2022: A Year in Review

Where do I start? Well the beginning is a good place. It has been a busy year, full of growth and loss and betterment, always hope for the betterment. 

I have learned a lot about myself this year--lots. I guess self is the enigma and the prize. As long was we stay connected to self, we are never alone or lonely. There is always more than enough to amuse and confuse (smile). 

I took a Mindful Self Compassion Course in January-February. It was so helpful. I also continued my classes and workshop series at the SF Jungian Institute-- Deep River Poetry and Jung for Everyday Life. After the MSC, I participated in an affinity practice group that met on Tuesday evenings on Zoom. Later in mid-August, I started attending Al-Anon again and started my foray into Codependency Anonymous. I was in crisis so I started attending meetings daily multiple times for the first few months. I now attend meetings a few times a week and participate in a smaller CoDA group called the Power of 5 (30 Questions).

I found a group in Al-Anon that is for Black folks and two others with majority Black folks. A friend of mine attended a couple times and we talk about our family of origin issues that affect our relationships as parents and intimate partners. It has been enlightening. 

I attend lots of groups through InsightLA and enjoyed a series called Heart Medicine. I also attended Afrikan Wisdom on last Sundays at InsightLA and Alex's Mindful Tribe on Fridays. I stopped attending Alex's group which is a part of the Mindful-based Stress Reduction course, when I started attending CoDA meetings on Fridays. The times overlap. 

I attended two mini-conferences through CoDA this year too, the first one in September when I started going to meetings was really helpful. The second one was hybrid a couple months later. I like Al-Anon better than CoDA, but its growing on me. I really like the Al-Anon literature, specifically the daily readers. I have a really extensive library now and a few of my core meetings are with women who have a lot of recovery-- I hear my story and feel encouraged by their successes and coping strategies. They might fall down but the way down with tools is more like a stumble than a fall and a person's ability to recover (I've noticed) is faster than pre-Al-Anon. 

I really like the meeting closing which says to "take what you like and leave the rest." This journey is specific as is our relationship with our Higher Power (HP). I like that too. I am not in competition with anyone else. My recovery is my recovery. When I am well and share my presence and story or just witness another's healing, it rubs off. The healing is like a blanket we all share. When someone else feels HP's warmth or compassion, if I am present, I feel it too. 

There is a blessing in the company we keep, especially when we are all practicing betterment.

Wombfulness Gatherings

March 2022 marked the end of the first Wombfulness Gatherings cycle and we collaborated with Shawna Sherman, head librarian, at the SF Main Library, African American Center. It was amazing. I had an intern from Howard University, Mylan, oh my goodness. She was fantastic and crafted a social media campaign that brought in so much community. Here is a link to the blog and recorded program with featured Black women across the diaspora: Jamaica, Africa, Berkeley, Oakland, LA, Hawaii. 

We're going to have another kick-off during International Women's History Month 2023. This year's theme is finding "truth"--articulating a soul-journey or rite of passage. The target age is 55+-65+ We will continue the Gaia Talks too for which there is no age limit.  

                                    (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wiYHjUGG1hc&t=7s)

Teaching

I taught a class this Spring at Allen Temple Leadership Institute,

a Critical Thinking class I have been teaching in the Spring for the past couple years. This year was a challenge, as I hadn't taught for a year and I was nervous. We studied Mrs. Jarena Lee, the first woman pastor in the African Methodist Episcopal Church (Bishop Richard Allen's church). Her evangelism took place during a time when slavery was legal and a woman could not work unless she was widowed. So these single Black women preachers wrote narratives of their lives and used the sales to support their ministries and their families. Often these women were single mothers too, husbands deceased. 

Jarena Lee was a contemporary of Sojourner Truth, who was younger. Truth's Narrative is a bit better known, but Lee's is equally provocative. I learned of Rev. Lee, A Religious Experience and Journal, from the 19th Century Black Women Writer's series edited by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. in collaboration with the Schomburg Library. Rev. Lee's book is available in Creative Commons as its copyright is over 100 years old. 

We looked at the role of Black women in the church. Allen Temple has a female pastor, the first in its history, so the topic certainly had prescience. I always love this class because the students are often my elders and know so much and are so passionate about their chosen field. For a minute I thought it would be an all women class and then at the cut off date, a male joined us. He fit in well. 

I noticed how tired I was just before class and wondered how I had ever taught 4-5 classes each semester for 25 years online or in person. 

Employment
On that note, I am back at the college, so I cannot teach my favorite class in the Spring, because that would make 4 classes and I can't teach that many classes anymore. I am teaching two freshman comp classes and one composition and literature class.

Fall semester went okay. I taught three freshman comp classes, two 18 weeks and 1 ten weeks. I am teaching a reduced load.  The theme was "greatness" and we read Muhammad Ali's book, The Greatest: My Own Story (1975) co-written with Richard Durham. It was an amazing class. Students completed the course with online multimedia presentations to compliment their research essays about a person who exemplified greatness. The people profiled were both provocative and controversial.

I don't have a theme for Spring Semester-- unless its "retirement" (smile). My goal is to pass 55-75 percent of the class. Attrition is high for first year students in online core courses like English 1A. When the course is accelerated to 8 and 10 weeks as mine are, the completion rate drops even further. I asked the Vice President of Instruction recently why the college offers these courses online and accelerated when students often fail. He said to bring this concern up in the next department meeting. 

WCRC in Berkeley

The Women's Cancer Resource Center has been another wonderful resource on my healing journey. I have taken so many wonderful art classes and meditation classes and writing classes. I am really enjoying Tomye's watercolor pencil and acrylic painting classes. Next year she will be teaching another painting class. My classmates are really good. I am new to painting. I am more a photographer and illustrator which explains why I feel more comfortable with the watercolor pencils. 

Also, since I had to return to work this fall, I have had less thought time to have fun. Again, I am looking forward to being free again at the end of Spring 2023 for the rest of my life.  

As a way to show my gratitude, I hosted a "Bring Your Own Jam" (BYOJ) on Friday, Dec. 30. It was a virtual event. Friends from Oakland, Eureka and Montgomery shared highlights from 2022 and plans for 2023. I played songs requested and danced. It was fun. One friend just made 82 earlier December and my other friend shares my father's birthday. She is in her 70s and I am in my 60s. Coolness. We are all survivors of illnesses that could have taken us out, but obviously that was not the plan. I am happy about that. I'd like several more decades to have fun now that the "work" is done-- publish, dance around the planet, make beauty.

The Art of the African Diaspora

I continue to rustle up work for the Art of the African Diaspora exhibit at the Richmond Art Center. I really enjoyed this year's work. It looks really good. I didn't sell my portrait this year or last year, which is disappointing. I submitted a photo from Elmina Dungeon in Ghana and last year was a photo of Brother Muhammad, a elder, expatriate in Ghana. He is an ancestor now. 

This year I was thinking of submitting a landscape from the Grand Canyon, but ended up submitting work from my Sunsets at the Beach series. (I missed the art drop-off deadline, so I will not have a submission this coming year). 

