The Contributor: May 10, 2023

Estas dos disposiciones amenazan con privar a millones de pacientes con enfermedades raras de futuros avances. Los pocos fondos federales que se destinan a la investigación de enfermedades raras a menudo se destinan a condiciones que afectan principalmente a los estadounidenses blancos. Por ejemplo, compare la fibrosis quística (FQ), una enfermedad pulmonar con un impacto enorme en los estadounidenses blancos, con la enfermedad de células falciformes (SCD), que afecta de manera desproporcionada a los estadounidenses negros.

IN THE ISSUE

Estados Unidos. Las enfermedades pueden afectar a diferentes comunidades de manera diferente. A los estadounidenses de origen asiático, por ejemplo, se les diagnostica carcinoma hepatocelular a una tasa tres veces mayor que la de los estadounidenses de raza blanca. Una de cada 1,800 personas de ascendencia puertorriqueña vive con el síndrome de Hermansky-Pudlak, un trastorno de la pigmentación de la piel. Hay más de 7,000 enfermedades raras. La gran mayoría no tiene cura. Los investigadores han logrado avances increíbles en los últimos años. Pero los grupos marginados tienen razón al preguntarse si se beneficiarán de todos estos avances prometedores. El número limitado de pacientes con cada condición rara a menudo hace que las empresas de biotecnología se

21

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"All my customers,

tellin’

apartment

Vendor Writing

Contributor vendors write in this issue about road rage, a local activist, ableism,

WHAT WE DO

detengan, porque un tratamiento exitoso podría no recuperar el costo de la investigación y el desarrollo. En 1983, los legisladores mejoraron este problema al establecer un crédito fiscal para reducir los costos de realizar un ensayo clínico para un medicamento para enfermedades raras. Desde entonces, la cantidad de medicamentos aprobados por la FDA para enfermedades raras ha aumentado en más del 2,000 %. Desafortunadamente, los legisladores socavaron el valor de estos créditos fiscales en dos disposiciones de la Ley de Reducción de la Inflación del año pasado. El primero limita los reembolsos por medicamentos que tratan con éxito múltiples enfermedades raras. Ya, al menos una compañía de biotecnología ha cancelado un ensayo clínico en etapa avanzada que habría probado si uno de sus medicamentos existentes para enfermedades raras también

1. Mantenerse callado 2. Sólo dar nombre y apellido

3. No mentir 4. Nunca acepte/lleve documentos

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podría ser efectivo contra una segunda condición rara que causa ceguera. El segundo impone una sanción a las empresas que desarrollan los llamados medicamentos de molécula pequeña, por lo general píldoras que guardamos en el botiquín, desde ibuprofeno hasta antibióticos. El IRA somete esta clase de medicamentos a negociaciones de precios cuatro años antes que los medicamentos "biológicos". Los fármacos de molécula pequeña son importantes en el tratamiento de enfermedades raras. Pero la sanción significa que las compañías farmacéuticas podrían desviar los dólares de investigación de esta clase de medicamentos hacia los productos biológicos. Pero los productos biológicos generalmente se administran en un entorno clínico, por lo que es más difícil para los grupos vulnerables acceder a ellos.

El número total de estadounidenses con SCD es tres veces mayor que el número con FQ. Sin embargo, un estudio encontró que la financiación del gobierno entre 2008 y 2017 fue casi $2,000 más alta por persona para la FQ. Incluso si los investigadores tienen suficientes recursos para desarrollar un tratamiento para una enfermedad rara, los pacientes en comunidades marginadas enfrentan barreras para participar en ensayos clínicos. Los estadounidenses de color representan aproximadamente el 40 % de la población de EE. UU. Pero las estimaciones sugieren que representan solo del 2% al 16% de los pacientes en ensayos clínicos. Debemos unirnos contra las políticas que dañan desproporcionadamente a los grupos marginados. Jenifer Ngo Waldrop es la directora ejecutiva de la Coalición de Diversidad de Enfermedades Raras. Envíenos sus sugerencias por e-mail: news@hispanicpaper.com ó 615-567-3569

Contributor Board

Tom Wills, Chair Cathy Jennings, Christine Doeg, Demetria Kalodimos, Kerry Graham, Amber DuVentre, Jerome Moore, Drew Morris, Andy Shapiro

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WHO WE ARE

Joe Nolan • Yuri Cunza • Jennifer Waldrop • Victoria M. Bee • Amarr Croskey

Contributor Volunteers Christine

Cathy Jennings Executive Director

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Carli Tharp SNAP Specialist

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Housing Navigator

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Mary Margaret Weatherford

Housing Navigator

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Buying more papers grows & legitimizes a vendor's business, allowing the vendor to apply for housing.

