Day: June 2, 2017

Maria and I met our friends Ed and Carol Gulley at the New Round House Cafe Friday night, both of us really needed to get out after a long and challenging week. Since so many of you contributed to the Round House in its long struggle to survive, and since the new care is more vibrant and welcoming than anything we might have imagined, I wanted to share it with you a bit.

A community cafe is very different than a franchise restaurant, or even a good local diner.

A community cafe is part business, and part labor of love.

Community cafes are not conceived only as profit centers, but as gathering places.

This sense of love and commitment permeates them.

Unlike most restaurants, community cafes are places where people to to know others and be known.

I am not fond of community eating tables, and don’t generally use them, but I grasp the importance of being known, even if I can’t be loved. That is the essence of community.

We need to pay for things in a community cafe, but money is never the point. Safety is the point, security and connection.

In my small town we cling to old and new values. We are all online, we all have our banking apps, but we all understand that the search for community is at the heart of the human experience. It is something every human being wants and needs.

In my own view, the lack of community is a kind of cancer, I can see it every day erodiing our political system and degrading our way of speaking to and about one another, just look online.

It is commonly understood in my town that we speak respectfully to one another, because we can’t escape from each other or hide behind our computers to hurt insults and crudities. I have made some friends at the Round House Cafe, settled some differences.

We know where to see each other, we know where to find each other, we have to be able to speak to one another.

The community cafe tonight, the New Round House – reminded me of my younger days in New York City, living in Greenwich Village, then a sea of community cafes. Every night, I ended up in a cafe, talking to friends and newcomers, sharing ideas in safety and finding connection.

There was that feeling in the New Round House tonight, the buzz of warm conversation, the sound of laughter of discussion, of friendly argument. I was sitting there for two hours before I knew it, and I thought, wow, Scott and Lisa have done it, they’ve done the impossible. Community cafes are supposed to be dying, not being reborn.

My town is defying conventional wisdom. Our independent bookstore is strong, even in a village of fewer than 2,000 people.

Tonight, I could see and feel it, this warm place, an open an inviting space. Maria and I shared one small pizza, it cost $13, was thin and healthy, we stayed for  hours and talked and talked.

We are grateful for this place, I was drawn back into time, sitting at the Cafe Wha at the corner of MacDougal street, where my apartment was and Minetta Lane. listening intently while a young folk singer named Bob Dylan got up shyly in front of a fading spotlight singing Highway 51, I think it was, I’m not certain.

He was a skinny, short figure with a lot of anger and feeling and we all knew he was something different something special, there was a white glow all around him.

Ed and I and Maria and Carol slipped into  a rhythm, trading stories, memories, ideas. It was a kind of ballet.

I loved those cafes, they made New York seem so small, we were so connected and known and safe.  And here I was again, at the other end of life, sitting in one. It was miraculous to have that feeling back in my little upstate New York town. I hope to spend man nights like tonight, an old man hanging out with old friends, telling tales and spinning yarns.

Community cafes are not just about money.

I went to the doctor’s today, mostly because if you have open heart surgery you are supposed to go to the doctor if you have the sniffles. The doctor was an elderly gentleman working part-time in the urgent care center in my town which handles colds and milder emergencies.

I went through all of the heart stuff, promised that I felt safe at home and was not the victim of domestic violence, and answered 100 questions about my heart, aches, sneezes and coughs. Life in America is getting complex, everyone is covering their behinds every minute of the day.

After much testing and prodding and deep breathing, the doctor said I had bronchitis, which would probably go away in a day or two. In case it doesn’t, he prescribed me some antibiotic medications, which I doubt very much I will take. I also got a tiny bottle of codeine – based cough medicine, which I enjoy.

I came home and mowed the lawn. The pollen set me off again, I think. Then I went to the Mansion with Red, perhaps the most healing thing I ever do. Watching Red and Maria on the porch, I was reminded of how much I have to live for, and how lucky I am.

My cough is still wicked but I got out to the new Round House Cafe with Ed and Carol Gulley. It is an amazing place, and despite some coughing fits, I feel I am getting better and stronger. We are taught in America to live with an abundance of caution,  and it is difficult not to be pulled into that whirlwind.

My diagnosis was life, and I love my life very much and wish to keep living it. So better to be cautious sometimes, I try to be kind to my refurbished heart. It has put up with enough from me.

Two formidable women, Goddesses both, are considering a joint creative project, crochet and fabric, a wall hanging perhaps. Someone sent Connie some patterns for knitting fish, and Connie is figuring out what to do with it. Maria has proposed a wall hanging that the two of the create together.

Maria is excited about it, Connie is thinking it over, she is always careful about undertaking projects, then quite often plunges in.

There was another connection happening in Connie’s room (you can see the air conditioner you all bought for her, the white stand in the rear of her room, it has made it possible for her to work again.)

Connie and Red have formed a powerful attachment. When Red was sick, Connie was also sick, she had to be evacuated by ambulance to another facility because of breathing problems, she was returned a day later. She and Red have not seen each other in a while, their re-union today was long and heartfelt.

Red is so at ease with Connie, they have made a soul connection.

Connie rubbed his back, brushed him, held his head in her arms and talked with him. He drank it up. Then Maria came up with this joint idea. I hope it happens, I think it will, these two strong and creative women love talking art with one another, why not make something together.

But you know how it is with strong and creative women. Nobody, least of all me can tell them what to do or would dare to try.

I was in the Battenkill Bookshop signing books today when a woman came in touched my should and asked if I was Jon Katz. I admitted my guilt, and she smiled and said she was a reader of the blog and wanted to know how to join the Army Of Good, if there was an application form or ID.

