good wishes for 5776

Happy 5776! It is always a pleasure to follow the activities of Diane von Furstenberg, and the series on DvF is fascinating. I am thrilled to have been sent a copy of her memoir in 2008.

I was so thrilled to get a copy of the memoir by Diane von Furstenberg, after writing to say I was sorry for being so rude to Barry Diller whom I oft saw riding his bike in Central Park in the 1990s. I was usually involved in debriefing myself prior to my work then with homeless women havinguntreated psychiatric issues in a shelter we created. From 2008 through 2013, I shared the book and my critique of her memoir as a research method with my graduating seniors in my Methods of Research cours in midtown Manhattan. I also shared her memoir with my Columbia University School of Social Work students. The students generally loved the real life challenges and opportunities and themes! Many of my students work(ed) in fashion. I am always amazed how much love there is for DvF! Thank you!

Having once lived for almost 30 years between Horatio Street and West 39th street (including 488 7th Ave), I have known many garmentos, seen Ms Von Furstenberg and Mr. Diller. My first social work job was organizing small businesses for a coalition including the old Hatter's Union in the early 1980s! My comrade Gale Brewer is now the Borough President of Manhattan. We all admire DvF's involvement in the life and zeitgeist of New York City, and the world. I admire the hard work, so many demands, determination , and most of all the spirit of good will and caring, and bringing beauty in our world! These are rare qualities, thank you.I

I am now on social setcurity disability, homebound, and have to use a rollator to get around. I have been unable to really get around Manhattan since 2013 and have yet to even see the HighLine whilst spending years with a life on Horatio and Washington. I hope to soon enough. Thoughts for the future this first of 5776

40 anos despues Pueblo, Colorado State

Keep running into visitors from Pueblo and Denver, Colorado, spoke with my own Columbia alumni recently. I read that the school will host Daniel Hernandez, jr., a hero in the shooting of Tucson CongressMember Giffords, to speak.   Feeling bliss at having had such wonderful adventures in life. Wanted to get my thoughts from 40 years ago out to Pueblo:

Best wishes for the Colorado State alumni homecoming events. I follow the college activity on Facebook (alumni, football).  My Facebook friends include people from Colorado including Pueblo. This summer, in my Newark NJ apartment building, I have had frequent talks with a recent Pueblo graduate. I wanted to share some of my activity although I am not an alumni.

It is 40 years since I left Pueblo after my freshman year of college (1972-3). I graduated high school in Colorado and then my parents moved to New Jersey. I did not return to Pueblo  but lived with my parents and moved to Brooklyn, NY. In 1978, I graduated Brooklyn College, went to Columbia University for my Masters then started Phd at Columbia (comparative social policy). I am a social worker as well as an adjunct professor for decades with a range of college populations (international, lgbt, immigrant, first generation, primarily urban). I primarily teach Methods of Research to graduating seniors, and field instruct/advise graduate social work students. I am also an alumni of the International House, NYC where I had a fellowship whilst working on my Master's degree.

I loved my year at Pueblo although sometimes it may seem more romantic than it was (of course). I lived in the dormitory, volunteered on a crisis hotline, pledged Tau Kappa Epsilon, loved the sunsets and landscapes, and focused on being fluent in Spanish. I remember how so many of us were supporters of Native American organizing at Wounded Knee, SD that year. Students were going there in solidarity. I dated a Jewish woman and attended my first synagogue services in Pueblo. I visited the homes of various classmates during breaks and several actually visited me in New Jersey and Brooklyn. An endless array of stories to share far away from Pueblo which adds to the romance of those memories.

More recently, I helped a Colorado high school friend who was born in Pueblo with her crime novel set in Pueblo. This summer I met friends of a neighbor. The friends are all living in Denver,many are immigrants from Cote d'Voire. One of them is a Pueblo graduate and I have shared my photos and memories with her. She hopes to be accepted in Master's program in a New York City school. I have had over a 1000 students to teach and/or mentor, and she is certainly among the most ambitious. It has been a joy to hear her stories of CSU-Pueblo: international students, transgender students, her major (business), the environment, as well as how the campus has changed. No doubt I would be visually lost with all the changes. 

My year in Pueblo was particularly fascinating in my studying Spanish which is perfect to have in my social work practice. I recently had a graduate social work student who came to NYC from Los Angeles to be more fluent but I think my Pueblo year was better! I had a number of friends of Native American heritage and although we have the wonderful American Indian Community House, there was certainly a zeitgeist in Pueblo that year. I did not have the specific idea of being a social worker at that time, but I was particularly influenced by the kindness and intellectual lens of Professor June Hearn. One of my peers was active in organizing for lesbian rights in those early seminal years, she later became a lgbt lobbyist in Washington, all part of a 40 year history which now   includes marriage equality, etal in the past year(s).

 Thank you very much for reading through my email. I am not an alumni yet certainly have a rich diverse memory from just one year at Pueblo. I am also sending to the Social Work department to share my thoughts.

I look forward to following the college activities on Facebook.

All the best and thanks for your work!

Mike

RM

Caregiving revisited

In my bibliography:

Memoir is in the content analysis family and is an unobtrusive generally qualitative method of research. Qualitative meaning that the data is essentially non numerical in data collection and analysis. The variables are predominately nominal.

