between seven and eight million plastic bags get wasted on dog waste. I am glad that so many dog owners are cleaning up on their four-legged children. It makes walking that much easier for the rest of us. On the other hand, what would those same dog owners do without plastic bags? I agree that plastic is a problem. The environment is choked with it and it is destroying everything. So is our dependence on it. I agree that plastic needs to be reduced, and if possible, completely eliminated from the environment. Is that ever going to happen? Who knows? But dog owners, so emotionally dependent on their pets, are not going to be happy about not having anything to scoop up after their little best friends forever. And no one is going to accept kindly the notion of just leaving it there. We are not going back to those days. I remember one summer evening, more than twenty years ago, I was walking in Trout Lake Park, which has since been taken over by dogs, and I saw one lady going through an anxiety attack because she couldn't find a plastic bag for one of her big black poodles. Fortunately, I have long tried to carry a couple of plastic bags with me. I gave her one, she happily scooped up after her doggy, and the poodle came over for a pat on the head. He was saying thank you. Then, a few years later, on the Skytrain, a passenger was warning everyone that he was about to throw up. I reached into my pack and handed him a plastic bag, which he made quick and efficient use of. Then there was the fellow sitting next to me on a bus. He was eating a banana, and suddenly, he was holding the empty peel in his hand, not knowing what to do with it. I gave him a plastic bag. Problem solved. I try to reuse as much as possible. For garbage, I use plastic bags repurposed from frozen vegetables, bread, toilet paper, or similar packaging. Everything gets reused, washed, and reused again until it is no longer usable. Then, unfortunately, it goes into the landfill. Yes, we have to phase completely off of petroleum and other fossil fuels. But what, besides virtue signalling, are we going to do about plastic bags? We seem to have created a need that is not going to go away, or that isn't going to go away for quite a while, anyway.

Life As Performance Art 123

My own personal responses and reflections on Pride are always going to be mixed and nuanced. I still will not physically carry or wear the rainbow, not out of embarrassment or shame, but for one simple reason. I don't do labels. Even when I call myself a Christian, who is also a queer, somewhat non binary asexual male, these are things that do not define me, just as I try not to define others by labels or categories. They simply describe some of the many facets that make up a complete person. Labels are like scaffolding, but they should never be mistaken for the finished building or monument. People also often need these labels, or this kind of scaffolding, in their own evolution from one stage in life to the next. So, during Pride week, there were rainbow colours festooning everything, especially banks and shops, since the queer dollar is a big dollar. Also some of the more liberal Christian denominations, not all of them, were sporting Pride flags. There was talk and discussion in my church, about displaying the rainbow, but eventually nothing was done. I'm okay with it either way, though I really prefer my place of worship to be detached from secular labels and concerns. It is the same principle as staying separate from the state. As much as I welcome that my church, the Anglican Church, welcomes and affirms queer people, they always seem to go too far in embracing social movements that have really nothing to do with the Christian faith, while going on blindly ignoring the more pressing calls of Christian urgency and ministry, especially serving, defending and advocating for the poor and homeless, whose needs, in my opinion, trump the also legitimate aims and desires of queer people. It is unfortunate that some of the more vocal LGBT etc. Anglicans, are still too blinded by pain and trauma to be able to see this, and end up wasting valuable energy proclaiming their cause as though it is the only legitimate claim in the universe. But this also suggests the narcissistic underbelly to Pride, and that elephant in the room still has to be named. A lot of people are still growing into the awareness that LGBT etc. really are part of the mainstream and should be treated and welcomed as such. So they carry and wear the rainbow flag and other rainbow adornments, but also to remind themselves that this is how they must grow and are growing into a city, a country, a society, a community, and a culture, that welcomes everybody (as long as they are not poor or on low incomes, unfortunately), especially a minority that until recently was so cruelly ostracized, punished and abused, and in some parts of the world are still at risk of being put to death for having same sex attraction, desire and love. The rainbow flags and adornments are like visible affirmations, and some need these visible affirmations, both for others to see, and to also see them on themselves. I am way ahead of them. I was fully aware that I was queer when I was fourteen, and was fully out when I was eighteen. But at that time, it was impossible to reconcile a gay lifestyle with Christian discipleship as I then understood it. But there was for me one essential difference that set me apart from the Christian homophobes and the self-hating Christian gays and closet cases that were surrounding me. I did not hate my sexuality, and even then, I was dead set against reparation therapy (trying to change one's sexual orientation). I left my lover at the time, just when I was shy of my twentieth birthday, out of a desire to fully embrace Christ and to live as he commanded, in loving service, joyously abandoning myself to God. Discipleship without compromise. Even then I was asexual, and unlike most young men in their early twenties, getting laid simply was not important to me, even though I had been in a relationship, but I didn't know this at the time and for the simple reason that in that era there was no language, there were no words, to describe or define asexuality. No one seemed to know or believe or even want to believe that there was such a thing as asexuality. Especially since we were right in the throes of the Sexual Revolution. I accepted a life that was chaste and without intimate human love, for the simple reason that the call of the Holy Spirit was far stronger and more compelling and more consuming. Does this rule out that I will ever have a partner in my life, even now that I'm in my sixties? That is something I refuse to forecast and for one simple reason. I have no idea what the future is going to bring, nor if next year I am going to go on being the same person I am today. As they say, the only constant in life is change. If it seemed appropriate, with a really good and patient person, could I see myself getting married to a man? Sure. But right now, this for me is not a priority, but still a possibility, and right now my focus is on following Christ one step at a time, in whatever direction he wants to take me in, even if that means taking me into the life of another man. But who only knows? I never hated my queerness, and because of this I was able to leave behind the more damaging expressions of the Christian faith. I have never bothered to get into other relationships but for the simple reason that God has called and enabled me to a life of holy chastity, and this has also empowered me in ministry to other queer people. We are not damaged goods, and finally others are beginning to recognize this. As for myself, I am going to go on living unlabeled and undefined, except by the love of the God whom I serve. No need to carry the rainbow, because my life and spirit are the colour of water, and the colour of glass and pure crystal. Rather than wear the rainbow, as the light passes through me, all the colours of the rainbow will be reproduced around me, in my art, my writing, the way I live and the way I speak (hopefully!). Love is love, yes, but it must be a higher love than what many of us want to settle for, a love that transcends all preference and desire, a love that embraces all, a love that liberates all, a love that holds in order the very wonders of the universe and the most intimate details of the cosmos that are contained and reflected in our own small and very tiny lives.