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Vampires in Havana A tale of survival, greed, corruption and cartoon vampires from the father of Cuban animation.

After nearly two years of survival on the streets, the Duke twins finally made it

“I just remember it was… hell.”

“But we said we’d get through it, we prayed every night,” Michael Duke II recalled. “Prayed every night. Even during the day, we’d be at work prayin’.”

“I’d been talking to Him the other day,” Michael’s twin brother, Matthew, agreed. “Just please be a good day. Sometimes we didn’t even eat. When you’re used to eatin’, used to goin’ to your own house and eatin’, then you become homeless, you’re gonna lose weight. Just yesterday though, we bought two pizzas.”

They nodded together under the glaring fluorescence of their new studio apartment. It’s the first permanent roof they’ve had overhead in years. It’s the first city apartment they’ve had to themselves ever.

“It’s been good, I’m blessed,” said Michael. “Blessed,” said Matthew. “And I’m so happy, boy. All my customers, I’m tellin’ ‘em, ‘I got an apartment now!’ Just puts a smile on my face, you know, it makes me happy.”

The Duke twins grew up in Cheatham County, far from the city but close to family.

“My granny passed away, we was still livin’

BY JUSTIN WAGNER

there. Then my pops got sick, and the health people was havin’ a hard time getting to his driveway through the hills and ruts and all … it was out in the country. He had an oxygen machine,” Michael explained. “I had moved in with my aunt, about two months later is when he got sick. There wasn’t enough room, so we moved out here.”

“Some families, you know, when their parents and grandparents die, they’ve got aunties and uncles to fall back on,” Matthew elaborated. “But our family ain’t like that. There’s distance.”

Michael said he and his brother “had it made” when they were kids, but life in the city was a brutal adjustment. Matthew shared the sentiment, saying every day was a unique struggle.

“When you’re out here, you don’t know when’s your last meal. You don’t know if you’re gonna make it. It’s survival mode out here, you know, you’re by yourself,” he said.

All the twins needed was a run of good luck to get back on their feet. They didn’t have much, but they had a 1999 Chevrolet Monte Carlo and the help of their father – another Contributor

vendor named Michael Duke Sr.

But the car overheated and grew decrepit. Michael had sustained a number of injuries with no way to treat them, and without high school diplomas or GEDs, work opportunities were few and far between. They were able to stay with their father for a bit, but before long they were on the streets of Nashville, camping out in the woods to avoid trouble.

They had tried to enlist in the military before all this, but were rejected for health-related reasons. When Michael II was young, he dreamed of building helicopters and airplanes. All that had blurred into memory – now, the twins just needed a home.

Michael Sr. helped them sign up with The Contributor to make a little money, and to seek assistance with housing. But in their way was a long wait through the winter months, storms, and long days on the road selling.

“It was hard, but we made it through,” Matthew said. “The winter, the heat, walking back and forth for 12, 18 hours a day.”

“It breaks your body down, it really does. Out in that sun, walking constantly,” Michael said.

But after months of persistence, the twins have a home.

They got a call from The Contributor at the end of April saying their name had been pulled on a housing waitlist, and they jumped at the opportunity. Since then, they’ve been working on furnishing their new room at Parthenon Towers.

The brothers recalled the move-in experience in abject disbelief.

“I’m still not processing that it’s ours. At the end of the day, I’m still thinking, like, this ain’t true,” said Michael. “Being homeless, we got so used to it for every single day, I’m still processing it.”

“There ain’t nothing like your own spot,” Matthew said.

Michael and Matthew agreed that they had a story to tell after surviving so much, with the caveat that they weren’t sure how to put it into words. But when Michael summed up their journey in Nashville so far, it didn’t take many words to spell out the resilience this city’s homeless community manifests daily.

“It was hard,” he said. “But we made it.”

PHOTO BY JUSTIN WAGNER

THE CONTRIBUTOR CALENDAR

Nashville’s Best Free Events Downtown

Whether you’ve lived in Nashville for years or you’re just in town for a few days, there’s always a way to get out and about without spending a ton. Every two weeks, The Contributor rounds up some of the best local fun to help you navigate all the city has to offer as well as volunteer opportunities and the occasional quick hot tips for the tourists from a vendor.