"The  Caregiver's Tale" is in my bibliography as Dr. Burack-Weiss was one of my Columbia University professors. She volunteered in a program that I helped to initiate, a shelter for homeless women who were non-compliant with psychiatric treatment.  She created a weekly group for women to talk about whatever. I am totally biased in terms of the researcher.  Dr Burack-Weiss has had a long history of helping through her work at the Jewish Home for the Aged, and being among the first volunteers at the Gay Men's Health Crisis. 

In her project, Dr. Burack-Weiss created the independent variables of caregiving situation and relationship out of an inductive process of reading through memoirs. I knew several of the memoirs and a favorite author Paul Monette was included in her sample. She has that heuristic sense of what works from the breadth and depth of her experience.  The hypothesis is that these variables inform the caregiving situation. The variables are nominal: how can one rank alzheimer's or AIDS, or a child with a neurological disability. They could be ranked perhaps in terms of cost, years to caregive, other variables, but as a distinct variable, the situations and relationships have no order. The memoirs have a detailed highly individual quality to them that gives meaning to caregiving and to the paradigm.

2013 reunion of our Vrboska, Croatia forebears!

Honorable Milanka Opacic

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Social Policy and Youth

Republic of Croatia

Dear Minister Opacic:

It is a pleasure to follow policy developments in Croatia. I am in the 5th generation of Vrboska, Hvar immigrants to the United States. II am a social worker and adjunct college professor with training in comparative social policy (masters degree and doctoral study at Columbia University, New York).

A friend and social work colleague does strategic planning for the Open Society in New York City. I follow the Open Society Mental Health Initiative on Facebook. I was impressed by the posting today. While a doctoral student, I spent much time in Zurich, Berlin and Rotterdam visiting agencies working with people with AIDS, substance use and mental health services immigrant and lgbt services. Open Society finances a number of initiatives on drug policy in particular.

 My undergraduate students  and my graduate students in NYC come from a broad swath of nationalities and comparative social policy is important to them. Students of mine have done internships in the Dominican Republic, Peru, Pakistan and London.  I am happy to share the website of your Ministry with the current cohort.  It is a joy to have undergraduates from Dalmatia in recent times.

This summer the family of siblings, cousins etal of my maternal grandmother  held a reunion. There are so many pages in the online family history book from the reunion showing much love and caring. I cannot imagine the voyage of our great-great grandparents with 7 children taking the boat to the United States and starting a new life in Chicago, Illinois. The family males made money diving in Lake Michigan and the Chicago River, some were musicians, and some ran a tavern (with a live bear). There are so many cousins which includes a Chilean branch, and a popular contemporary musician in Chile. What a legacy from little Vrboska!  For multiple reasons so many emigrants from Hvar, named "heaven" in a recent BBC series, into the world. 

I am happy to share an interest in policy and advocacy on mental health issues with my Mother. She was the mom of 9 children and found time to advocate for people. On her death she was given a memorial by the State of New Jersey for her advocacy. I made a short video on YouTube about her life.  The link is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQppEXGoSOk.  My undergraduates critique the video as a memoir qua method. 

Thank you very much for reading through my email. It is a pleasure to see the development of good services and know of the spirit of advocacy in your ministry. Thanks also to your many staff and colleages who are making a difference in the lives of others. It makes me proud of my Croatian legacy (25%, 75% Irish). 

Best wishes.

Sincerely yours,

Brewer for Manhattan Borough President 2013

dear Friends:

On my own initiative, I have to ask you to volunteer and/or contribute to the campaign of Gale Brewer for Manhattan Borough President. It has been a joy and a privilege to know Gale for several decades. Her enthusiasm, commitment, good ideas, follow through, leadership and love mark her as the best. In the sweep of time, I have had a life due to a meaningful lens knowing Gale. 

Decades ago as a Columbia CUSSW student intern, I negotiated a placement with the pioneering social worker in politics, Ruth Messinger. Gale was the Chief of Staff. Nowhere else could we have organized such an inclusive coalition and had actions such as sitting-in a local tavern marked for a massive rent increase, or doing laundry on the street to support another business. I think of the spirit of my social worker buddy, Hannah of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom, who always showed for a demo. She would be so thrilled to know Gale imagined and created zoning to protect some small businesses. This community organizing took place whilst college senior Barack Obama was in the neighborhood and I somehow just feel he signed one of our street petitions.

In my 9 years working at Citibank, it was a pleasure to hear the thoughts of Gale during her graduate work at Harvard, and at City Hall. Those late 1980s/ early 1990s were tough years since so many of my friends were dying from AIDS. I look at the photos of parties and see the faces of men I loved who are now dead. Gale was always at my parties and I see the face of my wonderful friend Frans from Rotterdam who is now dead and how he loved her. A photo of him is in one of her campaign videos. From the 1980s, we all advocated for civil rights first routinely denied, In my 1990s doctoral study, some of my research on lgbt families was received well, but my advisor oft decried there are no such families. Thankfully, in the spirit of my friends and their families, Gale has always been part of the advocacy with marriage equality in New York shining as a beacon to the world today.

When I moved to Newark in 1999/2000, I still campaigned for Gale in her first race for New York City Council. It was incredible to meet so many interesting people as well as to witness her natural rapport with people on the street. On election day, 9/11/2001, my first thought was to phone Gale as all transit was stopped due to the WTC attacks. For years I would share that "where were you moment" at the start of each of my college classes in Manhattan. My moment included being blessed to have had Gale and my Mom to purposefully phone that scary and significant day in our history.