Life As Performance Art 122

You know, I really wish they would ban the fireworks. Such is the wish of many people who live downtown. Of course the whines and squeals of protest would ascend to the heavens like a vile and acrid incense, since the stupid people that make up the vast majority want their dear little spectacle, and the fireworks themselves are lovely, even if I no longer go out to see them. But at ten in the evening I really want to start going to sleep. It's also the way the streets in my neighbourhood become unnavigable, even by foot, after six pm, and then there are the leftovers who want to stick around and make noise and destruction until la madrugada, or the small hours of the morning. Like that idiot shouting and screaming from somewhere not far outside my window at 2:30 this morning. I had to shut the window, not much fun on a summer night, but I had two fans on so it was still tolerable, and I fortunately was able to get back to sleep okay. I also found myself wondering if he was homeless, mentally ill, and frightened and traumatized, or just drunk and stupid with a nice warm and very taken for granted bed to go home to. One never knows. Neither should compassion fatigue be ever used as an excuse for not doing anything. I suspect that those most likely to hide behind that little smokescreen of a lame excuse are the same ones who have never cared a turd about anyone less fortunate than themselves. You know who you are. The same people who vote corrupt and greedy scumbags into political office who cut back or eliminate social programs just to give greedy scumbags a lovely robust economy. The most vulnerable end up getting thrown under the bus and then we have to listen to those well-off bastards whine, whinge and scream about those awful homeless people making their beautiful neighbourhoods unliveable and unsafe, when they are the very people responsible for creating the very conditions of homelessness. I have no patience with this kind of selfishness or hypocrisy. And we know exactly who they are. They live in the rich and tony neighbourhoods that they have made particularly ugly with garish red black and white lawn signs that protest the modest increases of taxes just so that we can pay for social programs to help get people off the street and into housing. The most egregious and offensive are the ones who don't even live in the houses. They are there for investment, property flipping and money laundering. Why not build really affordable housing in those same wealthy and leafy neighbourhoods? We shouldn't have to care about their property values. Those same people have already coasted for so long on their greed and privilege, and it is time for them to start paying up. My dream is to see all of those sumptuous mansions renovated into apartment buildings to house people on mixed and low incomes. The rich can go move to Grand Cayman and Lichtenstein or wherever so they can be all that much closer to the precious money they have stolen from the rest of us. I don't care. And I really don't care where any of them might happen to be from, whether China, Mexico, here or the United States. Greed has no racial preference. Wealthy people who whine about paying a few extra dollars for the common good are the ones that need to go, and not the homeless. Today is the Pride Parade. I still don't know if I'll attend after church, if only to take a quick peek at the people and the costumes just after the parade, but I find these things exhausting and after several years of street ministry, and no longer being what anyone could even charitably call young, I am really needing to rest these days. Hence, these grumpy blogposts.

