"Dying on the Mic" at First Street Church

"How did Dr. Agee do at the mental health workshop at the church?" a student asked after our group returned from the First Street bible study that I led.
"I got up there and choked in the beginning." I confessed
Kia cut me off " You did fine, Dr. Agee. You didn't 'die on the mic'."
But she was wrong, at first, I did die on the mic.
I've done Bible studies before. It's actually a mental health workshop that is set in the context of a story from the Bible. So I was trying to recount the story of Paul and discuss conflict. It would ultimately become a workshop on stress and burnout. I had done it many times before. But this was different.
This was no regular workshop. Anything that I knew about stress & conflict flew out the window when I got up in front of the fellowship hall full of Katrina survivors.
I second guessed myself on the podium and got nervous. I choked on the story of Paul, inwardly cursing myself for not using the story of Noah or Jonah or any biblical story with less details. You would expect things to get worst when I got heckled from the crowd, by a Bishop! "Go back to Acts 10 that's where the conflict is." He hollered from the back of the fellowship hall.
I was dying on the mic, in slow motion as the Bishop questioned my interpretation of the bible. Even though I was getting schooled by an old school Bishop I actually felt relieved that I was being challenged on the Bible. Because, "I don't have a doctorate in the Bible, my doctorate is in Psychology" I told him.
"Then tell us some Psychology," he said "Can you tell us how to start rebuilding people instead of just rebuilding the city of New Orleans?"
I pretended to re-read my notes as I tried to calm my nerves. One of my students, Kimbra chimed in with a comment to buy me some time. I checked my feelings, I felt humble, ill-equipped and too presumptious to tell them anything about stress. I didn't know what to tell them so I started with the truth. "I've got some handy tips on stress, and depression, but I apologize, because I think that whatever I have to say may be deficient."
Pastor Eden asked the congregation for more time for me to answer the Bishop's question on re-building people. Soon after, I began to get flooded with other questions from the floor "How do I help people with anger." "How long should someone have a pity party?" "Did you know that there is only one child Psychologist in the city?"
I offered suggestions and used my students (Bonnie, Kimbra, Kia and Tori) as guides to a appreciative inquiry process of what the audience knew as first hand experts at survival. The solutions weren't coming from me, I was a guide who could support and reinforce the methods they were already using. People smiled and clapped, and patted each other on the back. They seemed to feel validated and encouraged by offering suggestions and hearing from others.
We talked about supporting our leaders who were sure to be so burnt out that we need a new term for it like ' burnt over.' One pastor confessed that he was overwhelmed and he needed the break that I provided that night. He even asked me to come back and support the pastors who are flooded with these same types of questions. I had brought some stress-relief hand outs but at first I hesitated to distribute them. Towards the end, I felt comfortable enough to share them, if any one would find them useful.
The last outburst came from the back of the room. I instinctively froze.
"Give us what you got, doc!" it was the familiar voice with the same intensity but a different tone. The Bishop had stopped heckling me, and was giving me a pass to proceed. Gratefully, I was given a second chance at First Street church to redeem myself on the mic.

Read more about First Street
- Professor Agee --

Rough and Beautiful

After much fear and medical discussions we moved forward to gut houses yesterday. We had to wear face masks with filters as well as protective, clothes, gloves and eyewear. There is arsenic, mold, and asbestos in the air, dirt and water in the 9th ward. We were the crew from California, there was another crew, an elderly group from Chicago who were being oriented at the same time. We did our volunteer efforts through Common Ground.

The students worked hard and I had a newfound respect for them. I ripped up a floor, tore down walls in big plaster chunks, and demolished a bathroom. It was hot, tough work and we were feeling it later. What we working on was rough, how the kids felt later, was rough. However, having that experience was beautiful.

I wished I had enough money to fix every house on the block. One student wished that he was stronger so that he never had to stop working.

(Picture: Jarralynne & Kia) Photo by: Victoria Hamilton

-J-

Perspective

Even though we prepped the students with guest lectures like Gloria Chun and her discussion on dealing with grief and loss in interviews, the students still feel unprepared.

There is guilt, shame, worry and a frustrutation about how limited in scope our interaction is going to be on the grand scale of what needs to happen.

I share their feelings.....


Picture: Hilary talking to a resident after a community re-building association meeting.

Photo: by Jarralynne with Tori's camera

Black Victims- Black Solutions

I am impressed and awed by the type of support that people are recieving down here. In fact, when we arrived at the Baker, LA FEMA camp. The site is called "Renaissance Village". I brought Victoria, Gene, Kia, Tori, Laydei (Rasheedah) and Kimbra down from New Orleans. Kimbra organized the visit from our Big Buddy meeting from the day before. Elyne met us there and we were able to get in to the camp when I showed my ID.