Ancestor Retreat

Another high point this spring was the Ancestor Retreat I participated in in April. Deep Time Liberation was recommended by Iya Arisika Razak in preparation for my Souljourning for Truth, a trip I was taking across the country to Sojourner Truth's homeland, Ulster County, New York. 

I'd started doing research on these phenomenal women 19th Century African American women, a year earlier as I healed from surgery and got back on my feet.  Most, if not all were from the East Coast and free women of color. I learned about contemporaries of Sojourner Truth and her predecessors. 

People were not masking as much and businesses were opening to indoor commerce. However, I was and continue to distance. My illness left me immunocompromised and I mask and avoid crowds. 
Not much has changed for me in that aspect; however, Deep Time Liberation was online, so I was able to participate. 

I mapped out the journey to New York via car. The plan was to drive across the country stopping at National Parks along the way. After a consultation with an agent at AAA, I realized that between the gas and hotel costs, not to mention car rental, I would not be able to afford this as the fundraising efforts peaked at $2000.00 and stayed put. I needed a lot more money than that. 

I didn't give up hope and decided to take Amtrak. Got a roundtrip ticket ticket for $500 and after an introduction to Iya Jo, was invited to stay at her house for a month. There went the need for a hotel in New York. Yeah!

Iya Jo met me when she lived in the Bay and recalled our meeting during the Maafa Hurricane Katrina activities in 2005, raising funds and awareness here. We curated many activities: fundraisers, an anthology, political activism for resources for Katrina survivors who now lived in the Bay. Iya Jo and Baba Daniel welcomed me into their home like family. 

We are all connected, right?

Her home is a temple, candles and prayers and altars. Libations are her way too, the ancestors walked this road before me. 

In the photo below, I make a collage with photos from Ulster county and Battle Creek. I add a bit of Mars sand to the image-- it looks like waves but that's not water, it is sand. I wanted to draw attention to the Sojourner Rover's 25th anniversary year. "It was launched Dec. 4, 1996, aboard a Delta II boaster. It reached Mars on July 4, 1997. 

The Sojourner explored Mars and sent back images and analysis of rocks and surface materials to scientists here for research. "It operated in Ares Vallis channel in the Chryse Planitia of the Oxia Palus quadrangle, from July 5 to Sept. 27, 1997, when the lander cut off communications with Earth" (wikipedia). The dates' historic significance is uncanny. July 4, 1827 was the year New York State planned a gradual emancipation of enslaved Africans. This was the contention between Truth and Dumont. He told her that if she completed her work earlier, he would free her a year earlier and then did not. This is why she walked away to freedom October 1826. September is also the month Iya Truth made her final ascension. 

Truth learned to love the heavens from her mother who told her that's where her siblings lived. Truth said don't weep for her, that she was going home "like a shooting star." 

My Grandmother Josephine was already there, in New York-- ancestors are like the air-- everywhere all at once. Turn and the hug envelops.  

Taking a year off was a good choice. I needed all my energies to heal completely.  I have a coach, who helped me envision this souljourney-- the journey inside and the one on the ground. My body was still grieving its loss . . . it still feels the absence. I don't think any-body expects to lose some of itself on the road, but I had a diseased organ and it needed to be removed. I made a complete physical recovery and both my check-ups have been excellent. 

My Go-fund-me folks were lovely too and remain friends. I wrote a booklet about my Souljourney for Truth which was magical. There is also a 35 minute film.  When I arrived in Poughkeepsie May 23, I immediately started looking for Sojourner Truth's Freedom Trail. I really wanted a map-- I was not getting any hits on Google Maps. I immediately became familiar with the local and county bus line and rain and shine I was on it traveling to Esopus and New Paltz and Kingston looking for those illusive directions to that 11 miles walk Truth took to freedom in October 1826.  

I met people who'd been at the opening of the curated trail, February 2021, but no longer could put their hands on the map. I spoke to elders and met many wonderful people. None were available for a sunrise jaunt June 1, Truth's freedom birthday, the day I'd chosen to walk. June 1st is the date she changed her name to Sojourner Truth. 

I asked around and Rome Neal suggested Kevin W. Thorbourne, who showed up with a second camera-- his brother, Glenn. They picked me up in Poughkeepsie and we drove to the general area the map on-line designated. We had some cross streets, historic and natural landmarks, the area is also known for a reserve named for a famous naturalist and writer, John Burroughs. We passed it, backtracked and drove onto the site hoping for assistance.   

There was no signage, no entrance to the park.  We drove around, backtracked, stopped started over.  It was an exciting and frustrating adventure.  We leaned into the excitement. I walked several paths in the vicinity until we kind of dead ended on this road and decided to walk it to see where it went. 

I walked along a few yards and looked down and there was Truth looking up at me. We were ecstatic. Though I'd watched the Truth Walk trail dedication online, I didn't remember how many narrative plaques there were.  All of a sudden, I looked up there were Truth button shaped signs on the trees just above my head. 

I am short. 

It wasn't a road without peril, up and down and through tall grasses and flying insects. I had a walking stick and I certainly needed it. I wasn't 29 and I wondered even at 29 how Truth walked and carried her baby too? She was a determined Black wom(b)an, so was I. 

I slipped and caught myself a couple times, but carried on. It wasn't going to be all 11 miles, so the loop was not strenuous, but the symbolic gesture -- the walk, was satisfying. I felt really happy to be there that overcast day overlooking the Hudson River thinking about Truth and Freedom. 

I remember 29 too. I was separated from my husband and responsible for two girls. I'd never lived alone before with dependents. It was certainly an uphill journey as I adapted and learned on the job how to care for my daughters while instilling independence and skillsets (like carpentry and auto mechanics) so they would be more equipped as grown people than I was when I had them. 

I think they are great women and great citizens, model mothers too. 

Back to Truth. 

The walk was a highlight of the trip, but if things could get better, they certainly did. Kevin shot mini videos, really cute and as we stood by his car after the walk looking at the footage when these ladies asked what the occasion was-- I was in a white dress and copper crown with a staff-- cars had stopped and looked on our earlier treks up quiet roads nearby. 

Honk if you believe in "freedom," we wanted to say and folks nodded, slowed down or waved, anyway. 



Back in Poughkeepsie

I am on the Walkway Across the Hudson (selfie). I rode Iya Jo's bike when in town. It was raining a lot and I didn't want to ride it to New Paltz, but I rode it to events in Highland on the Walkway. 

Here is the official Souljourning for Truth film (June 1, 2022, Ulster County, NY), directed by Ms. Wanda Sabir, filmed by Kevin Thorbourne. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Vbc45EXgh0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MgdyAdwHWok&t=3s

Back to June 1 Freedom Walk

So Kevin and I are looking at the footage. We are really pleased and two women in the parking area ask us if they can ask us a question. We say yes. 

One of the women was a graduate of SUNY New Paltz and she was so proud of the Sojourner Truth Library and mural inside. She insisted I visit. I'd already been in touch with Morgan Gwenwald, Special Collections Librarian, there and had an invitation to drop by. That was a fun visit, once I made it. I had to rent a car and returned just a day before I left for Michigan. 