I do not know all the issues particularly since I am such a Newark person now. As I think about Barack Obama, I may even disagree on some points, but they make tough decisions, have a heart, and I trust their judgments. Gale is one of those rare people who always has something positive to share about others. I know of her caring from many shared friends and experiences with Ellis, Susan and Gail, Wayne, Muriel, Hans, Ann Schwalbach, the Hunter Scholars, some of my siblings, and others just in need. What a wonderful life so many have had knowing the spirit of Gale.

As you can read, I no doubt have total bias. I love the spirit of her campaign and know that she will be the best investment. Perhaps you can volunteer just to meet fun, involved folks with passion for our future.

Thank you so much.

thoughts on how research happens

Paradigm and paradigm change are integral in research. In my Methods of Research bibliography is an Open Society Institute video on their drug policy advocacy around the world. 

http://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/voices/what-world-can-learn-switzerlands-drug-policy-shift

As ever one's  personal experience is just that, one's personal experience.  Most of my interest in drug policy has been in terms of clinical social work since 1982 with clients having substance abuse concerns. Caregiving as presented in the work of Ann Burack-Weiss has so informed my practice. I routinely refer to mindfulness as per Buddhist thought.

Policy is another lens. In my experience, luck has had it that I have known several drug policy advocates who are also tied to the Open Society. The first is a Swiss legislator who I visited in Zurich in the early 1990s and was then involved in the work presented in the Open Society video. I also observed the experiment to allow drug use in a Zurich park. My trips were in the time of my doctoral study in cross-national social policy, and I visited social work programs in Berlin and Rotterdam. 

Secondly, I have known the strategic planner for Open Society programs throughout the world and heard about initiatives since the 1990s. Third, I have done recent consulting with a drug policy organizer in San Francisco whose program is funded by the Open Society.

The work of these advocates as well as my lens as a social worker qua researcher are examples of how research can and does happen, and is utilized. The Zurich project initiated as action research  for real life social welfare activity and is presented as a case study video (case study is a method of intense focus on a case, group, community,  program or policy).  My friend at Open Society has put together resources around the world about drug policy, i.e, meta=research. The San Francisco activity is  case study and action research: the process of needs assessment and implementing solutions with real time evaluation feedback.

Thinking from the lens of Kuhn, paradigm shifts. Drug policy is changing as data analysis shows best practices from real life activity. There are many ways of knowing. 

Always da best! A wondrous spirit in our world.. Sindiwe Magona

The amazingly talented author/poet/social worker.. Sindiwe Magona. From International House, NYC to Columbia University (Faculty House and school), to the UN.

Clearing out thousands of photos. Love the lifes of Sindiwe Magona that I have been so blessed to witness! 

grateful for the love of my friends

Awe, grateful for my friends! Sent this pastel to my best friend for his birthday. He thought I did it for him and framed it. LOL.. love you! Told him though that it was #66 of 92 I made this summer. I have so many drawings from over 36 years, I forget the magic! I just love the colours, form and spirit.

Art in da magical summer 2011! #66of 92, pastel, telling a story, Newark NJ; 21 Aout 2011. Saying goodbye to the young adults leaving for college today! All the Best!!
summer of 2011 magical love, Newark NJ, creating some vision everyday! (primarily under 5minute pastels) I love colour!

OF COURSE, another bestest friend I have known over 30 years got a 8x10inch pastel for her birthday. I finally asked her if she liked my birthday card. She said it was OK but she had better ones from me! i love my Dean friend in adventures!
#15 of 92, machines of the corner market, June 30, 2011, Newark NJ

Thirty years social work.. September 1981

1981, September. From 1981-82, was elected the Columbia University School of Social Work Student "Newsletter Editor". This month I have been emailing with another grad who was the best collaborator 30 years ago! She is now a social work professor. I am sending her duplicate originals that I still have. So happy to have her to send along!!

Thirty years ago! Such paradigm shifts but I also see longstanding social work interests. Each month sections such as: legislative alerts, viewpoints, student caucus news, job info, resources, calendar! These are nuts/bolts in student life today. Legislative alerts, viewpoints, resources are critical in social work practice. Case to cause!

Thirty years ago, I see we were writing about Reagan... ugh, and "return to the Dark Ages". Very perceptive in light of the 30 years to that ideology resulting in the GOP nihilists of today.

Wow a lifetime of social work, Columbia, knowing wonderful committed people! I am grateful!

"How many white AIDS orphans have you seen lately?"

Happy Mother's Day weekend! A statement from a book reading about Mothers, dead from AIDS.


God Bless Sindiwe Magona.. a treasure in our world! Her comments at a book launching event in Johannesburg, RSA about ten days ago. Link to the press account. http://news.book.co.za/blog/2009/04/20/hivaids-angry-sindiwe-magona-holds-mirror-to-black-south-africa-with-videos/

I have known Sindiwe since 1980 when we were social work students at Columbia University. We are all buddies who live around the world now! Zurich, NYC, Penang, South Africa!

Emailed everyone the past few days and it is a joy to share Sindiwe's voice!

