like I don't feel ugly enough

You are reading http://livinginthehood.blogspot.com

The sonnets you've been reading, Poetry, are primarily written about news stories and other broadcasts I've heard on KUNM.

I've been posting them on their "discussion" web forum, under "community."

I got an email from the webmaster. All my posts have been moved to a subcatagory called, "Rogi Riverstone's Kitchen Sink." Apparantly, there were "complaints," particularly regarding the fact that my posts were on the opening page of the Community Forum.

I put them there because there's no subcategory called, "current events," or "comments." There's no discussion forum for news, either.

So, I'm in a little, backwater ghetto, where nobody will read my stuff, I guess.

Why were people complaining? Was it the word, "titty," in one sonnet? Was it my criticism of the Democratic machine in this state, in the personages of Mayor Chavez and Governor Richardson? Was it my endorsement of Kucinich? Was it my advocacy of the Green Party?

Or is it the fact that my writings are informed by my experiences in the War Zone? Is it too controversial that I speak for the voiceless poor? Ignore it and maybe it'll go away?

A highly-placed person at KUNM referred to me as being like Don Schrader the other day.

Don Schrader is a nudist, able-bodied, gay man. He's a vegetarian. He lives on a poverty-level income, because he refuses to pay taxes to the war machine. He is frequently seen clad only in a small pair of cut-off shorts, in front of the University bookstore, holding a protest sign. He produces a weekly, late-night program on Public Access television.

He is a man of principle. He lives what he believes.

And he is perceived, in this town, as a crack-pot. Especialy by the affluent so-called "progressive" community.

I am not Don Schrader. I do not CHOOSE to be low income. I am not able bodied. I am constantly discriminated against and even physically and verbally abused and attacked for my situation.

So, have I been relegated to the postition of loveable crack-pot?

Is it Leslie's hospitalization, or is it prejudice, which has consigned me to sit at a desk and take voice mail messages and write new cards for the rolodex? Is this why I'm expected to ALWAYS clean up a particular reporter's dirty lunch dishes, which I always find, cluttering my work station?

I heard an announcement today about "OFFCenter," a "community art space. I looked it up on the 'net.

It's run by the same woman who ran Art Street. OFFCenter is her PhD project; she got a grant for it.

I was attending Art Street for awhile. I introduced my self and tried to show her the ARTICLE I'd written for net4tv "Voice" on Outsider Art, in which I'd cited her organization. I said, "would you mind if I..."

She interrupted me and said, "clients can't use the computer."

I continued, "I was saying, would you mind if I gave you the URL to the story, so you can read it?"

On another occassion, two of her "pet" homeless artists had a sack of Halloween candy. One man said I could have some.

The bag was tied in a hard knot. I'm not very strong, nor can I see well, particularly plastic knots.

I slid the bag toward me, so I could better see how to untie it.

"Don't take it ALL! It's to SHARE! DAMN!" the man said.

The woman was standing right there; she saw the whole thing.

I said, "I wasn't trying to steal it; I was trying to untie the knot!" and slid the bag back across the table to him.

She said to me, "As long as you're in here, clients are supposed to be doing art; you can't just hang around, talking."

I held up the art supplies I had been collecting when I'd first walked over and said, "I came over here to collect some supplies I need; he offered me the candy."

She literally chased me across the room, as I walked back to my work station, to repeat herself.

The message was that I am perceived as a boat rocker and a trouble maker, that she has her eye on me, and I'd better watch my step, or she'd throw me out.

I quietly went around the room, STEALING what supplies I needed, packed them in my cart, and left.

SHE controls the art studio space for homeless and low-income people in this city. I have no recourse but to stay away from the ONLY accessible studio space in which I could have worked.

I think I'm perceived as a threat because I'm smart. I'm not a low-functioning, depressed, frightened, maliable street person. I'm also not one of her "cash cows," the artists who produce stuff she can show off to her benefactors and contacts.

I'm a writer. That means I'm a thinker. That means I'm dangerous.

She has to be the big fish in a small pond of traumatized, impaired, timid people who have no way to defend themselves.

She's exploiting the most vulnerable population in town, so that she can have a degree in art "therapy," and sit around, gossiping and playing with art supplies all day!

So, I can't go there, either.

I hitched up Porkchop and went to the convenience store today. It's very cold, below freezing for most of today and yesterday. It was finally sunny, at least, and the fierce winds had calmed.

So, I wanted some damned soda pop. If I have to sit in here, all alone, having people in this town slam doors in my face right and left, gawddammit, I'm going to have a friggin soda pop and work on my art, which I can't sell anywhere, legally!

Walking down the street, here comes some young gal with her dog off the leash. I said to Porkchop, "wait, buddy, we have to wait for the irresponsible pet owner to pass."

She cussed me out and made excuses. She even flipped me off.

All I said, over and over, was, "what you're doing is illegal."

I shouldn't have to explain to every friggin hippy free spirit that: I can't see nor walk well, that I'm trying to protect MY dog and myself, that other "cute" family dogs have ATTACKED me and Porkchop and caused BOTH of us physical injury!

But, no, yuppy brats can do whatever they want, when ever they wish, and to HELL with my health, safety, security or right to walk down the street without being friggin' ATTACKED!

And I'm NOT Miss Cleo, the Psychic: I don't know, nor should I HAVE to, which dogs are dangerous and which are no threat.

To me, ANY stray dog, not under direct control of a leash or total confinement by gate and fence, is a LETHAL THREAT!

If Porkchop bites anybody again, they'll put him down, and I'll end up in legal trouble!

So, here I sit, all alone, having been well put in my place again.

I'm nothing but crazy trash.