Month: June 2006

This morning I noticed a pile of wood and rubbish outside of Dave’s Seafoods’ front door. Gives me a bit of hope for the future as that is a sweet corner for any sit down coffee place.

According to the Washington Times, the city may consider making double parking legal. My response, no, no, no. Bad people, bad.
I’m thinking the law of unintended consequences. Imagine a church, they have a parking lot, or a hunk of land where cars park. Ya know if the city is starting to allow double parking… Sell the land, or throw up an administrative or mission focused building instead. It would take away the incentive for places that have responsible parking policies to remain responsible. More so if those places are near to others who have their irresponsible parking policies catered to by the city.
Before anyone says it’s just a few hours once a week, let me just say that some churches are more active than others, and the bigger the church the more activities. You’ve got early morning service that may be at 7:30 or 8AM. Then there is the regular time service at 10 or 11AM. Between the early and the regular there is Bible Study or Sunday School. The regular service can be over 2 hours long, depending on the domination and or if any baptisms are occurring that day. So you could have parking problems from 7:30AM till sometime after 1PM. Almost 6 hours during the day.
And under fairness would any other non-profit or a business who has peak business for 6 or so hours once a or twice week also be eligible for double parking? If the restaurant and bar owners got together and said, “hey we need more parking on Saturday night from 9PM to 2AM!” Would they also get a concession?
You know what would be helpful? A study. No keep doing what ever you’re doing ’cause I wouldn’t want to delay things for the sake of a study, but a study would help. Get the location of every single church, mosque, temple, meeting house, coven and what religious have you and map it. Find out when are their peak times (Sunday morning, Friday night, Saturday sundown, Wednesday night, etc). Map where people double park in mass (regardless of assumed reason). Detail (size, DC/MD/VA tag, if DC what ward)what cars are parked in and what cars are blocking, and for how long/ when. I’d bet that you’d find that most religious places of worship practice responsible parking practices by having parking lots and more or less respecting the laws of the city during their peak times. And where people are double parking en mass, are near a few large churches, making up a small percentage of the District’s whole worship population. A large number, maybe not a majority but a large number, of double parkers are from one of the surrounding states, possibly followed by DC residents from various Wards. A majority of the blockees would be DC residents, if there is regular parking on that street. But that’s my guess.

Wednesday’s posting sparked a fair amount of discussion. And maybe some of us come from different backgrounds different experiences, and thus a different point of view. I really don’t tend to have these discussions with my close friends. Mainly because my close friends share the same working class background (‘cept Nora) and sometimes part of the family drama that we left back home includes members who would be classified as poor. There is no need, or desire to dwell on their condition, and it may result in no desire to dwell on it here with non-family members.
To check what my background was I gave mom a call yesterday. “Poor, lower-middle, lower-middle, well compared to my family, poor,” she said. I asked her what she considered herself now. “Lower-middle.” I would call my sister to check her status but that seems a little mean. She lives in public housing.
From my aunts and uncles to my own family the American Dream, or at least parts, have been available. In some it has been lived out, struggled for, and in cases, achieved. My grandparents were North Carolina sharecroppers, my aunts and uncles went to college, putting themselves through with a mix of summer jobs, scholarships, the GI Bill and other support. Mom unfortunately mom didn’t go to college, so she didn’t go forward. From my point of view my aunts and uncles lead comfy middle class lives, and were able to provide for their children and put them through and keep them in college. Coming from the poor/lower-middle range with a combo of scholarships, loans, grants and emotional support from my parents (who mind you, didn’t save one red cent for my education) I was able to go to college. With college and then grants to go to grad school and then taking out another loan and working part time to go to grad school again, I am the woman I am today. So you have two generations that have raised themselves up.
In my background are friends and family and people I went to school with, with their own struggles. I compare notes with other friends who have similar intimate characters in their background. The movement from one situation to another, from poor to middle class is not theoretical, when it is observed closely over time in the lives of people we know on a deep level and in our own lives.
That upward movement is not easy. It takes something inside to persevere and fight, as well as opportunites that society provides. America is the land of opportunity. Pell grants, state colleges and universities, small business loans, programs for first time homebuyers, FHA loans, Vet benefits, tax incentives, social security*, etc provide just some of the opportunites. I am so lucky to be born here.