The posted photos are from 1992 into 1993. In 1992, I would meet
Sindiwe in the UN employee dining room. I was up for a job in the UN Secretariat. Sindiwe worked as a
Xhosa translator.
Her books were published in London by Women's Press in 1991. We decided to then have a book reading at Columbia University. Photos of Sindiwe and a CUSSW Dean, Muriel Reed when we were planning in October, 1992. Lastly, photos from the book reading in February, 1993. Wow what an event! Sindiwe also spoke at the start up of Dean Reed's scholarship fund at Columbia in 1999. The fastest growing scholarship fund at Columbia! http://www.columbia.edu/cu/record/archives/vol25/07/2507_SSW_Fundraising.html

In 1993, Sindiwe also spoke to my first college stint! the students loved her! These days in teaching research methodology, I use Sindiwe's books to illustrate memoirs. I read from her first book this week to the class. Later, I googled her and thereupon found the latest news! I will the YouTube share with my classes on Monday! They will be so awed by the words of this one person!

I feel so blessed to have known Sindiwe, her process and work! It is amazing and hopeful to know that such an advocate is being heard around the world! The biggest hugs and best wishes!

Susan Boyle inspired

thank you Susan Boyle for reminding me and the world of our humanity!

wowed like millions by Susan Boyle's performance, her story is so inspiring. Living in a little Scottish village, in public housing, 47 years, long term unemployed "but still looking", took care of her mother, who died in 2007. Susan felt she had to sing to fulfill the wish of her deceased Mom! A real life story of anyperson to fulfill their dream! The type of person one usually ignores and thinks not much of, too old, nor buffed, sharkish enough. She reminds me of endless people I have known in that song.. "I dreamed a dream". She wanted to sing to a larger group. She took the big leap to her dream and like millions, i am just blown away by the performance!

getting ready for another college reunion this weekend. thinking how the hundreds of us at Columbia with Barack Obama passed him by all the time and who knew that today, such an inspiring President!

so wowed by the inspiring stories! and that voice of an angel, truly!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9lp0IWv8QZY

many many big wishes for her success and happiness! thanks much for the happiness in your voice and story to share in our world! I know her Mom must be smiling at her from somewhere! We are all smiling at Susan! Love her simple waves of kisses to those she enthralled..... wow! I hope she gets to the end and performs for the Queen. I hope she is invited to meet President and Mrs. Obama! I know she will be offered many a big kiss!

hugs, peace, compassion

dating age, "not fat enough",,,

love happens between men of varying ages everyday. love happens at any age! thoughts of a couple of guys in their 50s now celebrating a year together! another couple, met in their 40s, now having their 15th year! Mazel tov!!!!

As a college professor (research, psychiatric content), Columbia U alum/teaching, 54 years old, and as a NYC/NJ denizen, I run into younger men everyday. it is interesting to realize the crushes younger men have on me as I am easy to confide in. My issue with younger men is that it is all too easy to manipulate the seductiveness. There is a power differential that I don't exploit, so I do not get involved with men much younger than 30 years (of course there could be one in 10 million...). Anyhow, 20 somethings always zone out... poor things having to deal with creating an adult identity! There is also the generational zeitgeist... I was definitely part of mine!

Photo of one of my grandfather buddies! Salut to grandfathers!!!

My whole issue now is how to respond to men in their 70s who routinely send me shouts online! Younger men are a breeze to deal with but as we live longer ... dating men in their 70s? I look to see life views (no republicans of course), some geographic nogos.. I have no interest in Florida, Georgia, Texas...too republican and HUMID! I look for a joy of life! Some of the sexiest men I have chatted with online are studs in their late 60s!

all of these age issues are in constant flux of course. All of a sudden, I am over 50 which is in itself a whole other lens changer. Being over 50 years, I feel I have achieved longevity and not too concerned with so many of the usual stuff younger men are caught up in. I wear what I want, express my thoughts with a historical and intellectual certainty just from the experiential awareness of how society has changed. I may use a cane at times, but i was a go-go boy, never had to wait in line to get into a club, had radio shows, had my black chaps/white 501 attire that made me fierce! I have had an adult identity for 30 years! There is a whole gap that I feel ultimately with guys 20 or 30 years younger than me. I dont have that for men older than me. I generally find most of the men I like older than me are in long term relationships and I am ultimately not interested in just a casual sex thing.

I have been in love but i am also a survivor of the AIDS plague. Everyone of my buddies from the 1970s and most of my contemporaries from the 1980s died before the advent of the new meds in the 1990s. So I am just amazed that I am HIV negative and living with the memories of over 3000 buddies. My favorite men all died. I have never been entirely single, having a partner or then a regular date(s) my entire adult life.

I am a NYC flaneur so I dont stay home with a pet, my tv is broken, and I like being out of the house to socialize. I have always been involved in what's up at the time. In the 1970s, I was in NY, SF, Provincetown, a gogo boy (background dancer in jeans on a cable show) and part of the whole gay revolution. Into the 1980s, I was a Saint/Garage/Palladium club goer; then spent most of my free time in Berlin, Amsterdam, Zurich and Paris as I had the friends to visit and money to travel often. in the 1990s, I was so involved in NYC life... working with the homeless, people with AIDS; and in my personal life, somedays up to 15 men would phone me in a day to hang. There are so many men but I have been content (sometimes to my detriment) to be fairly serial monogamous. It is in the last few years time to mostly teach/read/think. the realization that there is always another man (in the elevator, around the corner...) when I hear "too old" "or too young" or "not Black" or "not enough money for me", or "not fat enough". And that is what I generally tell men of every age, color, size who complain about rejection.