It's neat looking, rows of trailers like at a camp site, or a RV park. There are social areas under tents. Under the smaller tents the students started working with the kids who ran away from us at first and then came back. The Berkeley students did a mini-poetry workshop with Deron the natural poet. Gene swapped skateboarding tricks with a kid who had a board. Kimbra played basketball and Kia and Tori did arts and crafts. Rasheedah and I both talked to adults, we met Victor, Bettie, Alvin, Ernest (Counselor) and quite a few other people. Alvin called Katrina a 'miracle' because it washed away all of his sins associated with his crack addiction. Jesus had delivered him. Victor, blasted me, he said that nothing good would come from our questions. I didn't disagree with him. I let him vent, he said a lot, and encouraged me to qoute him on it. That nothing wasn't going to happen and that people didn't care any more.

The kids called themselves "Nothing" and "No Body" and "No Name" because so many people had asked them their names and ages. Bettie was talking to me about the different agencies that had come to help. I told her "I've heard, that's the teacher from New York." "No, she said, that's the people from out EAST, Harvard". I tried to remember the Harvard project and corrected me that the other group came from "Howard". I had to get it straight about the Louisana Recovery Program, the New Orleans Survivor Alliance, the Resource Programs that were local and national. I couldn't keep it all straight.

But, what we saw the most was that there were a lot of Black people getting services and help from fantastic, well meaning Non- Black people. Somehow, strategically African Americans need to be involved and incorporated into the solution.

Picture: Alvin (The Counselor) because he counsels the kids from the kitchen Photo by Victoria Hamilton

The wisdom of Sister Judith

Sister Judith said so many things that prompted me to think. This is devoted to the wisdom of Sister Judith.


Sister Judith....

...on Bad Advice

• from disaster consultants"Don't give service in the trailers"

.... on Outside Help

• "At one point we were dealing with Outsider Overload" .
• "We can't survive if we don't have 'influx'"... (influx of financial, intellectual, and structural support)

...... On how people see Katrina Relief efforts

• " People want the storm to be over, it's just started"
• "We've been fematized"

...On school aged displaced Katrina residents

• "The didn't want to get on those shiny yellow school buses when they came to take them to the new schools. People were suprised that they couldn't leave their mothers."
• "The displaced kids get it, when they get expelled because they don't have a clean uniform, or they are crying in the classroom, they get it." "Clearly...they are a burden"

...On Burnout

• "My friend told me I was exhausted. I had to think about it, I guess I am."

Photo of Sister Judith by Victoria Hamilton

Meeting the Helpers

We met Sister Judith who is part of Baton Rouge organizing committe to support the school system as they manage the influx of New Orleans students to their school system. It is a massive scale re-structuring, re-organizing, re-thinking of how to teach kids. Especially traumatized, displaced, scared and confused and worried kids. We met with another team of uc Berkeley faculty and students that are coming this way every 6 weeks. I could throw a rock and hit Charles Underwood's building back at Berkeley but we didn't come together until we met in Baton Rouge in Sister Judith's downtown flat. We met with Sister Judith, Charles Underwood and his team from UC Berkeley, as well as faculty from LSU education and law school programs.

Planning versus doing
They discussed how much the real work of counterbalancing the storm. According to this group, the work has only just begun "There is a tendency to get in 'scurry' around and plan". Sister Judith said. The original thought was to not have the residents in the FEMA trailers to get used to services in the trailer. The problem was it took so long to plan that kids were waiting for months for services. Sister Judith, Big Buddy, Boys & Girls Clubs and Delta Express (The UC-Berkeley, LSU, Baton Rouge community collective) got together to give serices NOW! The types of services given are Art Therapy camps, Writing & Poetry Workshops, enrichment activities for young and older kids.

Picture: Using Victoria's Camera
Kimbra, Sister Judith(in pink), two Berkeley students with Charles Underwood(greybeard), Victoria and Kia with Scotty in the back.

Prepping to Go

Yesterday, we did a poetry workshop in preparation for our trip. Hilary shared a poem called "Malcolm". It was powerful and moving and at the same time comforting. We've been preparing these students with lectures, guest speakers, reading materials, writing exercises, videos, music and so many New Orleans maps. However, it wasn't until I read her poem that I felt more at ease. I was hoping that I had done enough, that I had prepared them well enough. However, after reading her poem, I knew that I would be learning from the students as well. Our schedule is insane, packed all ready. And those are just the official on the record visits. That doesn't include all the friends of family, play cousins and people your mother told you that you had to call when you were in NOLA visits. It's going to be a hectic and important trip. My prayer is that we will be guided to do whatever work that needs to be done, whether it be through the pen or with a shovel. Jarralynne-


Picture of some of the team
(pictured from L to R Bonnie, Matt, Hilary, Jarralynne, Gene, Kia, Tory & Brandy)