TN WRITERS | TN STORIES: ELIZABETH ELKINS AND SCOTT WILLIAMS

May 13 | Tennessee State Museum, 1000 Rosa L Parks Blvd.

The Tennessee State Museum is hosting an event to explore the biographies of David Crockett and Timothy Demonbreun. In We Should Soon Become Respectable: Nashville's Own Timothy Demonbreun, Elizabeth Elkins, “sorts through the legends and nails down the facts in order to present the true story of ‘Nashville's First Citizen.’” And in The Accidental Fame and Lack of Fortune of West Tennessee’s David Crockett, Scott Williams looks at Crockett’s fascinating journey, “while also examining the birth of Tennessee during one of the most fascinating periods in American history.”

MUSICIANS CORNER

May 19-20 | Centennial Park, 2500 West End Ave.

Musicians Corner, Nashville’s free concert series, will begin its five-week season on May 19 with performances from Alanna Royale, Lilly Hart, the Seratones and more. On May 20, Nikki Lane, Jackie Venson, Roanoke, Hobo Cane and Luke Schneider will play. The multi-genre series will showcase a variety of performers at 12 concerts over the course of five weeks. Musicians Corner will take place every Friday from 5-9 p.m. and Saturday from noon to 6 p.m. from May 19 to June 17, with a special Sunday performance over Memorial Day Weekend and a special Thursday performance on June 8 by the Nashville Symphony.

SHOP BLACK FEST

May 13 | Hadley Park, 1037 28th Ave. N.

Shop Black Fest in Hadley Park will include more than 150 local Black-owned businesses. This event will include food trucks, a DJ, performances and vendors of all kinds as well as kid-friendly activities.

WOMEN CHANGEMAKERS: BOLD VISION, INNOVATIVE RISK-TAKING AND INSPIRED LEADERSHIP AROUND

THE GLOBE

May 10 | Nashville Public Library, 615 Church Street

This event brings Alyse Nelson, president and CEO of Vital Voices Global Partnership and author of Vital Voices: the Power of Women Leading Change Around the World to the downtown Nashville Public Library. This event is presented in partnership with the Lawyers’ Association for Women. Since 1997, Vital Voices has provided support and training for women and girls of all experiences to help them develop as leaders. Register at https://women-changemakers-alyse-nelson.eventbrite.com

STORY TIME FRIENDS: FEATURING OMARI BOOKER

May 15 | Nashville Public Library, 206 Gallatin Ave

This storytime Toddler Tales will be hosted by Omari Booker, whose artwork was on the cover of The Contributor last week. Omari is a visual artist based in Nashville and Los Angeles. The philosophy that undergirds Omari’s work is “freedom through art” and he says he, “aspires to create work that communicates to his audience their unique and intrinsic ability to be free.” Start ‘em young.

This History of the Lost James County

BY RIDLEY WILLS II

In 1840, voters in Hamilton County voted to move the county seat from Dallas to the more desirable lands east of Tennessee River in the newly created Ocoee District. The commissioners appointed to select the site were directed by the Tennessee State Legislature to locate it “at or within one mile” of “Rich Joe” Vann’s former residence that he had inherited from his father, Cherokee Chief James Vann II. The commissioners purchased a 40-acre tract just south of Vann’s home and named the new seat of government Harrison in honor of General William Henry Harrison.

This turned out to be an unwise decision as railroads from Atlanta, Memphis and Nashville converged on the new town of Chattanooga, not Harrison. Attempts to bring railroads to Harrison failed and, by 1880, Chattanooga had become a strategic railroad junction. That year an effort was launched to move the county seat to the more accessible Chattanooga. In November of that year a referendum was held and Chattaoooga won by a large majority. Efforts were made to prevent the move on the grounds that the voting was fraudulent. Nevertheless, the county seat officially became Chattanooga.

Angry that their efforts to keep the county seat at Harrison had been thwarted, citizens in Harrison considered consolidating with Bradley County, but finally decided to create a new county in the rural area north of Chattanooga, east of the Tennessee River and west of Cleveland. The legislature called for a vote of those living in the area in February 1871. The count was 594 votes to establish a new county named James and 26 votes to remain in Hamilton County. The new county was named for the Rev. James J. Jones, a Methodist minister who had lived in the area since 1834.

