Three Beautiful Things 07/23/2011: Purple Flat Top, Retirement, Saturday Breakfast

1.  I got started (again) reading "Purple Flat Top" and am finding it historically interesting and entertaining as a story.  The book has piqued my interest in the history of Chewelah, WA and the stories, of author Jack Nisbet as a man in his early twenties living in northeast Washington are fascinating and often very funny.

2.  I am very happy for a very good friend of mine whom I saw yesterday and who told me about retiring this coming November.  The boss doesn't know yet and so I'm keeping my friend's name to myself until it's all official, but it's really great news. (By the way, this is not anyone in the world of Lane Community College.)

3.  Two hundred forty men, women, and children came through the line yesterday at St. Mary's Episcopal Church for a free breakfast, a free breakfast offered every other Saturday at our church.  I managed to slip in a good conversation here and there as I served bacon and toast.  It was especially good to see D. again this morning.  He was a student of mine at LCC a couple of years ago.  He's a few years younger than I am. As when he was my student, he's still homeless.  He lives in his van with his son who is nearly thirty. (When D. was my student, he and his son lived under a bridge. He did his studies and wrote his papers at the public library.  It was all too much for him, though, and he left school.)  D. is getting a lot of help, trying (again) through rehab and meetings to kick his heroin habit and is getting professional help in coming to grips with the grief brought on by the multiple losses of loved ones to death in his life and the loss of his physical health which has, for years, kept him being able to do the work he did for many years before his life collapsed.  He's trying not to depend on heroin to numb his grief, but to live with his pain and get help with it.  I've seen him at two breakfasts in a row and his eyes are bright, his mind quick, and his good nature readily apparent.  These are good signs that he's probably telling me the truth that he's off the smack.