After we posed for photos and I gave the women one of my Souljourning for Truth buttons, we walked down the now familiar road and saw the Truth Freedom Walk sign. It was literally right there by a fenced open field and highway. 

As we stood there taking more photos a bicyclist rode by with questions and we learned that he was from Amsterdam. Yep. Truth had sent him by. A native Dutch speaker, he had to help us document this moment. I gave him a button and later he wound up at a church I'd been trying to get too, but was too tired to drive there. 

I didn't want to push myself, because I had to stay well. I heard about his visit because the pastor, Rev. Zuill and I had been speaking since introduced by the curator at the Esopus Museum. Her son and I share the same birthday. I'd seen Rev. Deborah Zuill online in the dedication ceremonies and then again at the Dutch Reform Church in Kingston. The sexton shared a video with me from her computer. Besides keeping the grounds up, the sexton is also a fine artist who likes painting formerly enslaved Africans from their narratives. Her work is all over the church on the second floor hallway and meeting rooms. 

On Juneteenth weekend I went to a concert there. I also attended the Pinkster Sunday church service there early June, the weekend after my historic walk (smile). 

My first excursion was right after my arrival. Esi Lewis, professor at SUNY New Paltz and head of a nonprofit dedicated to her mom's memory, Dr. Margaret Wade-Lewis Black History Research and Cultural Center at Ann Oliver House in New Paltz. Her mom founded (or was one of the founders of) the Black Studies Dept. at SUNY New Paltz. Esi is also an attorney. She and others coordinated the New Paltz Juneteenth the year I visited (2022) at a historic community cemetery where Black Civil War Veterans are buried, along with freed Black people. Historic Huguenot was the location of the second part of the commemoration; however, I had to leave for Kingston. 

I had a chance to finally meet Susan Sessin, Town Historian, whose car I followed until she lost me. We'd spoken on the phone and via email before I arrived.  Loved the opportunity to connect with folks like this during my monthlong visit. At the Kingston City Government offices we met with the guests on the Ulster County Juneteenth Truth Tour. There I finally got to meet Truth's 6th Great Granddaughters, Barbara and Kimberly. 

Earlier that week, Wednesday, I'd met quite a few of the guests at the special hearing in the court where Truth sued the State of New York for the return of her son, Peter, sold south which was against the law. The legal documents filed had been lost until a year ago. For one day, the public was invited to see the documents and hear jurists talk about Truth's impact on the legal system and on their lives. 

Amazing that a government that legally enslaved human beings, ruled in favor of this Black mother's right to her son. The kidnapper was ordered to return the child to his rightful heir, his mother.

It was an amazing moment. 

Kingston and by extension the entire area is like a country town. Vast and white, yet friendly. I really enjoyed my souljourn. In Poughkeepsie I saw a jail in the middle of a neighborhood. I didn't see a lot of Black folks, but I saw want . . . by no means did I think, all was well for everyone, but there was wealth in Ulster county and there is wealth in Empire State where the roads I traversed on foot and bike and by road revealed plenty-- a stratified plenty. 

When I drove to Northampton, MA, there was open roads and a long drive from Poughkeepsie. My rental had a flat or low pressure tire and so between car trouble and thinking I was lost a 4 hour drive took all day. I really wanted to return, but I didn't have an extra day. The David Ruggles Center was such a delight and the walking or driving tour was equally delightful given the living history and again Truth's huge footprints I was mapping. 

It was amazing to see yet another monument, set in a park. This made three, the one at the Walk Way Across the Hudson and the monument to Truth as a child. I didn't mention that Esi Lewis and her friend drove me there and to Jugs Tavern, where Truth was enslaved before Dumont, her final owner purchased her. 

The idea of a person being owned feels strange, yet in Ulster County following the Truth Trail it is a reality that resonates in one's bones. I can still feel it in my body as I recall the scars on the back of the child Isabella at Port Ewen where the child sculpture is placed. 

Afterward, Esi Lewis dropped me at the opening of one of the many Empire trails and told me to walk straight which I did. I was about two hours from the other statue, dedicated on International Women's Day this year. How fitting right? That this Black mother, suffragist and abolitionist would model female agency in Ulster County. 

After I admired the statue, I still have another hour's walk ahead. I think I made it back to Iya Jo's house just before dark. 

You only live once right? Correct, so live your life. Don't put it off for anyone. 

Truth owned property and spoke about how owning property and reading really didn't guarantee you'd make a good choice at the ballot box. It just made it more likely the villains would continue to control outcomes. 

I'd wanted to see the Cascade Mountains, so that's what we did for my birthday (also in June) after I returned from visiting Truth's Freedom Trail. I'd planned to walk it again that day, but there were too many scary bugs and the grasses were really tall. I turned around. The Cascade Mountains are old. One doesn't think about mountains as aging. Like people they shrink in statue and grow dense. One could feel their depth. I wonder what it felt like to walk along a trail. I will have to climb the Cascades next time. 

I did return to the Sojourner Truth library, went shopping in a mall and bought some healthy goodies at the grocery store and health food store. I was on my way to Michigan by way of Chicago again. (The train route is circuitous.) The next morning we put my considerable items in the suitcase and one of Iya Jo's and headed to Amtrak. I had way too much to carry. I am going to have to learn to pack lightly. I haven't mastered this yet. 

In Chicago I met with my friend Zoe. That was a fun visit, until I lost my suitcase. Zoe found it and I got it on my way back home. (Yes, the train went back to Chicago from Battle Creek, MI to head to Oakland.)

We stopped off in Pittsburgh where I got to August Wilson's home, now theatre complex. The famous Hill District. I might have visited there on my way to Detroit after leaving Chicago-- I forget. There were stops at every little town across the country. We must have stopped 50 times going and coming. It was a lot. The train arrived in Pittsburgh six hours late. We were supposed to arrive in the daytime, but it was dark. I still hired a car and spent too much money visiting the hallowed stomping grounds of our beloved Race Man, August Wilson. 

I am so happy I splurged and stayed in Battle Creek a few days to unwind. Sitting up for 4 days is hard. I did get a massage for the road and got one when I arrived in Poughkeepsie. The sister had magical hands. 

I was having trouble walking when I boarded the train for Poughkeepsie. Packing too much also means you have to carry too much, even as a senior with accommodations. 

Washington DC

I took the train to Washington to see the Truth bust at the State Building; however, the revelation was the Independence Monument completed by an enslaved Black man. That was amazing and not a part of the official tour. If you don't know your history, the guide is certainly not going to share it, but we had a good one. He even told us about the enslaved Africans' thumb prints and other finger signatures along the columns. 

Reminds me of the cherubim in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil, where the African artisans, made the angels different some with mocking faces and bodies to leave their presence in the holy spaces. 
  
While there I participated in the ADASSI Ancestor Libations and Prayers for African Ancestors at the Anacostia River. I got to cross the new Frederick Douglass Bridge too and visit the Carter G. Woodson Park and home. 