Two small towns, Harrison, in the middle of the county, and Ooltewah, on the Southern Railroad in the Southern end of the county, vied to become the county seat. Ooltewah won, disappointing the politically powerful who lived in the northern part of the county some twenty miles from Ooltewah with no good road or railroad between them and the county seat.

At the time of its creation the population of James County was about 5,000 people, primarily people of Scotch-Irish, English, German and Huguenot ancestry as well as some Black people and folks with Native American ancestry.

To create the county, Hamilton County gave up about one-third of its territory and Bradley County gave a smaller section of land east of White Oak Mountain Of land to the 385 square mile James County. Because there were no railroads in most of the new county, farmers frequently crossed the Tennessee River in small boats to catch the train at Sale Creek,

an unincorporated village in northern Hamilton County between Chattanooga and Dayton. Ferries along the Tennessee River also played a vital role in the lives of James Countians. Poor roads were a huge problem for the rural county. A courthouse was completed in Ooltewah in 1874 and the first jail was built four years later.

In 1890, the constitutionality of the creation of James County was debated in the legislature and efforts were made to repeal the act creating it. The court house mysteriously burned in January 1890 and was rebuilt in 1892 only to be burned again in 1913.

By 1919, James County was bankrupt. An act to abolish the county was unanimously passed by the General Assembly on April 13, 1919, and Gov. A. H. Roberts signed the bill the next day. The act called for a referendum on a consolidation with Hamilton County within two years. The election was held Dec. 11, 1919, with two-thirds majority required for passage. The result was 953 votes for annexation by Hamilton County and 78 votes against. James County, created out of rivalry between political factions, with its brief history plagued by chicanery. Its capital and its tax base were insufficient and substandard banking and terrible transportation facilities made the exit understandable. In 1920, only 12 miles of poorly kept gravel roads were turned over to Hamilton County.

The portion of James Country that had been ceded by Bradley County in 1871 consisted of the land east of White Oak Mountain, including the communities of Apison and Collegedale. An effort to return this area to Bradley County went nowhere as Bradley County officials were not interested in assuming the significant economic problems in Aison and Collegedale. The last of James County’s bond indebtedness was paid by Hamilton Count in 1956.

James County also gained the distinction of being the first county in the United States to be consolidated with another.

Photograph of the James County Courthouse in Ooltewah. TENNESSEE STATE LIBRARY & ARCHIVES

Learn More About the Housing Inventory Count

BY JUDITH TACKETT

We can expect the Point In Time (PIT) Count to be released any day now (as of this writing it has not been published). And once that happens, all of us interested in homelessness will mull over the numbers the local government releases about that one-night homelessness count in January. The news media will pick up a story or two, and activists will loudly proclaim how inaccurate a picture the PIT count provides.

But what we will not do is look at the Housing Inventory Count and analyze the trends of our homelessness approach to assess how these two snapshot data points could help us examine the bigger picture, especially in combination with other data points like the Homeless Management Information System and the Local Education Agencies (LEA) data on homelessness.

That’s why in this column, I decided to talk a little about the Housing Inventory Count, and more specifically, what it could tell us about homelessness in Nashville.

According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which requires the submission of the annual PIT and Housing Inventory Counts by the end of April, the Housing Inventory Count provides “an inventory of housing conducted annually during the last ten days in January. The reports tally the number of beds and units available on the night designated for the count by program type, and include beds dedicated to serve persons who are homeless as well as persons in Permanent Supportive Housing.”

Specifically, the Housing Inventory County includes emergency shelter, transitional housing (and a program called Safe Haven, which is being phased out over time), as well as permanent housing beds such as rapid re-housing and permanent supportive housing. This inventory is conducted at the same time as the PIT count.

Let’s take a closer look at last year’s Housing Inventory Count data Nashville submitted to HUD. Overall, the Housing Inventory Count is divided into two sections: 1) temporary housing including emergency shelter and transitional housing; and 2) permanent housing including permanent supportive housing, rapid re-housing and other permanent housing.

Once you look at the Housing Inventory Count, the document will break down the counts per organization for each temporary and permanent intervention. For example, the following information is available for emergency shelter beds.

Now, looking at the 2022 PIT count, it told us that there were 1,037 people experiencing homelessness in emergency shelters on the night of the count. When we look at the above chart of the Housing Inventory Count, we see that we had a total of 1,328 emergency beds around the same time. In addition, we know that the PIT count showed that 634 people were found sleeping outdoors that night.