I am alive, engaged, and enjoying life's adventures! My favorite friends who changed our universe are all dead, young. Young men have a seductiveness but I have seen thousands burn out, go Republican, get wierd. These days I am beyond thrilled that we have a President Obama who has already given gays a lot! If I was 10 years younger I would be applying for a White House job (I did apply to the Clinton White House). So, if someone doesnt want to know about me.. who cares! I have a life is my mantra! Loving the challenges as I do get older and my perspectives change about dating, age, life!

hugs, peace, compassion

college life

Easter Monday.. back to work in the USA! If anything life in the USA is "where are you working?" in teaching college part time it is confronting the reality of the all encompassing work!

Thoughts from reading a range of blogs about college life. For many college students it is about juggling college and work. In my undergrad experience, I first had dorm life, then a job that paid for my tuition, then I finished college by having a roommate and being poor all the time! Here I am poor at the time, skipping class.. it had to be social psychology as I still dream that I missed class, an exam, and I have a paper due. (photo at Riis Beach, May 1977). The bus to the beach was at the end of the subway line at Brooklyn College. What a joy to go to the beach that hot May 1977!

Thoughts from the blogs...
students have problems focusing.... in meditating one tries to get rid of all the samsara of life. it is just hard to be focused, one trains oneself to do that. For 20 somethings there are hormonal and developmental issues still going on. I forever look at 24 year olds and see the zoning out. It is normative. Students often need to be kinder to themselves. Work work is generally immediate satisfaction and concrete.

On the other hand, one needs to prioritize. once again I have students who are away this week on vacation since their kids are out from school; or students cannot concentrate on reading but went to a concert on the weekend and had the best partying!

complaints about the adjuncts... colleges are businesses and full time professors are managing research grants or consulting contracts that bring dollars to the university! University professors will have graduate students, dissertation candidates, etc. It is the academic environment. I can understand some complaints but then again there is student grandiosity that involves thinking that one is so intellectually gifted one should be with the best.... allegedly, full time professors. Some of the best teachers are adjuncts or junior faculty. LOL, I know a whole number of the older generation of professors who slept with their professors to get their jobs. It was not about intellectual work. Once again, college is a work place. There is still who one knows! The "best" students will generally get some research or seminar projects. But, most students are not intellectually gifted. I visited one of my undergrad sociology professors in the 1990s. She was impressed with my graduate work and amazed that I never had any special projects in college. I have my intellectual gifts but I was an art major in college and spent all my time making art. As I said... I had that nightmare of the social psychology exam/paper for years!

I also loved Columbia because I loved the whole environment! The differing schools, the International House, the library! whoa what a library! The continuing abundance of lectures, workshops, the dynamics of a university in the city! So a perfect graduate school! Interesting to read another blog about out of town students fussing about the greatness of NYC. Wrote back that there is great diversity in NYC as it is a Babylon. Students often visit from their college which reflects the class/race/ethnic stratification in much of the US. Why should colleges be any different? People come to NYC for the opportunity as well as to get away from intellectual & social conformity; as to Chicago, Los Angeles....

Maybe 30 to 34% of students graduate from accredidated colleges (not Bible, mail order, online). Any business can say it is a college.. but is it accredidated? Will the credits transfer? The majority of Americans now go to college but also do not graduate. High school drop outs/age outs go to community colleges to finish their GEDs. I applaud my graduating seniors that it is an accomplishment that they are graduating! The last semester may be tough but it is all in their heads.. they are just almost there! Of course, one graduates and then everyone wants to know what "big" job will one get? College is not linked in with the overall labor market policy in this country. But one gets a diploma which will not be taken away. Jobs come/go and one's work performance is but one variable in a workplace. A college degree is a lifetime achievement!

I love teaching part time. I also like a regular job for the day to day interactions and normative reality of it. Teaching can be too isolating for me. I have no big interest in full time academic life because I like the bustle of worklife. I am like many social workers who teach part time in lieu of having a private practice. The students always add a dynamism to my intellectual life. Of course among social workers I also hear how research was their worse experience! I have always loved reserach. But I find my own projects to be too bohemian for normal science. My photos, altars, blogs, memoirs are more literary than social science. I have also always seen myself more as an organizer than a clinician although I have great clinical skills. I like being Professor... and never think of being Doctor.... I liked doctors until I started working with them.. but that is another blog....


hugs, peace, compassion

Oster, April 1990 Vierwaldstatter See, CH

happy Easter! Photos from 1990... boat ride on the Vierwaldstatter See from Luzern to Burgenstock and back. What a good trip with my Zurich amigos!

impossible to answer but tried to give a list of my favorite books on a site..... so many favorite books. as a college professor I have spent 30plus years reading, recommending, creating curriculum. A recent favorite is Istanbul, by Pamuk! Wow such history, perspective, a good story of growing up! Prior to that was Pankuj Mishra's An End to Suffering. (I am such a NYReview of Books junkie).

My all time favorite gay book is Becoming a Man, by Paul Monette! Whoa what a story... the best yet! Another Country by James Baldwin has to be the best NYC novel ever!

my long time favorite social perspectives are by the iconics such as: Richard Hofstadter, C Wright Mills, Peter Gay, bell hooks, Sindiwe Magona, Ann Burack-Weiss all being other Columbia University faculty/grads. Havent read President's Obama's memoir, but as an alum, I instinctively understand his perspectives. (My first college years & degree in art from Brooklyn College and then time at the NY Art Students League, so love Lee Bontecou, Sylvia Stone, Pearlstein...). In the last year or so, I have mostly religiously read endless issues of Art Forum so I am also a bit out of the literary au courant news!