When I pulled into the station in Emeryville, I counted the days. I'd been on the rode 40 days and 39 nights. It was Moses' rode trip or Muhammad's with a pink suitcase-- the references felt holy, not that I needed such validation. It was holy because I'd asked for guidance and Truth showed up and she still guides me. At the cemetery in Battle Creek, Barbara Allen introduced me. 

Yep, I am official. 

Presentation to Supporters

I waited to the very last moment to create my presentation for my Souljourning for Truth sponsors, Sunday, Oct. 30.  We don't know what day she walked to freedom, just that it was in October in 1826. I have a booklet (20 pages which tells the story of my journey. They will be available for purchase soon. I also have a purse with an original design and buttons I shared along my Souljourning for Truth, which are now for sale. Again, stay posted, I need to find vendor(s) to support these two products. These items were a part of an art exhibit, "A Brave and Startling Truth: Women Scribe the World," Nov. 2-Dec. 4 curated by Stephanie Russell in Poughkeepsie, NY.

I had enormous design help from Tyrice Brown, an artist, poet, teacher in South Carolina. She was fast and efficient. I looked very good. My son-in-law helped me finalize a few items and insert video and practice as he juggled three children two babies that Sunday morning. I dashed home afterward with moments to spare. It went well, but definitely was a "had to be there production" (smile). I will create the slide presentation again for the public. It will one of the features on my YouTube channel @wandaspicks

Later this year, in November, we honored Truth

Honoring Sojourner Truth on her Ascension Day, Saturday, November 26. My friend, Kheven gave me a collection of her speeches so a few of us got together on FB.com/wombfulnest (via Zoom) and read her speeches and discussed them. We started and concluded with songs, because she ministered with her songs. Visit the Sojourner Truth Project which looks at the speech "Ain't I a Woman?" which was not the original speech given. The popular speech which was published 12 years later and is credited to Frances Gage, who added the "Ain't I a Woman" refrain. Gage "presided over the 1851 woman's rights convention in Akron, OH, where she introduced Sojourner Truth, a move that was also not supported by all attendee."

Gage separated from Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton "when they did not support the 15th Amendment, giving African-American men the right to vote while not giving women or either race the same right. Her belief was abolition first, women's right second and temperance third" (Civil War Museum)

One was propaganda, the other Truth. Truth knew both versions. She approved the first. Both are also in the Penguin collection; we read the original version.   


Grand Canyon

On the anniversary of my surgery, I had another trip planned and then my friend Fred T, died. I left the day after his memorial service. July 20. 

Colorado means red and the river which is the most colonized tributary in the nation is a Black woman's womb-- monetized and broken off to supply and feed and support so many children, so will eventually disappear. 

However, in her glory, she crashed through rock and created over a six million years the Grand Canyon. I had to see her work. It was like a giant footprint. Took Amtrak and headed south and then west. It was a nice trip. Part bus, part train . . . delayed and left stranded for hours on our way back, but it was worth it. 

You don't know beauty until you have see a sunset in Grand Canyon. I visited the South Rim. This coming year, I plan to visit the Northern Rim. 

Well, All Good Things End

Actually nothing lasts forever, so wise ones enjoy the moment and then release it. I am practicing opening my hands rather than clinching my fists. 

Ran out of sick leave and had to go back to work this fall too. August found me nervous about teaching 4 classes, so I taught 3 and got through it. Spring session I'll teach three more and then I can retire. It is official. I am in my 65th years 2023. 

I am so happy to have my life back soon. Being off from work for a year to do what I pleased lets me know that I need to end this contract. Although I will have less income, even less than the part time salary I am making now, being able to live the life I want is so worth it. 

I thought when this day arrived I would have a partner who was also looking forward to being on the same train with me, but oh well, such is not the case, but I will be fine. I am fine. I am letting go of control and letting the car steer itself.  It is connected to a higher frequency and together we can't get lost as we create the path to freedom and joy together. 

I am lovin' the journey since I got my new set of wheels. The old model was not how I wanted to travel. I am an elder now. I wanted a better class and more amenities, so I traded it in for a better ride. I got what I asked for. It is so smooth, I can't feel the road. 

BYOJ December 20

On my half-year birthday we got together in Zoom and played favorite songs and danced. It was fun. 


It's Nia Day, Friday, December 30, 2022

Not a creature is stirring not even a rodent. Good the traps are holding. I was born on a Friday. I am Osun's child. Who knew? Nia is my song-- purpose arriving ahead of me like sunny days and predestination,  a soundtrack designed just for me. The steps engraved along a path my ancestors carved in the landscape, sheet music notations I sing. 

I am never lost, not for long. I turn my face and there it is. . . a note flying on the hummingbird's wing or just ahead the fluttering dragonflies. Butterflies whisper songs in my ear, light on my hand, embrace my soul when it parts and returns it to me. 

I linger in today. Tomorrow is too far away to contemplate. All is well, I think. 

I was born on a Friday. The day of congregation-- Yomul Jumah. I feel lucky. 

At the Morning Sit (InsightLA) we looked distress in the eye without blinking. Hugging it close, my knees shook, not enough to collapse, but enough to notice what it feels like to wobble or lean into the shifting consciousness. 

My basement is empty. All the guests sit in the living room. I went shopping today. They tell me to prepare for a long winter. They plan to stay a while. 

This year I have been working on my recovery. I hadn't known I was lost, until recently. Now certain mysteries are cleared up. I have been working hard-- last year in preparation for my surgery I took a Mindfulness Stress Reduction Course. It was extremely helpful. Fear is the unknown sometimes. Knowledge is the candle lit. When there is light it is easier to not fear (as much (smile). 

Movement

I also take Tai Chi Chuh and Qigong for balance and stretching. I have taken Mindful Self-Compassion and learned about the Plum Village Application which I used to learn about how to function when there is turmoil. How to handle strong emotions. How to be gentle and kind to oneself. How to listen to one's body. 

I have continued with the acupuncture. I have also had coaching. 

Al-Anon

In August when I started back in Al-Anon, I also added Codependence Anonymous. Al-Anon is my go to, that and meditation circles. I like meditating in group settings. I am much better at controlling my thoughts than I was last year this time. I do not feel like my life is running me. It feels more like I am more in control. I am learning patience. 

As I ease into the center of my sixth decade, I have noticed that I cannot keep as many balls in the air as before. I also do not have a desire to be everywhere and do not feel attached to events or activities that have passed which I missed. I am also not attached to those events which I cannot participate in any longer.

I do need more growth in holding onto resentment and having expectations. I also still like giving advice and letting certain people walk on me, but I am learning to pause and think. Ask for time to think and then answer. It is a learning curve. 

Though I have learned in these 12 step rooms that I am not unique and that others have similar stories, there are cultural differences. 

