Listen to Your Elders, #SanFrancisco

Listen to your elders, kids. They’ve been around the block rather quite a few more times. And they have all the stories.

I met a wise woman named M.J. last week, at the second meeting of the recently assembled San Francisco Street-Level Drug-Dealing Task Force. Look into that, too, OK.

Btw, what…a beautiful room that was, a true reflection of our diverse community. There are about a dozen people in the task force, including SFPD Tenderloin Capt. Carl Fabbri; someone from the Public Defender’s; someone from the District Attorney’s office; as well as neighbors and small-business owners, folks who have been unwittingly, yet directly impacted by the T’s problematic; ex-addicts, ex-dealers, and ex-convicts, folks who have done their time and gotten their act together and who know how easily the cycle can and does repeat itself. And there were about three times as many of us in the room that evening, neighbors keen to learn about this task force and voice our takes on the matter and our hopes for the future of our community. Also there was Lindsay LaSalle, managing director of Public Health Law and Policy with the Drug Policy Alliance – but Ms. Thing was too busy eating her late lunch or early dinner in front of everyone – yup – for me to care about her in any meaningful, respectful way, and the proof is in the pic above.

Anyway. M.J. She knows. Because she has been around the block, OK. Listen for and to the M.J.s you meet along the way.

And if you wanna hear what M.J. herself has to say, then check out the Revolting Seniors podcast on which she and some of her friends from the Curry Senior Center in the Tenderloin dish and ponder and remember and hope and warn. It’s a conversation among LGBTQ seniors from all parts of the country living in the T and serving it, too.

And this has been my first-ever podcast recommendation. Enjoy.