Life As Performance Art 121

So this weekend we have the Celebration of Light, and we have the Celebration of the Love That Dare Not Mention Its Name. There will be just under a half million folks clogging the beaches and bridges in this city to ooh and awe over the annual pyrotechnical spectacle, also known as annual public fireworks display. And everyone, including the CBC, is talking about it. That is going to happen this Saturday night, just after my bedtime. Then tomorrow, there will be the other annual pyrotechnical spectacle, also known as the Gay Pride Parade (more currently known as Pride, since being LGBT etc., this occasion is going to include more than just men with good fashion and decoration sense who also happen to be into each other, and other assorted twinks) It will likely be attended by more than half a million participants and spectators, usually around six hundred thousand. That will be Sunday. Now, everyone, and the CBC, seem to be talking about the fireworks. No one outside of the LGBT community, except for the CBC, seems to be talking about Pride. There must be reasons for this. I never hear it mentioned by coworkers, and I am employed by a very inclusive organization. Neither do I hear much about it by friends who are not LGBT, and there is certainly no mention made around my apartment building. The fireworks, yes. Pride? It is as though people are still embarrassed about homosexualtiy, gender identity, and transgender issues. Except the CBC. But most of those people don't listen to or watch CBC. If I say, casually, Happy Pride, I get a little embarrassed smile and nod, perhaps, but that's it. Did I mention that we are already in 2019? Did I also mention that stores, shops, banks, and even the odd progressive church, are all decked out and festooned in rainbow colours right now to acknowledge Pride. Of course the Pride buck is also going to be celebrated, and some of the churches (my own Anglican, and the United) have strong policies of inclusivity). But so-called regular folk? Don't hear much from them. And don't get me started about the theologically conservative Christian organization that runs my apartment building. I already left them a voice mail asking why Pride is never included in the community announcements and bulletins that usually adorn our elevator and other common spaces and if this has something to do with their conservative take on the Christian faith and a desire to protect their tenants from this nefarious corruption? No one responded. Probably too embarrassed. I do have my own issues with Pride, by the way. They seem to have, like many organizations that represent marginalized populations, a garrison mentality. They have banned the Vancouver Public Library and UBC from being in the parade, because both institutions gave or rented out space to public speakers who questioned and challenged some of their precious tenets and positions about gender identity. But most people seem to be allergic to nuance and not many people have developed enough intelligence to really recognize or appreciate irony, and for now, anyway, I'm not going to trouble myself further about any of this. Happy Pride, Gentle Reader! And remember. We are all included!

Life As Performance Art 120

I slept well last night. I am surprised. I did wake at 3, but somehow went back to sleep and remained in that state while fielding another ridiculously vivid dream, till I gradually was waking up between 4 and 5, then finally dragged my carcass out of bed just at twenty minutes after five. Now I am waiting for my clothes to finish their wash cycle and when they are in the dryer I can start thinking of breakfast. Life has taken on a direction for me that twenty years ago I would never have anticipated. I did not know that I would end up in affordable housing. I didn't know if I would end up anywhere. I was desperately poor, barely subsisting on basic welfare, and still too tired and burnt-out from all the weird and intense happenings of the previous fifteen years or so (I call this my thirteen year nightmare) to work full time. It was just nineteen years ago, the first night of the fireworks in late July, 2000, and I was enjoying an early evening walk in Stanley Park. There is a very tranquil path that circumnavigates the miniature railway. I went for a walk there, soaking up the tranquility and feeling deliriously alone in the presence of my friends, the towering Douglas fir trees. I wasn't sure what it was, at first. It was this odd pale object on the ground. I could see it was a feather. A huge white feather. I picked it up. It was the outer tail feather of a bald eagle. I then burst into tears, because I knew I had just been given by the Creator a very precious gift. I just pulled this bit of info from Uncle Google: "In Native American culture it is believed that all things possess an inherent virtue, power, and wisdom. The feather, for example, is a powerful symbol that signifies honor and a connection between the owner, the Creator, and the bird the feathers came from. It symbolizes trust, honor, strength, wisdom, power, and freedom. It is an object that is deeply revered and a sign of high honor....When a feather falls to the earth, it is believed to carry all of the energy of the bird it came from, and it is perceived as a gift from the sky, the sea, and the trees. Feathers may arrive unexpectedly, but not without a purpose...The eagle’s feather... is one of the most esteemed. In Native culture, the eagle is considered the strongest and bravest of all birds. For this reason, its feathers symbolize what is highest, bravest, strongest, and holiest." I am not First Nations. And I am a Christian. But I have long had deep respect for First Nations people and for native spirituality. And I know, now, that finding that feather marked the beginning of a huge transition in my life, that has led me into decent and affordable housing, full fluency in the Spanish language, full employment in meaningful work with a helping profession. This has also meant enjoying a full and complete recovery from post-traumatic stress disorder. It means that I have been able to travel internationally for the past ten years or so, it has meant putting an end to some very difficult and toxic legacies. So much has changed during this time, and more is going to change for me. This is inevitable. I may never boast of any of the benchmarks of success. I will never earn a lot of money, nor own my own home, or car (don't want to either), nor many of the other accoutrements of a successful life. I have something much better to enjoy. I have been able to take all my difficult circumstances and put them to work for me. I celebrate a life that is full of God, full of love, joy and meaning. I celebrate a life that is not about me, nor is centred around me, but around God and his love, and this is what I mean to communicate to the many whom God brings me in contact with. I have everything I need, housing, food, clothing, meaningful employment, health, friends, the ability to travel, and the capacity for creating art. Which is also to say that I have everything that I want.