I know a bunch of authors/publishers/editors so biased towards their works. love the Harry Potter series... (no one predicted Arthur would be the publisher! whoa) I wrote a letter to the Diane von Furstenberg crew , they replied with her book! What a fast good read!

love the classics such as Dante, Freud, DW Winnicuit, deTocqueville, Marx, Habermas, James Joyce, Agnes Smedley, Pema Chodron, Georges Simenon!

I am busy working so I am gathering my next reading list... Bolano, Nathalie Serraute.... Every 5 years or so, Ihad a year to just read all who I have to read. in 2002, I read Dante, Saint Augustine, the Tibetan book of living & dying, then James Joyce! I will die before reading it all but maybe I have some clues to the next life..( ?)

hugs, peace, compassion

Salut Ides of March

Salut to the Ides Of March! Does feel like the start of a new jahre (Roman calendar of Julius Cesear times)!!! This winter in NYC/Newark was cold all the time. I think the temp was 22f everytime I heard a weather report. Of course it did get warmer but that 22f was a constant! ugh

Happy Birthday to my nephew.. who is 27jahre today! I certainly remember the day of his birth.. my roommate told me.. "you are now an Uncle!" My parents always wanted a sports star.. and they got him in their first grandchild.. signed to play minor league baseball on his graduation from high school! Frequent news photos and stories of his accomplishments in the hometown press! Many kudos to him for doing it!

Hoping for a good jahre ahead! For once in my life I am trusting our President! He just feels so familiar.. the Columbia U connection, community organizing, progressive politics, changing the lenses! I do think that the administration's work is making a difference. The corporate media, in particular, is yet to process the historical change. The tired ways of looking at phenomena through their alleged bipartisan, jaded lenses is jarring. NBC had Meet the Press and wierd questions from the moderator such as ... didnt McCain say something similiar in the campaign and was beaten up?... Then, Eric Cantor with the ridiculous spin of the Disney to Vegas train. Can only wish we had trains like other advanced industrial nations. The election was seismic, things have changed, and we would be in a twilight zone if the Republicans had won. So this wierd bipartisan... of course, the media is big business and many of the boys did make out in the Bush years. CNBC has certainly shown its colours.

Matt Lauer on Today got on my nerves with his harrangue of Michael Phelps and marijuana. Like my nephew, a young man, worked hard in sports, and accomplished a great deal! In Phelps case, he also has cognitive issues (ADHD) which can hamper one's judgment at times. The real culprit is the one who set up that cellphone photo. I am not buying Kellogg's for awhile. Matt is another generation and time frame. Being around the same age it is hard to accept that what one knows now is not where guys 30 years younger are at.

happy new year! (Roman)
hugs, peace, compassion
Happy Happy Birthday

backtrack to Purim

posting the pages of an invite to a fundraiser held in 1984 for klezmer music. Great music for Purim! I was on the event committee, organized by a NYC family foundation, predominately supported by employees of a leveraged buyout company. The company officers were all Harvard MBAs and the company was their endeavor. (I declined going into the Harvard MBA program as I had just finished my Columbia MSW degree in 1982). The family foundation was run by the CEO and his wife. They lived on East 82nd street doors from the Metropolitan. We usually met with committee members at the Stanhope Hotel around the corner.

Such a festive event! great music! excellent food. There was a pre-concert dinner of Moroccan food at a committee member's home. Nice apartment... 111 East 63rd St... close to today's infamous Bernie Madoff! I had written down Madoff's address but misplaced it as I knew the address was somewhat similiar. The hosts of the dinner moved south in 1986 and I didnt stay in touch. A really lovely family! They were very involved in NY Philharmonic fundrasing.

The concert took place at the Americas Society on Park Avenue. This November 2008, the Lenox Hill Neighborhood House held a klezmer music soiree but don't remember the performance spot. I was going to fax this 1984 invite to the assistant exec director just for fyi... I worked for Lenox Hill in the 1990s at the Park Avenue armory program (down the street from the Americas Society).

The fundraiser made some money although not sure of the results as in 1985, I was recruited to work for the NYC Board of Education to help create new social work programs. I didnt stay in touch with the foundation until the 1990s when I heard the couple had broken up, the foundation closed.

In 2009, I am amazed once again by how busy I was in the 1980s! But also over time the different meanings which locales and places have. In 1984, I paid no attention to the Park Avenue Armory. In 1985, I went to a fundraiser for the Nation magazine there. Ran into some Columbia professors which was great fun! Watched James Baldwin and Gordon Parks smoke cigarettes and drink at the bar! Who knew I would be working in the armory 11 years later! It is almost ten years that I have walked the streets of the UES (although I zoom through on the 6 train to the Bronx a lot)

hugs, peace, compassion

back to normal.... funding UN programmes

Kudos to the Obama administration for restoring funds to United Nations programmes such as the population fund. Research has always shown that money given to help educate women, provide better health care, and give women reproductive choice stabilizes people's lives, their communties and ultimately our world. http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=30164&Cr=population&Cr1= It is a joy to see science replacing a particular narrow ideology in this new administration!

thoughts again on women who have enriched my life. Spoke with my Lakewood Colorado high school buddy anoche. He spoke how the girls just loved me as I would listen to them opposed to many of the guys. His memory is that the hot girls all liked me and he was jealous! I really dont remember any of that. I vaguely remember high school actually and would love to know who all these hot girls were! lol. Of course, I was 16jahre when I graduated and then my folks moved us to NJ the December after my graduation. I just remember hanging with my buddies at the drive-in, or driving into the foothills or prarie.