This information then allows us, as a community, to discuss the following:

• What was our emergency shelter occupancy rate? Quick response: It was 78 percent for the night of the PIT count

when we also took that emergency shelter inventory as part of the Housing Inventory Count.

• If all the people sleeping outdoors had come inside, would we have had enough shelter beds? Quick response: No. A simple calculation shows us that we would have lacked 343 emergency shelter beds that night.

Now, to be fair, the evaluation and analysis is a little bit more complex than I have just demonstrated. First of all, I only looked at emergency shelter beds and completely neglected other temporary housing and permanent housing options.

For a more in-depth analysis we would have to look at the eligibility requirements to access shelter beds, people’s barriers to shelters, overall shelter options, availability of other temporary beds, and even permanent housing availability. Furthermore, we know that during the one-night outdoor count, we generally do not find all the people sleeping outdoors. Moreover, the outdoor counts certainly are not measuring episodic homelessness for people who may be sleeping indoors on a friend’s couch or in a motel on the night of the count, but who may be back outdoors the next night. As you can see, other data sources such as the Homeless Management Information System and education system would be helpful to fully evaluate our community approach.

To sum it up, the PIT count tells us about the needs, and the Housing Inventory Count provides critical information to the Continuum of Care about the supplies of beds (temporary and permanent). Together they can provide an overview of the trends and progress of our community’s work to end and prevent homelessness. In reality, we mostly leave that Housing Inventory Count number out of our discussions, which to me means we are not

fully invested yet in building a solid system that actually ends homelessness.

In short, homelessness can only end when we give people access to non-time-limited housing units with the right wraparound support to assist people with maintaining their housing. And outdoor homelessness will only end if we have sufficient options for people to shelter indoors from where they can quickly move to permanent housing and/or permanent supportive housing if needed. For many people experiencing homelessness, we are talking about subsidized housing (and let’s not forget, emergency shelters are a form of temporary/interim subsidized housing).

In late April, a local news outlet reported

that Mayor John Cooper said 800 places were in the pipeline to house people experiencing homelessness. It was unclear whether that meant temporary or permanent housing. He also announced that Metro would close one or two encampments every month moving forward. Having 800 new units in the pipeline is fantastic and much needed.

However, before we are too eager to shut down encampments, we better ensure that we have the increase in permanent supportive housing in place that we need. Otherwise, politicians, who now are applauding these efforts to shut down encampments, will have to eat their words when they see the revolving door of homelessness spinning out of control.

Summer Reading List

In The Contributor ’s annual reading list, regular writers, volunteers, vendors, interns and more help wrangle a mish-mash of our favorite reads from the previous year. Here is what we were reading over the past year.

Rough Sleepers: Dr. Jim O’Connell’s Urgent Mission to Bring Healing to Homeless People

BY GWEN E. KIRBY

When you first meet Dr. Jim O’Connell, you instantly know that you’re in the company of one of those rare individuals who are able to truly see people and listen to them. This book captures his humility and deep caring for others. You will not only learn about how O’Connell and his team have built Boston’s Health Care for the Homeless Program, the nation’s largest medical system to care for patients experiencing homelessness, but also about the importance of truly connecting with people. You will read about tenacity, consistency, and true caring – and you will recognize that serving people is about more than just implementing a program. It is about building relationships and mutual respect that leads to accepting people and their choices. The brilliance of this book lies in Kidder’s ability to show the growth of Dr. O’Connell through and with his team to constantly learn and relearn how to work with people within a system that perpetuates chronic homelessness.

— JUDITH TACKETT

Homelessness Is a Housing Problem: How Structural Factors Explain U.S. Patterns

BY GREGG COLBURN AND CLAYTON PAGE ALDERN

Colburn and Aldern take a systematic approach as they dissect the question of why some cities see higher rates of homelessness than others. They clearly point to the housing market conditions such as high rent costs and low vacancy rates as the main culprits. The authors also examine individual factors that increase risks of homelessness (poverty, mental health, substance use, etc.), but conclude that rather than focusing on blaming individuals, our country needs to examine the housing system we created. This book not only looks at the causes of homelessness at the individual and systemic levels but also attempts to offer solutions. The authors point out that homelessness programs have not failed, rather the lack of scaling up programs in light of scarce resources is what does not work. “Homelessness is a Housing Problem” uses direct and easily digestible language to help us think through complex issues and concludes that the differences in rates of homelessness are based on how communities structure their housing. In essence, the example of how the U.S. has been able to reduce veteran homelessness by investing in housing, rental subsidies, and systems thinking can provide a blueprint to reducing overall homelessness.