*Yes, the program will be gone by the time I get 65 but it frees up parents and their siblings from having to directly support 100% my grandparents’ living expenses. I hope that it will remain solvent long enough to support my parents, so I (and maybe my sister) won’t have to deal with all of my parents elder care expenses.

Chatting with another resident, he mentioned that he used to have certain beliefs or ideas about poverty, crime and such but then he moved here. It is one thing to see people from the comfort of your car as you drive back to your homogeneous neighborhood, pass people of different social classes in those brief encounters, or hear about situations on TV or read about it from journalists, it is another when you have to live with the diversity of people and ideas and not on your own terms.
Poverty takes on a whole different dimension when you live next to or on the same block or around as people you would describe as poor. Your encounters with the homeless are not in a soup kitchen where you are volunteering or a fund raiser. Your relations with people who struggle financially are deeper because they are your neighbors. In some strange way you may be forced to relate to them as equals. Appreciate them, be annoyed by them, and they with you, as equals. No distant pity here. And I think equality is a good thing.
Prostitution seems to be a victimless crime to some people but when it is in your back alley it really isn’t. I have heard, mainly when listening to Libertarians, that recreational drugs should be legalized and then we wouldn’t have the crime. Well I’ve never believed that, but does one keep that kind of thinking when your neighbor’s car is broken into by a crackhead? Would a legal crackhead not break into cars? Yes, alcohol is legal and strangely we’re not so fond of all the liquor stores in the neighborhood.
Now I’m debating to touch race. After deleting and retyping, and deleting and retyping, I’ll write this… There is a diverse set of people in this neighborhood. You have middle class blacks, poor blacks, folks directly from parts of Africa or the Caribbean, Anglos from down under, and, but not limited to Protestant Koreans from G-d knows where.
But back to my point. Has living here changed your point of view on certain issues?

(think Eva Cassidy)
Wade in the water
Wade in the water, children
Wade in the water,
G-d gonna trouble the water.

There is more water in my basement this morning. Still not bad, nothing my wet vac can’t handle. New Kid on the Eckington Block reports that Fragers & Home Depot (no surprise there) has no wet/dry vacs or dehumidifiers, but National Wholesale Liquidators does.
Oh and the kittens have been moved out of the wet basement to the bathroom. Tuxedo kitty has a new home where he can be loved. His sisters are having a good old time in the bathroom, even Tortie kitty (aka Ugly) has agreed to be petted and scratched behind the ear (still don’t try to pick her up).
My commute yesterday and today was tolerable. The intersection at 5th and R strangely was not overflowed with water. The sewer drains are usually blocked and clogged and two small lakes form there. Not today. But still my shoes are wet. Thank goodness I keep an extra pair of shoes at my desk, but I swear these things are a 1/2 size too small.

|—————————————–|
| Blagden Alley Association |
| Monthly Meeting |
| THURSDAY, June 29, 2006 |
| 7:30-9:00 pm |
| Ed and Richard’s |
| 929 M Street, NW |
|—————————————–|
The newsletter is at

http://www.pro-messenger.com/Blagden/Monthly%20Pages/2006%20Monthly%20Pages/BAN_2006_06_P1.html

The guest speaker is Jack Evans, Ward 2 Councilmember.

So the topic is the state of the city.

Also, see the web page at http://blagdenalley.com or
http://naylorcourt.com,
(depending on your persuasion).

What do the guys who hang out on the corner do when a police car parks itself on the corner?
Answer: Play football in the street.

What do they do when two police cars are parked?
Answer: Go to G&G. Or around thereabouts.

What do they do when they have come back from G&G?
Answer: Go to a house where they have visited before, sit in the yard, play football with the little kids, send some text messages and wait till the police have driven away.