It has been one of my strengths to know people from many backgrounds. I wouldnt be a social worker if I wasnt interested in hearing people's stories. I am blessed to read all of my college students' essays on a myriad of topics. Having clients/patients has been fascinating! I am always amazed by what and how people process and think!

An Oster card sent from women who meant much to me (1999 photo uploaded). Listening to older women. I usually focus on grandfathers though as I am of that age where my peers have that status. But, I do know many grandmothers or woman of that age. Always a blessing to get cards which I save. Since my Mom's death, I have particularly thought about grandmothers. I spent 50 some years with my Mom but my nieces/nephews will not have that luxury. My Mom loved her grandchildren much! I know how much she was loved by her father's mother.

The caption in the photo montage is from Andrea Bocelli (the voice of an angel!!) as my remembrance of the women who have now died. "I already hear that she can hear no longer: in silence, she went to sleep, she has already gone to sleep". Thanks much for the memories!!!

peace, hugs, compassion

Turk thoughts March 08, 2009

President Obama is making a brilliant decision to visit Turkey this April after the G20 summit in London! Turkey is one of the countries that I look at in keeping some paradigm about the world. I have known a number of Turks over the years, and I read theorists who see Turkey as that bridge between the Europe and Asia.

1987 pastel of a graduate school friend from Columbia University. She and I would pal around a lot. She came with me to visit my Mom and siblings one holiday. She came to a Citibank company picnic with me one summer. We were residents at the International House. She worked in television. She was one of the political refugees from the Turkish Army coups in the 1970s. She came to NYC from Paris. One of the many who could not go back home. Dunno what happened to her... she moved to Queens and we lost touch.

This past year I read Orhan Pamuk's Istanbul! Wow, such a fascinating read! A book I lived through, looking up references online, looking at my own memories in other ways. A fascinating book.

From my SIPA days, I have thought about the end of the Ottoman empire and the absence of a muslim political entity in international politics. The Ottoman empire was cut up into pretend nations by the European powers after WWI. Today we have nations such as Iraq, almost 100 years old, part of the Ottoman empire for centuries, and still the power vacuum. The whole mideast and the Muslim world does not have that power it had as an international broker for centuries. We have yet, as a world community, to figure that power gap out. Today, we have Iran versus Saudi Arabia, orthodox versus modernists say in Lebanon, and the sad legacy of no resolution for Palestine.

I think it quite astute that Open Society aka the Soros Fund, has an office in Istanbul. Turkey plays a significant role by its years of brokering as a NATO member and part of other multinational relationships. Not only the Ottoman legacy, but also the years of Turkish emigration in the EU. The Turk presence particularly in Holland and Germany. I am quite pleased by Obama's decision!

peace, hugs, compassion

Zeitgeist for March!

photo of the WTC PATH concourse on Friday. The glass buildings rising and seemingly melting into each other are just stunning! Love all that glass! The PATH is always an easy ride. I took it maybe 2x in all the years I lived in NYC. Very easy commute into lower Manhattan!

spent Friday revisiting my old 1970s neighborhood.. Park Slope, Brooklyn, from my time as a Brooklyn College student. My life as an art student! Got off at Grand Army Plaza.. what an elegant stop. The limestones, doorman buildings, the park settings. I could only wish Branch Brook Park was as user particularly pedestrian friendly. Sat for a bit by the subway stop to watch the coming/goings on Flatbush Avenue. Thoughts of my times in all of the surrounding apartment buildings at parties or just visiting. In general I would always run into known folks in that Grand Army Plaza stretch in my 1970s years as well as during my six months stay in 1994-5. Didnt recognize anyone but...
I did run into a worker from the Park Slope Food Co-op. He has a vest with the co-op named and was helping a member bring packages back! Wow, they even help deliver now! I was a member when he was born, 1977. In those days we climbed up a huge staircase and trudged our groceries down those steps.... Wow what a legacy that co-op has! That was the best food place! Wow!

met up with my long time buddy and his partner living on Prospect Park West. Now those are some elegant mansions! The Brooklyn Gold Coast! Outside their mansion the crocuses and other plants are coming UP! I saw the buds on the trees! And, a the gorgeous apartment! Great deck although very windy in the Slope. Great view through the front windows across Prospect Park. Didnt see many people but did recognize some of the park paths I would walk. The best lunch.. Chinese oranges, chicken and lots of broccoli. All my favorites! I love my Chinatown shopping trips with one of the guys.. the best vegetables, tea shops, and Pearl River department store!!!

interesting chats as ever. Their daughter does so well in her new job as a researcher! I am jealous... I love research, statistics, etal! What an opportunity for her! One of the guys is looking for a job after he took a buyout from his company. I pitched him in January to one of the Sulzberger family, another Columbia alum. LOL.. as if the NY Times is hiring. But the family person was so sweet to me... I have to send a thanks. Anyhow, my buddy is so focused and has had such a work history. He is doing some fascinating consulting and I will be phoning him for celebrity gossip again. But most interestingly, the guys had met with a Canadian lawyer about emigrating to Montreal. Seems that the NY lgbt center set up informational sessions for people wanting to emigrate in case the Republicans had won again. Same sex couples have legal rights in Canada and the government has been helping couples emigrate. A small but significant brain drain! My friends rank at the top on the immigration priority list, but thankfully Obama won! Wow, in retrospect it would have been a nightmare if those psychopathic Republicans had won.