— JUDITH TACKETT

The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind

BY JULIAN JAYNES

Julian Jaynes, a reputable Princeton psychologist, released a book in 1976 proposing a profoundly unorthodox theory of the human mind. Crucial to his work and its reception was the notion that human consciousness evolved very recently, within the span of recorded history. While Jaynes remains a controversial figure, he was a titan of human thought and his seminal text is tantalizing and consumable to even the greenest layperson. A true educator, he invites the reader gently and eagerly into a world of unfathomable possibility. This is a summer read for Hoboscope connoisseurs.

— LAURA BIRDSALL

Hello Molly!: A Memoir

BY MOLLY SHANNON

If we’re going by the metric that having a sad childhood makes you hilarious as an adult, actress and comedian Molly Shannon proves this in her memoir Hello Molly! Shannon, who’s best known for her six seasons on Saturday Night Live, lost her mother, sister and cousin in a car crash when she was 4 years old. Her childhood was full of mischief, even as she and her family struggled through a difficult life without her mother. The book is full of vulnerability and grace. Shannon is an excellent storyteller and she comes off as genuine, smart and worthy of her superstar status.

— AMANDA HAGGARD

Remarkably Bright Creatures

BY SHELBY VAN PELT

This book hits everything I’m looking for in fiction: Something a little weird (chapters with an octopus narrator), a narrative that challenges traditional relations and storytelling that touches on various relationships on a broad spectrum of intimacy. In this book, a widow who also lost her young son befriends a giant Pacific octopus that’s in an enclosure in an aquarium as he lives out his last days. This exploration of friendship, family and relationship to self is stunning and will leave me thinking about it for a long time. —

AMANDA HAGGARD

No Choice: The Destruction of Roe

v. Wade and the Fight to Protect a Fundamental American Right

BY BECCA ANDREWS

This book, full disclosure, was written by my close college friend Becca Andrews. Her reporting on Roe v. Wade outlines the tangible losses in recent years and the storytelling brings into picture the history and nuance of abortion and the right to choose. The history allows for a better view into how we got here. The real stars of the book are the people profiled, who, as Andrews notes, are, “doing groundbreaking, inspiring work to ensure safe, legal access to this fundamental part of health care.” —

AMANDA HAGGARD

Glad My Mom Died

BY JEANNETTE MCCURDY

I'm Glad My Mom Died , a memoir by American writer, director and former actress Jennette McCurdy, is about her career on iCarly as a child actress. McCurdy writes about her relationship with her mother and the abuse she suffered into her adulthood. After her mother died in 2013, McCurdy began to examine the relationship and created a one-woman show, which was then expanded into this memoir. It’s an indictment of the types of parents who force their kids into fame, and it begs for a follow up when McCurdy is older. How does one come out on the other side?

AMANDA HAGGARD

Poverty, by America

BY MATTHEW DESMOND

We have created a huge tidal wave of poverty and homelessness in America — one that is not going to be stopped by a few grants to a few nonprofits. Matthew Desmond’s Poverty, by America , gets at how to dismantle the system we’ve built. We have to change the entire way we think and, even then, it is going to take years to turn the tide. But if we don’t begin, we haven’t seen anything yet. Desmond’s book explains all of that very bluntly, and also supports his theories with facts and figures. This isn’t light reading, but it is necessary. —

CATHY JENNINGS

BY J.A. BAKER The Peregrine

As J. A. Baker notes in The Peregrine , it is easy to let birds flit about on the fringe of perception, comfortably out of view. But as Baker spent a few months documenting the sophisticated habits of Essex peregrines, his appreciation for the falcons’ brilliance — and the breadth of their experiences — flourished. Recounting his observations with ornate, flowery prose, he begins to spurn his own humanity and long for the natural world he once ignored. It’s a stunning tribute to the rich, poignant and unsparing stories of wildlife, and a deft meditation on the beauty in every moment. — JUSTIN

WAGNER

I’m

Where We Labor

'What Things Cost' offers a moving tribute to our nation’s working poor

What Things Cost: an anthology for the people

Edited by Rebecca Gayle Howell and Ashley M. Jones University Press of Kentucky

352 pages $27.95

“Oppression is never abstract,” editors Rebecca Gayle Howell and Ashley M. Jones write in their introduction to What Things Cost: an anthology for the people. “It is in the detail of human living where we labor, be it joyful or tiring. Or both.”

