Update

Ok. So this isn't a story. But I figured some folks might be checking my blog to figure out what's going on with Bob. Here's what's going on. I left the LA Catholic Worker a couple weeks ago and drove back to Tennessee. Not all in one stretch, though. I camped along the way back. Had a lot of fun. Back in TN, I'll be teaching a couple sections of composition at the school where I got my undergraduate degree. (How I ended up teaching here is a story in itself.) But teaching those two classes probably won't be enough to keep me out of trouble though, so I expect to find some other things to do around here as well.

Bob's Summer Bookshelf

The LA Catholic Worker has a really cool library and quite a few of the books from it have made there way down to my room. Here's a list of books I'm putting back:

Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paulo Freire
(This one I borrowed from the Las Vegas Catholic Worker.)
Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee
God's Economy: Biblical Studies from Latin America Edited
by Ross and Gloria Kinsler
The Gift of Good Land by Wendell Berry
To Be a Revolutionary, an autobiography by Padre J. Guadalupe Carney
Reluctant Resister by Jeff Dietrich
Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark's Story of Jesus
by Ched Myers
Unveiling Empire: Reading Revelation Then and Now
by Wes Howard-Brook and Anthony Gwyther

I haven't even opened the Carney autobiography or Ched's commentary on Mark. But the others I've read bits and pieces of over the summer. Good books. In addition, I've read the The Biblical Vision of Sabbath Economics by Ched Myers - a small book but one that I'm still thinking about. I also read The Back Country, a collection of poems by Gary Snyder, and A Language Older Than Words by Derrick Jensen as well as poems from my Norton Anthology of American Literature and bits and pieces of Wes Howard-Brook's Becoming Children of God: John's Gospel and Radical Discipleship.

Yes I know. I'm a book nerd. I've pretty much accepted it by now. Feel free to e-mail me your thoughts on any or all of the books I've read. I think it's fun when people do that.

Oh! And I almost forgot a little gem that a friend from lent me called Love Poems from God: Twelve Sacred Voices from the East and West. I never knew Francis of Assisi wrote poetry and I was an English major!

The English Major

Well it's been over a month since I've posted. But I'm about to head home, so I figure it's about time to start writing down some of my experiences at the Los Angeles Catholic Worker.

The first time we went to serve beans on Wednesday night after mass, I met a lady who reminded me of my mother - about the same size and build. She looked like she might be a little bit younger, but she looked a lot more worn out. Yet she struck up a conversation with me and talked about how blessed she was. "Blessed?" I wanted to say. "You're living on Skid Row!" But her cheerfulness was unshakeable. She didn't have a home or a car, but waking up in the morning was a blessing for her.

The woman figured I was a student and asked me what I studied. "English," I told her. "Oh! I studied English too when I was in college!" she said. "Did you study English or American?" I told her I studied both. "Who was your favorite American author?" I didn't really have a favorite. "Mine was always Emily Dickinson" she told me. She must be smart if she liked Emily Dickinson. Dickinson's stuff can be pretty dense reading.

Later on when I realized that at the time I didn't want to have this conversation with a homeless woman. I am supposed to have conversations about what I studied in college with people who are successful teachers and leaders in the community, not people coming to get a meal on Skid Row. I guess I don't like to think that people who have the same background that I have can end up homeless. Maybe this is a way I unconsciously distance myself from the poor. The alumni magazine that my university sends out doesn't tell about the people who ended up sleeping on the streets. It wouldn't be good for PR even if these people were able and willing to tell their stories. But I suppose homelessness can happen to anyone.