Nia is a good day to take stock, which I did in conversation with two sisters at the year end, Bring Your Own Jam (BYOJ). BYOJ was born in 2020 to help with connection at a time when distancing was the new normal. For some people, this is how we move now-- personal space 6 feet by 6 feet, masked and cautious. I spend a lot of time in the street. Dogs are the new normal in my community. They get to walk on the sidewalks. I do not. 

Poetry Celebration

This year after thinking about it, we had another virtual Poetry Celebration of African American Poets and Their Poetry. We featured Kalamu ya Salaam from New Orleans along with many Bay Area poets. A special feature this year was also the inclusion of African poets from Kenya and Ghana and I think Nigeria. Nana Sula opened the gathering with a prayer and libation and song. She is also in NOLA.  We dedicated the poetry reading this year to Christine Saed, Branch Librarian at the West Oakland Library. She had the longest tenure and the day of this year's program was her birthday, Feb. 19. She died in January this year. Friends shared Christine stories. She was certainly "the People's Librarian." We shall miss her laughter and great stories. 

For 2023, I plan to host the 33rd Annual Celebration of African American Poets and Their Poetry, event on the last Saturday, Feb. 25, 10 a.m.-1 p.m. (PT). FB.com/wandas-picks  Our featured poets are Avotcja and Ayodele "Wordslanger" Nzinga, Poet Laureate for the City of Oakland.  I am also working with an editor to complete the poetry celebration anthology and schedule a reading at the West Oakland Library at some point in 2023.

It would have been nice to plan something for February, but we do not have a completed manuscript yet, so I don't want to build anticipation and hope and then nothing happens. 

Publications

I have been writing a lot and publishing. 

This year I co-edited a collection of poetry with Sara Biel, Colossus: Freedom, poetry that speaks to the lives affected by incarceration. I am also included in an anthology that looks at activism and art practice: Write Now! SF Bay: Uncommon Ground: BIPOC Journeys to Creative Activism, edited by Shizue Seigel. I am profiled in Black Gold. 

Wanda's Picks Website and Podcast continue

Though I am not broadcasting weekly, I have had some really remarkable conversations this year among them Quincy Troupe and many playwrights like Ishmael Reed and Mildred Inez Lewis re: The Museum Annex at Central Works in Berkeley. I also had an opportunity to interview some remarkable artists, among them: Xaviera Simmons.

I also have a YouTube Channel: YouTube.com/wandaspicks Follow me and subscribe. 

Other favorite stories and interviews for 2022:

Marcus Gardley's "King Lear at Cal Shakes" (wandaspicks.com + sfbayview.com)

Obits for Fred T Smith (wandaspicks.com +sfbayview.com)

Celebration of Mrs. Anita Black's 101st Birthday (sfbayview.com)

Quincy Troupe "Duende," Book Review/Interview Story (wandaspicks.com + podcast)

The Body Has Seasons (wandaspicks.com)

Ishmael Reed's "The Slave Who Loved Caviar," A Review (wandaspicks.com)

Interview with playwright, Cleavon Smith (wandaspicks.com podcast)

Zaccho Dance Theatre's A State of Grace (FB.com/wandaspicks)

32nd Annual Celebration of African American Poets and Their Poetry (FB.com/wandaspicks)

Michael Gene Sullivan, SF Mime Troupe's "Back to the Way Things Were," and thoughts on the passing of Muziki Roberson

With the teaching, I have found it hard to keep up with the virtual theatre scene. Hopefully, once I have retired I can once again watch plays and hopefully by 2024 attend plays again. Perhaps the technology regarding air purification will be at a higher level, so that we can feel safe while indoors. I'd love to be able to attend concerts and plays again. In the meantime, I have begun over the past few years to create soundtracks. 

Me? A character in a play? Oh my!

Ishmael Reed's play, The Conductor opened for a staged reading at Theater for the New City in October. It was a virtual and directed by Carla Blank. The production was so good, I went to all the performances. The cast was excellent, star-studded especially the actor who channeled Ms. Wanda, Kenya Wilson. Ms. Wilson's character is based on my life, yep! and work as a journalist at the San Francisco Bay View. I think this is awesome cool! The best complement and recognition to date is to be immortalized in a play by such an erudite icon, Ishmael Reed.

Here is a link to a review at wandaspicks.com  (I just learned that the play is opening at the same theatre in February and that the playwright rewrote a scene based on my review. Oh did I mention that this review was published in Reed's Konch magazine this year? Well it was.)

We had two really wonderful radio interviews with the playwright and all the women in the cast:

https://www.blogtalkradio.com/wandas-picks/2022/10/05/wandas-picks-radio-show and https://www.blogtalkradio.com/wandas-picks/2022/10/12/wandas-picks-radio-show

27th Annual MAAFA Commemoration 2022

We continue the in person MAAFA Commemoration this year October 9, 2022. The theme was "We are all connected, so we must treat each other right." Visit maafasfbayarea.com (blog for the program). It was really lovely, so many birds came out to wish us well. The water was warm and the day delightful. 

In conjunction with this year's commemoration, we had two programs, a reading at The Freedom and Movement Center with Colossus Books, Colossus: Freedom (all the money raised goes to California Coalition for Women Prisoners; we gave CCWP a check for $500). The second event was with our long time collaborator, the San Francisco Public Library, African American Center. The topic was incarcerated women and California's sterilization of women prisoners 20 years ago and the reparations bill passed recently to compensate the survivors. We showed the film, Belly of the Beast and I hosted a conversation with the lead plaintiff and her attorney. It was quite moving and informative. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFtjq0RDcDc&t=1s

2024, A Year in Review

You've Been Busy Wanda

Dear Wanda,

2024 was some year. Full and Fabulous. December marked a full calendar year since you said yes to postgraduate work on a doctorate in Women’s Spirituality. January 2025 marks your exit. 

In the archives you met Anna Julia Cooper, went by her house too in Washington DC and rang the bell.

Ding dong?

Hello?

Can I come in?

Oh, the house was sold. It's a private residence now.

I can't come in.

Can I walk on her porch and look at the back yard?

Thanks so much!

It's a large property.

I meet neighbors who knew the family and had been inside many times.

Up the street was Mary Church Terrell's place. Her house is a part of the National Park Service so eventually we might be able to see inside.

This year I traveled to DC a few times. I stayed with Paula, Monica's mom. Such a sweet lady.

I traveled by train to Austin, Texas, stopped in LA. I had so much fun at University of Texas @Austin (UT) for the Solar Eclispe. I got bling as in tee-shirts and souvenirs. I had so much fun even if it was cloudy and the big show was covered by a cloud.

I traveled home on Amtrak via Chicago. On my way back to California I presented a paper at a conference on the train. I hoped my connection would last. It did. So exciting. I applied to present another paper this summer, well, host a panel. The topic is Black Women Discuss Their Motherline.

I might present a paper at Harvard. I have to figure on what. I might look at Sojourner Truth and Harriet E. Wilson.

Auntie Theo Gayle made her transition in March, March 14. That was sad. I flew nonstop. It was a long flight. I had Charlie horses for days. I forgot my suspension socks.