What Things Cost is a landmark collection of writing dedicated to such detail. More than 100 poems and essays honor laborers everywhere, but especially those whose work has been devalued,

BY EMILY CHOATE AND CHAPTER16.ORG

exploited, or ignored — “generations of work stolen and extracted, the work of hands that built this country but never had the right to it.”

Proceeds from this book will support the Poor People’s Campaign, a movement first conceived by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. during the final months of his life. Its current incarnation, formed in 2018, works toward King’s vision of “a multiracial coalition of the working poor.” With this shared purpose, What Things Cost and the Poor People’s Campaign make a fitting alliance.

The book’s powerful opening sections place the experiences and lives of marginalized voices — including those of immigrants, women, industrial workers and agricultural laborers — in the foreground. Ruth Awad’s poem “My Fa-

ther Dreams of a New Country” establishes this perspective, when the speaker addresses America directly: “When will you learn my name?”

José Olivarez’s “poem where no one is deported” and Javier Zamora’s “Second Attempt Crossing” both convey the precarious minefield of living undocumented in America. Ocean Vuong’s “The Gift” pays loving tribute to a relative who works at a nail salon. Faisal Mohyuddin’s “The Holiness of Our Fathers” describes the speaker’s father, under great financial stress, leaving Chicago for temporary construction work on the Nissan plant in Smyrna, Tennessee.

Curtis Bauer’s “Dispatch Out of a Language I Used to Speak” describes operating a grain bin auger to feed cattle, evoking the machine’s physical power

through the structure and momentum of his language. Emily Jalloul, the anthology’s associate editor and a Ph.D. candidate at UT Knoxville, conveys the anxiety of growing up tending to her addict mother in “The Taking Apart.”

The lines of editor Ashley M. Jones’ poem “Hymn of Our Jesus & the Holy Tow Truck” are arranged in a circle, like the spokes of a wheel. Reading it leads us around a luminous wheel of image and memory, finding sacredness “flexed on the crossbar / of a rusty wrecker / on its way to the east side / of Birmingham, which is like Eden, / growing holy fruit.”

As Jones and Howell describe it, What Things Cost places at its center “the particular soul’s labor, pressed against the soulless powers that be.” A section titled “Blood and Bones” emphasizes the

physical perils undertaken by the working poor. These pieces also offer a series of reckonings with the systemic forces in our culture and history that create harm for our nation’s most vulnerable populations.

Memphis poets Marcus Wicker (“Reparations Redefinition: Bond”) and Emily Skaja (“If Anyone Should Fight to Breathe”) both contribute to the collection’s many poems that confront our nation’s recent crises, including conflicts over police brutality, callous decision-making during the global pandemic, and the toppling of Jim Crow-era statues. Wendell Berry’s “Questionnaire” asks what we are willing to trade for false notions of safety and righteousness.

Nabila Lovelace’s “Ars Poetica” is a haunting list poem that names many items from our everyday lives that are made with prison labor, an ignored sector of American labor. Lovelace asks:

everything we buy supplies metal for cages aren’t we ready for something else?

Subsequent sections of the book depict entanglements between laborers and land, as well as the hazards and vulnerabilities surrounding labor related to our food supply. Crystal Wilkinson’s poignant “O Tobacco” entwines the sensory details of Kentucky tobacco farming with warm childhood memories. Nashville poet Ciona Rouse’s “Yes/And” highlights how differently two people who are otherwise close can interpret the same grove of trees.

Layli Long Soldier’s arresting essay, “38,” sheds light on the mass execution of the Dakota 38, whose rebellion sprang from years of starvation on their ever-shrinking reservation. Martin Espada’s “Alabanza: In Praise of Local 100” memorializes the kitchen staff of Windows on the World, killed during the attack on the World Trade Center. Diane Gilliam’s poem, “In Line,” depicts an encounter that speaks to the fraught moments of connection and tension that occur daily in our nation’s grocery stores.

The anthology ends with moving testaments to the finiteness of life and

the irreplaceable worth of each person’s contribution. In his essay, “A Crowded Table,” Silas House recounts the significant but imperfect evolution in how his rural Kentucky family relates to lives that differ from theirs, including his own life as a gay man.