I said we were a grass-roots and truly populist movement, there was no list or admission requirements, anyone was in who wished to be in and donations and contributions were entirely voluntary. The idea, I said, was many people sending small amounts of money to do a lot of good.

This, I repeated, was our way of feeling good and grounded, and doing good, rather than arguing about what good is.

This is already a good week for the Army of Good, one of its warriors for good send a check for $1,200 to pay for a three day retreat at the Pompanuck Farm Institute for the members of the RISSE soccer team. (Maria and I will be helping with meals, she will lead a hike into the state forest, I will read scary stories by the campfire.)

And Summer the stray cat will be spayed and given her shots and get to come inside.

Several others have volunteered to help purchase a projector and screen for the RISSE refugee and immigration support center in Albany to be used in their adult and child classrooms. Maria and I are buying new jerseys for the soccer team, the team will be named the “Bedlam Farm Warriors.”

Today, another voluntary opportunity to do good. The Mansion is a Medicaid Assisted Care Facility, which is well and lovingly run, but which does not have much – any – extra money for frills or luxuries, and their funding and reimbursement is difficult and is apt only to get worse.

The residents live in an old Victorian mansion near the center of town, it sits on seven beautiful acres. But the residents have trouble using the beautiful grounds in summer and good weather, many of them have trouble walking on uneven ground or manipulating walkers and wheel chairs there.

We would love to help them get outside and enjoy the beautiful grounds.

Several residents and members of the staff have told me  they would love to purchase six or seven inexpensive plastic lawn chairs and one or two folding tables to bring outside to the residents could have picnics and parties and other activities outside on nice days.

The chairs and table would be placed right near where Red is standing, close to the rear, where they are building a new ramp.

I heartily endorse this project, one of the staffers and i were looking online and they have found several possibilities, one or two at a nearby Wal-Mart, one at a local hardware store.

The estimate is about $500, possibly a little less, depending on delivery, materials etc.

The table needs to be portable and plastic as well, for mobility and safety. Nothing that could cause splinters or is too heavy to move.

If you choose to help with this project, you can contribute in one of two ways. You can send a check to The Picnic Fund,  P.O. Box 205, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816, or to my Paypal account,  Friends and Family. ID [email protected].

For bookkeeping purposes, please mark any contributions to either PICNIC Fund, The Mansion. Thanks. I don’t wish to stress anyone financially, please do not feel any pressure to contribute, and if you do, do not be uncomfortable with small amounts. They add up quickly, and this Army seems to be growing.

And do not be uncomfortable sending nothing. I  remind you that you that the most important thing anyone sends the residents are letters and postcards and photographs, they are much loved, shared and read, over and over again.

They lift spirits and keep the feeling of human connection alive. The most valuable donations any of us give are are love and attention. In the Mansion, the residents no longer feel forgotten or left behind, and that is thanks to you.

If you wish to write them, here is a list of residents who would like to hear from you: Bruce, Allan, Sylvie, Jean, John Z, Tim, Ben, John R., Alanna, Peggie, Ellen, Joan, Brenda, Connie, Alice, Madeline, Mary, Barbara, William, Brother Peter, Diane, Helen, Jane, Dottie, Anita, Richard, Gerry, Charlotte, Arthur, George.

You can write the residents at this address: The Mansion, 11 S. Union Street, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816.

Some of the residents are not able to respond to your letters, but many do. I see the dog-eared stacks of letters by their beds and I see and feel their excitement when someone writes to them. July Fourth, the next major holiday, is approaching and that might be a time to think of them. They will have a party honoring the nation’s birthday.

Thanks. I am beyond proud at the good we have done, the arguments and anger of others are a gift to us and many more.

Summer’s month long campaign to make the Mansion her home is finally successful. The doctors have all cleared her for admission, the vet has checked her for ticks and fleas and taken her blood and will spay her shortly, the one resident who wasn’t sure about his cat allergies has agreed to give her a chance.

The staff was scrupulous about caring for her outside (the sign on the door instructors visitors and residents not to let her in) but this week went out and bought her a cat house and food bowl. Starting this week, she can come into the Mansion at night and when it is raining.

She has her favorite rooms – one is upstairs on a resident’s bed where it is peaceful and quiet, she also visits Connie and some of the other residents downstairs. She is fussy about her treats, prefers to sleep next to a human at night.

Thanks to the Army of Good, she has been thoroughly checked over by a vet, given her shots, pronounced healthy and is much loved by the residents, who are thrilled that three animals have come into their life – Summer, Red and soon, Leroy, hopefully my next therapy dog.

The one resident was understandably concerned about allergies, but the staff will vacuum and clean thoroughly, as they already do, and he is okay with Summer coming inside and has had no problems. It is not yet clear to me if Summer will be inside permanently or will come in and out.

She reminds of Flo, our barn cat, and she seems to pretty well do what she pleases. Mandy, one of the Mansion staffers, went out and bought her this house, but I predict she will not need it much, she has a big old house with lots of sofas and beds right nearby.

She also has some beautiful grounds to wander if she wishes.

In any case,  your money was well spent, and much appreciated. It went for Summer’s shots and blood work and tests, and there is still $186 dollars remaining to pay for her spaying surgery in a week or so. It would have taken the staff awhile to do what you all did in a day.

Every penny of your donations was turned over to Morgan, one of the Mansion directors, and she is making sure all of it goes to the cat.

This is a lucky cat, and he is bringing great joy to the Mansion residents. You made this possible, and thank you.