I remembered when I flew the next time to Washington. I was headed to Virginia for Furious Flowers, a Black Poetry Writer's conference. That was amazing. The next one is in 10 years. I'll be 76. I will also have my doctorate multiple books. (I wrote this last year in December.)

Mama will be 91. How cool. TaSin will be 52. I hope Bilaliyah will be speaking with me then. Legend will be 18, Wise 15 and Hero 13.

Wow.

Anyhoo. I plan to be fly cool...

In DC the second time, Ellen met me and showed me her Smithsonian Museums especially the National Gallery. It's now one of my favorites. I think the African Art is my favorite. It's not overwhelming and it's not as crowded. Paula and I went then popped over to the African American one. I treated Paula to lunch. I had something that didn't agree with me.

I took a benadryl.

The sculpture garden was also nice. In the AA Museum I saw the waterfall. So lovely.

I love DC. On the second visit, it was raining so hard in September, I didn't get to Baltimore to Lucille Clifton's house and Museum. But it will be there. There were flashflood warnings. 

When I visited in the Spring 2024, I did get to Maryland. Kenneth picked me up at my cousin's and we went to a Jazz Concert at a church. I took the Metro commuter train over. At the church that evening was a special commemoration of a slave insurrection. There was a procession and a play about a slave rebellion in DC at the wharf, called "Remember the Pearl." 

I had some yummy chicken and beans.

At the wharf where the procession ended, there were fountains I could walk and run through. It was fun.

This spring I treated myself to another rode trip, I drove to Joshua Tree and then to Zion in Utah. That was far. Joshua Tree was far too. It was all really pretty, I just got tired of driving.

I want to go to LA, but I'd have to drive I-1 because it's probably snowing on the Grapevine.

I don't like driving in the snow.

Big papers this year looked at 19th Century Black women like CA Pioneer Nancy Ross Gooch. Oh I forgot to mention, I went white water rafting.

California's 175 Admission Day is Sept. 9.

Another paper completed was on Hattie Wilson.

I learned how to read and write a study this summer. That was a hard class, but I got through it with a B.

Mama moved to the Bay Area this summer.

I was in a play this Spring and Summer. It was fun. We got a good review too.

I gave the talk this year at the 29th Annual Maafa Commemoration on accountability.

I am ready to conclude this task.

I really enjoyed my Spiritual Activism class. I really liked the mothering class this spring too.

I think I just want to be free and to stay free. I have yet to meet a man who appreciates a free Black woman. Most men are selfish and want me to promote and support their program.

Nope.

I am traveling solo because it is easier than negotiating space in his room.

I'd rather own the whole house. No. I don't want a roommate.

My storage spaces still need sorting through. When Mama moved in she threw me off balance. I was afraid to ride my bike after falling at least twice, maybe three times. The first time I fell was after interacting with Zahir.

That is getting easier. I do not want anything to do with him. I trip down memory lane and then I wake up. He's still snoring and won't turn over.

Nope. This woman matters to herself.

The emertis dinner was a high point this summer. Great food. Karla and Kheven came. TaSin didn't come and Shawn didn't have enough notice.

I shared a poem. The one I wrote at the end of the semester. Juanita and Mr. Alexander came. They love me.

I think I gave two talks this year one was on Tuesday. My topic was Don't Be a Doormat

Then at the Thursday Educator's Meeting my topic was Hurricane Katrina.

Hosting the Truth Stole was big and I have been invited to create a bibliography and submit an essay on Truth. I might submit the one I wrote that needs citations.

I had such a troubling semester with one professor who has failed me three times. Fall 2024 the final time. I had to do something nice myself, so I treated myself to a week in LA to visit two art museums:  LACMA and CAAM. Simone Leigh's work was amazing. I went twice.

Yes, the wildfires started. Yes, it was terrible. We couldn't drink the water. We couldn't breathe . the air, yet a friend who at 102 lost everything when her apartment burned down. 

"When they say, 'evacuate!' You leave everything," Ms. Mildred Pitts Walter said. 

The drive down was lovely. The drive back, the following Sunday was pleasant. The skies were blue again in LA county. Most if not all rest stops were closed. I wonder why.

I deserve a rest. I have been very busy.

If they say it and I don't believe it, is it true? What is sanity anyway, but an angle on the point of a star

“Reducing Mental Health Disparities in Black Californians Using Community-defined Practices: We Ain’t Crazy” – a literature review by Wanda Sabir

I had the opportunity to speak this morning on my radio show, Wanda’s Picks, at length with the architect of the California Reducing Disparities Project, African American Strategic Workgroup, report, “We Ain’t Crazy! Just Coping with a Crazy System,” which looks qualitatively and quantitatively at black mental health in California and its blatant racialized disparities. The report which was just released last month at the 44^th Annual International Convention of the Association of Black Psychologists, in Los Angeles, was just the first stop on a statewide tour where stakeholders and constituents will reconvene to discuss the scope of the document and next steps. There is money, $50 million dollars to be exact, connected to the implementation over the next four years.

$50 million dollars sounds like a lot but divided among the five areas represented in the study might look a bit less liquid as spatulas are used to ice a warm cake, but it is a start.

Slated to speak for 45 minutes, our conversation stretched to two hours, Dr. V. Diane Woods at first in route to her office then seated in her car speaking in what one can only imagine, less than optimum circumstances.

The day of the unveiling of two years+ work in Los Angeles she called me to let me know she was available for an interview, as I’d indicated I would be in attendance at ABPsi. Unfortunately, I arrived the day after her presentation and we’ve been playing phone-email tag since. Just arriving back in town after a meeting with black physicians at their National Conference in New Orleans last week, Dr. Woods is canvassing the nation with concrete data on how at least in California, a state the size of some countries with a GNP greater than many nations, how such information can ultimately prevent disease and promote well-being in the African American community. Her work reminds me of that of Dr. Marcus Lorenzo Penn, here in the Bay Area, who just had a 35^th birthday celebration last month. Dr. Penn’s work, at the University of California, San Francisco, in oncology looks at ways patients can manage stress and by doing so prolong their lives. He has a prescriptive yoga series with meditation, coupled with affirmations and visualizations, often culturally specific. This is the same Dr.Penn, who for the past two years has led the community in meditation at the annual Maafa Ritual in San Francisco. He is also a photographer and recently published a book with sunsets from around the world.

At the ABPsi conference I met a man who is using Biofeedback with youth in a high school as a stress management intervention—the adolescent years are extremely stressful as young people navigate the hormone grid coupled with peer pressure, societal prejudice, parental misunderstandings and just youthful foolishness—all a part of the growing process. Also at the conference, I was able to attend a member’s meeting where ABPsi president Dr. Cheryl Tawede Grills, spoke about an initiative, Emotional Healing Circles, the first launched in Tuskegee, Alabama, as a way for communities to address many of the psycho-social-emotional issues facing black people individually and collectively which impact our mental and physical health.