Life As Performance Art 119

Gracious Good Morning, Gentle Reader. It is just past 3:30 in the morning and I will be going back to sleep soon, likely just after breakfast and then later I'll finish writing this little bit of cheerful drivel. The early morning radio programming is hit and miss, I did not want to be bored back to sleep listening to some idiot talk about his business success, nor some other middle class zombie boring me about his golf game (I would rather watch paint dry), so it is a quiet early morning, or should I say, in Spanish, la madrugada tranquila. I wrote yesterday about the importance of being kind to others, especially given that with all the chances and uncertainty of this cosmic crap shoot we call life, ours could be the last friendly face that someone sees before they hear the words, Last Call, and it's time to close the bar. Well, yesterday, I also found myself, more than on one occasion, having to be quite assertive with different people. It began during a meeting at work in the morning. This branch of a government ministry that is now funding us also expects us to give our clients some lame ass surveys to fill out. I expressed that I will of course comply, since we must dance for our new masters, but with the caveat that my clients first express willingness and interest in said survey (two so far have turned it down). Giving clients surveys to fill out should not be part of my job, but I will cooperate up to a point, but for me, peer support is about client empowerment, so if the client says survey, I give her the survey, if he says no survey, then his wish is my command. Pure and simple. What is nice is that I was able to express my slight difference of opinion without getting defensive or resentful, maintaining throughout the sense of humour for which I will one day be famous. On my way to said meeting, an individual was being a nuisance riding his bike on the sidewalk. I simply said with a cheery cheery smile, "Oh, silly me, I'm walking on the bike path again." This fellow looked Chinese, older, and might not know very much English, or perhaps chose to ignore me, or whatever. The fact is, I said it humorously, playfully and simply left him alone after, instead of chasing him down and demand that he get his bicycle off the sidewalk or there would be unspecified consequences. Then there was the next bike idiot while I was walking between meetings with her light flashing in my eyes. Why people have on their blinding bike and car headlights in the middle of the day is really beyond me, but I told her politely but clearly that her light was hurting my eyes. She gave me rather a stupid look, and I again took care to leave her be. She already heard from me. In my second and last meeting yesterday my supervisor and I had a respectful argument about clients being allowed to smoke right in front of the door, where everyone can breathe in the second hand smoke. We were both able to get our point of view across, respectfully, and even though nothing is about to change, I do believe that we have both given each other something to think about, as well as coming up with coping strategies, short of anything changing at all. Later, in the local No Frills grocery store I had what could have become an unpleasant confrontation with a defensive checkout clerk. The policy at No Frills is that the customers bag their own groceries, but alternating customers are expected to pick up their goods on the far side of the conveyor belt, which given that we already bag our own grub, can be a bit much to ask. I just shut up and obey if the customer ahead of me has a full load, and there is no way they could reasonably share the conveyor belt, but yesterday, it was a small load and the checkout clerk was simply too lazy to push the button to move everything down to the end. So, just as she was trying to put my own small load on the other side, she indignantly scolded me about the policy to alternate out of courtesy for the previous customer, so they don't feel rushed (I had already been kept waiting by said customer as he fussed, and fussed and fussed some more over paying in exactly the right change). I gave her a little smile (I think) and merely said, "Courtesy cuts both ways." She did agree, anyway, I did not accuse her of anything, did not insist on talking to her supervisor, and was careful to be polite and succinct, while considering that she might also be having a difficult day, so why make it worse for her, even if she was on the verge of making my day worse for me. Was it lots of fun and all easy-peasy combining kindness with being assertive yesterday? About as much fun as a root canal. Worth the effort? Oh, yes! Do I need to improve on my approach? I will always have room for improvement. Am I going to get all stressed and neurotic about self-improvement? Nope! I'm too busy enjoying the ride.