Downtown Brooklyn

Once in a while, when I have time, I like to take the bus from the beginning of the route in downtown brooklyn all the way to the end on my corner in Bay Ridge. Something about the long ride helps me think. I was in downtown brooklyn today speaking to Ben’s class of budding helping professionals overflowing with questions and eagerness. Afterwards I was going to join an environmental rally, but it was cancelled because we were badly outnumbered by hostile burly guys paid by the construction unions who booed when we raised our signs for a photo op. We could have done it anyway, but the optics would have been bad. With unexpected time on my hands, I decided to walk down to Atlantic Avenue and get the bus. On the way I thought about the changes in the neighborhood. Sid’s hardware, where I used to get lumber for my sculptures cut to size, long gone. The Board of Ed, where we did so many actions, some of which I told Ben's students about, converted into luxury apartments where I imagine the echo of Wayne Fischer declaring "People with AIDS are people too!" as we faced off against a siege of "christian" hate sometimes echoes softly in the halls. I passed the Quaker meeting house, where we embodied respect for the people with AIDS who came for meals by serving them like waiters rather than making them line up to have food dumped on their trays like a prison cafeteria. Then a little further and across the street from the Meeting House, the large imposing mauve building with steps, unchanged after all these years. St. Vincent's Children's Services. I hated that place. I don't know who decided that my mother and I should go there for therapy. As the "child" in a child welfare case, you have to sit in the chaotic hallway with the screaming babies and the sobbing people whose families are being torn apart and the legal aid lawyers trying to have private conversations with their clients by whispering in the corners. There are way too many cases for the number of judges, so it's a long arduous wait, knowing that your life is being decided on the other side of those doors. The therapist's office was in the slightly damp basement. It was a tiny room, jammed with furniture - couch, chair, desk. The therapist was a large woman, which added to the crowding. I sat as far from my mother as possible, but it was still too close. They had given up on keeping me in the group home by then, my ability to escape had flummoxed them, and a judge decided it was safer to send me home than to leave me on the run. This meant that I could not say anything. While my mother shot out words like daggers, I used the skill I had learned long before - keep the body still, do not react, and send your mind sailing out through the top of your head up into the galaxy. Because I was not there, I don't know how many times we did this, but eventually the therapist, who turned out not to be an idiot, realized what was going on and they separated us, sending us each to our own therapist.