This, impressive and massive CRDP report is filled with personal anecdotes from the over 1000 participants across the state queried in questionnaires, focus groups, and in-depth interviews. This input grounds the document experientially in a way that takes one from head to heart. The route is circuitous as is the health model Dr. Woods’s life represents—holistic health using multiple proven instruments. She is not a one size fits all shopkeeper, which is why I am sure she was chosen to lead this study which resulted in an impressive plan which is aligned with similar studies conducted simultaneously in the Asian/Pacific Islander community, Latino community, LGBTQ communities (which overlap all other communities) and the Native American community (which also overlaps other communities, as do perhaps all categories, in a state where the caveat, biracial was born.)

Together, these documents give policymakers a different picture of California and concrete data with which to now implement policies which will change the way this state is structured from its medical system to its educational and prison systems. Mental health is a right for all. These other groups have been meeting with the African American Strategic Planning Workgroup since the study was commissioned and continue to meet to date. All the studies can be jointly accessed at http://www.dmh.ca.gov/Multicultural_Services/CRDP.asp

In the short term, the study will strengthen the existing mental health infrastructure. One of the complaints, stated in the study, was that folks do not know how to access resources. In response, Dr. Woods stated that there will be a directory generated from the research along with a list of research on African American mental health, as thus far, the academic literature in the mental health field does not support such a research model— Even though black clinicians are doing important and valuable research which challenges the western medical paradigm, as it opens the field to African indigenous healing modalities, many clinicians operating within the Western healing model are not aware of such thinking and research.

They were obviously not at ABPsi 44, where many plenaries and paper presentations especially at the student poster presentations—had my head spinning --in a good way (smile).

This has long been the goal of Maafa San Francisco Bay Area, to be a resource clearinghouse for people of African Descent who need culturally competent mental health services. In the past, whenever we’ve had our panel discussions looking at the residual psychological effects of enslavement and how we can heal from the trauma, we’ve invited organizations like The Institute for the Advance Study of Black Family Life and Culture, as well as The Mentoring Center, the Black Psychologists and Alameda Country Office of Behavior Health, which has a handbook re: services in the county. In the future we'd like to invite A New Way Forward Healing What's Hurting Black America: The Local Circle.

I wonder about all the shows on television today where people confront their demons in public settings. Is anyone ever healed from such an exhibition? How did the sensationalizing of illness become a popular sport? Is it a cry for help, and if it is, why resort to what often looks like humiliation and embarrassment for a cure? Are our communities this bereft of affordable clinicians and healthcare services that one has to stoop to such levels for help? Are we so distant from each other, so alone or isolated, that often TV therapists are all we can rely on, the studio audience our surrogate families? If healing is a communal experience, then one can see why first radio, then television, then the Internet has become the 21^st century family complete with distant and close relatives now that Face book has fine tuned and defined its relationship categories from the simple “friends” and “friends of friends” to variations thereof.

Prop 63, “The Mental Health Service Act,” is fueling the California Reducing Disparities Project (CRDP). In doing research and preparing for this journey with Dr. Woods, I found General Jeff, a man who is an active board member and advocate with the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council Skid Row. Dr. Woods is a regular guest on his show and familiar with Mr. Jeff’s work. In one of the televised interviews they were at a conference with prison officials, looking at mental illness behind bars and the grossly inadequate treatment of prisoners. Often over medicated, the prisoners once released are literally “crazier” than when they went in (Draft Report, Table 44, 189-190). In the report, Mr. Jeff's work is cited in extensively. He is a true hero, representing a population which is extremely marginalized and excluded, the chronically homeless and mentally ill.

In D7. Discussion of Preliminary Findings: Actions express priorities”, researchers state: “[T]he collective cry from across the State of California is that Black people have been ‘severely neglected’ by the system established to help all people. This statement is based on the evidence of a gross lack of priority programs and initiatives by mental health providers” (DRAFT Public Review Copy CRDP 230).

If one looks at Marin county, the richest county in the State and one sees how isolated the black community in Marin City is from the overall county, it is amazing how within the presence of such wealth, how Marin City has the “highest per capita concentration of the Black population and the highest per capita death rate in the county and the highest rate of children of color in the juvenile justice system (DRAFT Public Review Copy CRDP 198).

Terms like “’ISOJI,’ a Nigerian term which means “rebirth or revitalization, or renaissance”—a worldview which looks at character development as something that starts within and is expressed without via social justice, advocacy and effective communication is the basis of the community based organization in Marin county which “has facilitated,” since 1999, “programs that support family resiliency, early childhood education, mental health, health and wellness services, and collaborative efforts of community building between family and community members, service providers and organizations, leadership and policy makers, while maintaining neutrality, integrity, transparency, and accountability to the community” (DRAFT Public Review Copy CRDP 198).

The notion of having a prison as one’s nearest neighbor is not addressed anywhere in the report; however, with the expansion of the prison industrial complex for juveniles and adults—San Quentin lurking like a dark shadow over Marin City residents, it is not surprising that acid rainfall would affect the psyche of its residents. Marin county is a beautiful city, but if your home is just one exist away from a California State Prison where executions occurred quite frequently until stayed a few years ago when the third drug in the cocktail was exhausted, what does that do to one’s dreams? How can one rest peacefully at night?

I was stopped “Driving While Black” in San Rafael, and then followed to the Richmond Bridge when the officer couldn’t find anything to cite me for. My plates had incendiary stickers, like “Free Mumia Abu Jamal” and other such free speech indications that I was not from around there, but it was my first time being stopped. Prior to that, I thought only black men were suspect (smile).

By far one of the best aspects of this report are the personal stories and testimony. I got lost many times in the acronyms –the only letter I could always figure out was the “M” for “Mental” usually followed by “H” for health. In Table 36 Questions: What Do African Americans consider “good” mental health? There were a variety of categories listed from “Sound Moral Foundation & Being Self-Assured” to “Responsible, Sharing, Connected, Independence, Self-Love, Coping, God-Family-Friends, Self-Help, Positive Role Models, Prevention, Freedom from Micro-aggressions, Cultural Compassion, and Identity Crises” (DRAFT Public Review Copy CRDP 162-171).

As Dr. Woods mentioned this morning on the air, some patients just wanted someone to listen to them, not medication, which what many black patients were given despite their protests. This GP or general principle medicating was often accompanied by disrespect and disregard. One Sacramento woman says:

“Let’s say you’re 25 and you’re struggling with something that you know isn’t right for a long time and you’re finally . . . gonna go get that help and you’re not very educated about the first help you get, is telling you okay take a pill. Now you’re thinking this pill I gotta be on for all my life, you know I’m dependent on this and it’s like, like buying a car at the first shop you go to. You know, I mean I should just take this pill. You’re trusting that it’s a doctor, um, so if someone you know is just facing it and coming and trying to get that help and the provider just wants to do medication, um that’s an obstacle. . . . I’ve gone this long without medication. I don’t want to you know maybe have to use that as my savior. You know, help me with this so, you know if you just run into people and let’s say you might go to 3 or 4 doctors. And, they all just want to, to pump medication. . . ” (DRAFT Public Review Copy CRDP 168).