the best IRT ride home although delays. Not as many commuters seemed to get on at Wall St but maybe that was just my hunch what with the layoffs. I would have gotten off downtown to do my flaneur thing but it was raining. I hate sitting inside when I just want to walk about.

end of February and now the zeitgeist for March! so many interesting memories. great times with a buddy I have known almost 30 years. despite the dreariness in the media on the economy, I feel really positive about our futures! Salut to Marz, Mars, March!!!
hugs, peace, compassion

academic transparency

intrigued by the NYU takeOver (VillageVoice feed photo shown). I followed tweets, saw the student website, watched YouTube videos, checked NY One! Not clear about all of the demands but the transparency issue is real. not pleased by the NYU tyranny in putting down the take over. I have seen NYU become a corporate behemoth over time. Just the take over of the East Village for student housing. Amazing that they charge over $1000 a month for a student to share a dorm! A tax-exempt group which has benefited from City policy to expand dislocating many working class people in the process.

spoke with someone I know 30 years on the phone. He asked why do I know some wierd people.. talking about a divorcing couple I know. LOL! thoughts of how people just buy into myths, or drink the koolaid! I am always amazed by the myths... well God bless him! Wealthy people have problems but their wealth can screen others from knowing what is up. In the 9 years I did corporate affairs for Citibank, I saw enough late night black cars bringing in drunks who were helped out of the cab by the doorman and whisked upstairs in the elevator by the maid. Actually I started my doctoral studies as I was so bored by the endless partying and greediness in some of that life. Anyhow... Richard Hofstadter and C Wright Mills wrote on the phenomenon almost 50 years ago!

The same issues of myth in academia. The power of institutions to gatekeep as well as accredidate. Mostly the personal stories one encounters... Nasty evil divorces ... at least 5 families where the professor dumped his wife and deserted the children for a wealthier spouse. Married DL gays and lesbians. A famous couple espousing liberal causes everywhere and then their behavior ridiculing their gay son.. their embarrassment. The wife of a professor locked away in a psychiatric ward who used to phone the college looking for her husband. He had a wealthy student paramour. Thankfully, there are now ethics laws that one cannot date one's students. All paid big bucks despite their questionable behaviors. 95& of us would be fired, in civil court, and/or harrassed for similiar behavior. Some of these stories go back to the 1970s, many of these people are now deceased, but they were gatekeepers!

I think of these things in terms of the realignment going on in the US and world economy. The power of the wealthy and privledged to do what they want is manifest. I also always think of someone listed among the 50 most powerful bankers in the world.. a really lovely woman who has spent so much time helping others over the years. Generally committed academics, but then those who slept and clawed their way up, as in many career paths. So, as in the case of the phone converser.. people can be wierd.. it is just they may not share their truth or one can be blinded by the socalled status. From years of working with clients, people tell others what they want them to know.. it may or may not be what is called reality! And of course, just using basic critical thinking but then again maybe 30% of Americans have an accreditated college degree and logic may have only been an elective.

I dont know much about NYU. Sadly I mostly remember the wierd stories. I supervised several students from NYU. I flunked one. She was all caught up in the importance of "being at NYU" but did little work. I know several faculty.. one was a professor who in the 1970s spent her agency time exposing lesbian mothers and bringing them up for immoral behavior at Family Court. I was working with disabled children at the time, and all of us workers hated her. Times have changed.. she now hangs with the lesbian NYU faculty. Another NYU grad, now teaching at a NJ college, went to NYU as she was not accepted at Columbia for being anti-social. She was a big boozer and slept with more men than I can remember in those wild 1980s. A friend worked in Columbia admissions and had had a verbal fight with the candidate at her admissions interview! Now that was good interview style! Today, she is married to a WallStreeter, suburban, presents the highest of bourgeosie appropriateness. Mostly though I really know little about NYU as I was involved in my alma maters.

Anyhow... what is life...
series of challenges and dealing with the ambiguities along our path to fulfill our true will (if we figure that out!) I never had a professor I wanted to date... LOL. As an art student, i spent all my time making art and had an intense personal relationship. in social work school, I had a political placement, fellowship at the international house, editor of my college monthly newsletter. Whew! Today, I am too superEgo'd to even think about dating a student.. students need to go through their own life process.. I am just one person on their path and one hardly needs to go through my dramas! Of course every semester I have students who have their "crush" on me but I know that 2 months after the grades are in I expect to rarely hear from the student again!


I value academia highly. I love teaching research, ethics, but I also have a social worker mentalite of respect for ethical practice. There is a parallel process in teaching. I evolved into teaching as an outgrowth of my work as a community organizer and as a direct services worker. I had no college guidance in high school nor from my parents. I wound up in Brooklyn as I did not want to go back to Colorado and got a free rent job renovating brownstones and CUNY was free! Brooklyn College was great as I loved making art there! Columbia was so intellectually interesting and I got scholarships! In my PhD time, a professor told me I read too much! I had never really read the classics and history. I had no college mentors in terms of an academic life. My studies were very project oriented. Anyhow, I can understand Barack Obama and his mentalite, being another alum. I know he must have signed one of my petitions in those thousands of petitions!!!

I hope that the students and admin find a way to discuss. I do think that the transparency issue will be on the table as the costs are out of control. This is a time of great change and I think the university is but one to see changes. There will just not be the money to continue the costs! I hope that there is respect and a dialog that makes change happen albeit....

peace, hugs, compassion