We have one week left. Everyone is working hard, heads down. Fred and Ronzig are calling people for portraits and we have forgotten that this was the week for it. Lots of denial going on here! No-one is dressed for it, has combed hair. Oh, well. We are gorgeous anyway.
But the news arrives that one of the men had his bike stolen.
After he pays rent he has about 139 dollars left for food and sundries. He doesn't panhandle, sell drugs, or steal. In order to make the money he needs to live he does bottle runs. For this work he needs transportation. His bike.
He came in and tried to catch his breath. "Sorry, I'm late, have to finish this run.... I'll be back in 10 minutes. Can't leave the bottles here, in this neighbourhood they'll be gone in no time..." And off he went to cash them in. An enormous weight on his back, on his bicycle. The only means of transportation he has. He has been working hard, and his usual clean-shaven face has a few days growth on it.
He comes back and later goes out for a smoke and returns downcast. "My bike's gone." It had been locked up; not a particularly strong lock, it was inexpensive - what he could afford, maybe what had been given to him. He didn't seem particularly angry. Just needed to go and do the rounds to see if he could find who had taken it.
He has recently moved into housing and lives far away and has no transit pass. No way to do his bottle runs now. No way. No way.
Funny, but I find myself greatly angered by the loss of his bicycle. By the fact that he has such a small economic margin that we as a society have constructed and expect him to stay healthy and safe on. And I don't know if it is possible.

Ray was a bit late coming in this week. He didn't see me behind him and we almost collided - all 6 feet and 2 inches or so of him! And he was going a million miles an hour! Even in the heat! Full of apologies for being late he told of a couple of men who have died recently of overdoses. Men we have all talked to, men that you might have walked past on the street without a second thought. They were drug addicts. What does this mean though in terms of how we respond to others?
The roots of compassion are to suffer with.
com patior. To suffer alongside those who share this earth with us. This dusty dream. And yes, this past week Joe Fiorito commented about our work in a column Zooming in on city's homeless. And then he floored me by writing A snapshot of a life left behind. Thank you Joe. For your support and for just tagging along in your gentle, observant manner. Joe writes with such compassion. And patience. Another word that is related to compassion. I say patience because I believe it is a necessary quality that we need when we are looking at these problems and their solutions. We need patience but we also need action. We need to be patient when those with nothing are frustrated by a system that is eternally blocking their every attempt to be productive in their own lives. More on this later...

the writing work...

For the past two weeks we have been working on writing our stories. Making story boards and pouring over photographs while scratching our heads in the heat. The stories and photographs - this part, putting it all together signals a transition. We are coming to an end. No-one wants to stop. How to continue, she wonders to herself, late at night... Ideally we would have a solid base for our projects so that the work would not start and stop. So much is lost each time in terms of energy and education and critical mass. But there are gains with each project. Each time there is a shift and a learning, a teaching that is taken into the larger social system.

"Is it time for a smoke break, Nancy?" asks Bruce in his soft voice as he heads out the door with Ron and Jim and Kevin and everyone else. It is time for a smoke break. Bruce has been telling his story of how he came to be where he is, drawing simple blue lines to tell a story that is not simple. Though it is is a bit blue. Not wholly. I have been going through photographs with Jim, choosing multiple images that we will animate. On the other side of me Jean Guy speaks to the importance of the mental health system as it relates to staying in shelters. He tries to get me to take the pictures but I say no and we laugh. He will take the last shots that he needs. The process of drawing out the story boards is working well. We are recognizing the gaps in the photographs that we have, what we need to go out and take. We are all learning. And no, this is not a typical Photovoice process. There are many more iterations than you would normally have.

One of the guys is not feeling so well. His medication may have to be increased. There are so many delicate balances. He is glad that we are staying in today to work. Being outside with people would provide too much sensory stimulation. The subject of teeth arises at some point. It usually does. One of the guys has come in with a new smile. Another is desperate for teeth and he and his worker are fighting with the system to get him a set of teeth, to have proper dental care. He has lost weight that he can ill afford to lose. I worry. He is not the only person I see on a daily basis without teeth, suffering. He has had infections and has been trying to save the teeth he has, knowing that these are a basis for his health.

And on a another track dissemination has become a key word. It means that we keep going even when we are not in the field taking pictures, even after the people that Joe called the "provisional army of photographers" have dispersed. We (Erika, Jim, and me and Fred) submitted a paper about our last project to a journal today! After hours of fussing with an on-line manuscript submission system. It's done. And so am I, at least for tonight.