Another person, a man this time, from San Diego said in Gay Males, San Ysido Comprehensive Focus Group, that he is communicating his concerns to the care provider and the response is pills which make him feel “crazy and violent” so the medications are stopped.

Often the medications given to patients especially those in custody –more for behavior management than treatment or cure, are so strong, that patients end up like zombies. Often prisoners are released addicted to these expensive opiates their medical coverage, if they have such, does not cover.

Some of the stories recorded sound like episodes from the Twilight Zone. This is the story of a mother whose daughter, a new mother, was hearing voices.

“I took her to Kaiser and Kaiser refused her because she had Kaiser/MediCal,” the mother says. “So I took her to the hospital and they refused to see her. They talked to her, but she had to go to a county facility. You know, it went on for three weeks. Until she got so bad, ‘till she was telling me that she can’t be at home alone with me because she is a threat to the baby. You know, so you know for like three months, we struggling until I got to the place where I knew I had to get some help. Watch me, somehow I got her into the car, but they do not cooperate, and I mean she was taking the steering wheel, you couldn’t drive down the street with her.” The Lodi resident finally got her daughter into treatment, and guess what? Her daughter was given the wrong medication and ended up in a coma (DRAFT Public Review Copy CRDP 169). Given the President’s present Health Bill, I wonder what, if anything, might have changed for the new mother had it been in place when she needed urgent care.

Over and over participants in the study praised the community health care model as one they trusted. I loved the example given from the Maori tradition in New Zealand, where the elders and the family approach healing as a communal event. Blessings or prayers are offered before treatment starts, and the relationship is one of mutual support and trust between the patient, his or her family and the care provider who is not allowed to just run with any given treatment model. A family member is always present, and if the care is deemed counter intuitive or harmful, the family support person stops the treatment.

Family advocates are so important, especially when the patient is unable to speak for him or herself. This is especially important for children and elders. In our American medical system, I noticed when my father was ill, that he was treated a lot better than patients who didn’t have visitors. My brother and I let the hospital, convalescent home and all his care providers know that they’d better treat our father righteous, and when they missed up, we called the ombudsman, filed a report and shut the convalescent hospital down. Throughout the CRDP study, the importance of family in African American social construct is repeated over and over again. The family is also mentioned as integral to the healing process, the family and one’s connection to God or Spirit.

The model offered by Dr. Wade Nobles which looks at the person and environment as the nexus for health adds to this point, that is, good health is in direct relationship to the space one occupies at home and abroad. He and King call it the Culturecology Model © where “’the nature of the person’ and ‘the nature of the environment’ are inextricably connected“ (DRAFT Public Review Copy CRDP 214). In the Model of Cultural Identification/Location African American chart, the healthy person is grounded in Ma’at/Africanity in an environment where this “self” is supported.

In the “t” shaped chart, I found myself on the upper right side, positive self image—toxic environment, so even though I operate from what Nobles calls “’an authentic’ or ‘genuine’” self, this self is undermined by the toxicity of the environment away from home. The fight I have daily in being who I am at work, undermines my health and well-being.

I love Nobles’s claim that one must know oneself to be oneself, that to be African is to be connected to one’s origin, that which brought one into existence. I recall my early teaching in the Nation of Islam, where the Hon. Elijah Muhammad stressed first one must know oneself and secondly after knowing oneself, one much do for self (smile). I’m sure he would agree with Nobles that until one is connected to one’s authenticity or roots, one is not truly human, especially when one looks at how the devil is manufactured (smile) (DRAFT Public Review Copy CRDP 215).

The Report goes on to state that financial resources have not been allocated to culturally competent practices, so effective programs struggle to stay open to meet the demands of its clients. The Chicago Times stated that August 1, in Chicago, one of the contributors to this study, Dr. Carl C. Bell’s clinic was closed down. Hundreds of patients on Chicago’s Southside will not have mental health care as of this week. Where will these patients go?

In a shrinking model for public healthcare there are no existing clinics or medical centers ready to absorb Dr. Bell’s patients, so their names will most likely join the list of so many under served Americans. My cousin works in mental health in Chicago and has been on disability after being injured by a patient earlier this year. Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s “decision to consolidate 12 city mental health clinics into six led protesters to barricade themselves inside a South Side mental health clinic. Only a few agencies in the African-American community are able to raise the level of private funds needed to help survive a serious financial crisis,” The Chicago Sun Times reported Monday, July 30.

“Who is going to give money to a black organization that is helping black people who are mentally ill, abusing substances, poor and sometimes slow?” Bell responds to journalist Mary Mitchell’s question.

“I had two MBAs on staff . . . but we’ve been doing stuff with no adequate funding for a good two years. We spent every nickel on patient care,” Bell said. His clinic, Community Mental Health Council, is in Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr.’s District, yet the elected official with public funds (tax dollars) can afford to go elsewhere for psychiatric care for his depression, while the “1,000 mental health patients dependent on the Community Mental Health Council” have nowhere else to go. Where is the justice in this, especially in a city rated number one for homicides and gun violence.

Dr. Bell’s hope is that the city will spend money to help his patients transition into a new program, that “the patient[s] [aren’t left] hanging. Let us close out our business in a way that is not going to hurt patients.”

The Statewide California Reducing Disparities Project is being looked at across the country as a model for responsive effective preventative care. Here at home, proper funding of existing programs is a must and development of other support mechanisms and models is also recommended. What is happening in Chicago is systematic of a healthcare model that leaves its most vulnerable populations, especially if they are persons of color, without care.

Of the four consensus statements to emerge from this national dialogue of forty-five experts from “a variety of relevant professions” the one I found really insightful was number four that “a significant number of the health and behavioral health conditions in African American communities co-occur with other socio-economic conditions. This is not new information, but I like that it was included. These co-occurring conditions” which are often called dual and triple diagnoses include “substance disorders, severe mental illness, HIV/AIDS, poverty, diabetes, heart disease, low income, unemployment, and homelessness. The presence of multiple conditions increases overall health risks, stigma, costs and health outcomes” (DRAFT Public Review Copy CRDP 215).

The Statewide California Reducing Disparities Project shows that African Americans health and well-being is not a priority for the State of California whether one finds oneself below or above the poverty line, with or without private insurance. The “everyone gets the same’” approach has not worked and will not work for us, if we are looking for “‘good mental health in Blacks and to sustain what is working on an individual, community and systems level” (DRAFT CRDP 232).

Again, visit http://www.dmh.ca.gov/Multicultural_Services/CRDP.asp to read the Draft Report and plan to attend the report back in your neighborhood when the show hits the road (smile).

Dr. Woods will be in Northern California on August 9, 2012. There are other meetings planned in Los Angeles County, the first August 14, and another in Sacramento. You can call or contact the African American Health Institute of San Bernardino County at www.AAHI-SBC.org or (909) 880-2600 to find out when Dr. Woods is coming to a theatre near you (smile).

To listen to the interview visit: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/wandas-picks/2012/08/03/wandas-picks-radio-show