Editor Rebecca Gayle Howell also reflects on a complicated working-class childhood in “My Mother Told Us Not to Have Children”: “We fought to eat and fought each other because // we were tired from fighting. We had no time / to share. Instead our estate was honesty, // which is not tenderness.”

Nikki Finney’s riveting long poem, “At War with Ourselves: The Battle of and for the Black Face Boy,” grounds contemporary killings of young Black Americans like Tamir Rice in the same storm of racist violence that led to the Civil War. Joy Harjo’s “I Give You Back” voices the speaker’s profound personal need to let go of fear engendered by a legacy of racist injustice: “You are not my blood anymore.”

Two poems express moments of unexpected thrill after getting fired. In

Debora Kuan’s “The Night after You Lose Your Job,” the speaker is knocked out of her routine and reminded of the tremendous exchanges that take place among us outside of any transactional economic ethos. Dorianne Laux’s “Waitress” finds its newly unemployed speaker “running, breathing hard, thinking: / This is the grand phenomenon of my body. This thirst / is mine. This is my one and only life.”

What Things Cost offers a hardearned generosity of spirit, reflecting the sheer enormity of the working poor’s contribution to everyone’s lives. From the authors’ diversity of experience and seemingly endless variety of aesthetic and formal expression, we recognize all that’s made possible by the persistent, thrumming pulse of the world at work.

For more local book coverage, please visit Chapter16.org, an online publication of Humanities Tennessee.

“The book’s powerful opening sections place the experiences and lives of marginalized voices — including those of immigrants, women, industrial workers and agricultural laborers — in the foreground.”

Ashley M. Jones | CREDIT AMARR CROSKEY

Rebecca Gayle Howell | CREDIT VICTORIA M. BEE

Chloe Evans, local artist and COO of Know Boundaries, LLC. It's a company providing therapy for children with autism. In her free time she loves to watch dramadies, psychological thrillers and anything with Aubrey Plaza or Kathryn Hahn. She likes The Contributor to have conversations with Wendell and seeing his latest drawings. ART BY CONTRIBUTOR VENDOR WENDELL J.

A Community Inspiration: Clemmie Greenlee

The most inspiring leader I have ever met used to be a “crack whore.”

Unashamedly, Clemmie Greenlee believes and says this was part of God’s Plan for her. And, indeed, she is robustly healthy, sparkling, impish, beautiful — and deeply compassionate.

When she first met me, she instantly recognized me as someone who had struggled to stay off the street my whole life. I didn’t need to say a word. We had a great deal of fun going door to door with flyers in East Nashville, promoting Galaxy Star, (founded 2001, dba Nashville Peacemakers).

While visiting Clemmie in her spotless and welcoming home, I am ushered into her home office, where I am faced with an entire wall of awards, including a 2018 Proclamation from the State of Tennessee.

What I find so disappointing 16 years later? She still doesn’t have:

• foundational support and

• a yearly salary. She doesn’t even own her own home.

People have been donating in dribs and drabs for 20 years while she struggles.

Greenlee is a beloved anti-violence activist in Nashville. She won the Nashville Scene ’s coveted Nashvillian of the Year in 2007. Since 2008, she has been helping the homeless get off the streets, addicts get into recovery and the penniless get into stable support systems.

BY LISA A., CONTRIBUTOR VENDOR

She has rescued neglected and homeless kids throughout their growing years. Here’s a testimonial from one of her kids:

“ … Clemmie showed me that I have people that care about me so I’m gonna push myself to get better to prove to them that I can do this… there was a point where I would feel like 'I can't do this.' But you guys pushed me to the place where I can do it. I learned how to seek for jobs, how to study in school, and how to cope with getting along with people. Leadership is one of the main skills I learned.“

Kira is now 20 years old and enrolled at Tennessee State College.

As a survivor of sex trafficking, a graduate of Magdalene House at Thistle Farms, Greenlee traveled to New Orleans and risked her life to break up a sex trafficking ring and help open a safe house called Eden. Many of the women went on to graduate from high school and college, embracing a career.

Greenlee has directly rescued hundreds of people and impacted thousands, including southern lawmakers throughout the region.

Prostitutes now have a chance at being viewed as victims of pimps and other traffickers. She is responsible for changing the political discourse.

Since long before the violence at the Convenant School, Greenlee was addressing all forms of gun violence as the executive di-

rector of Nashville Peacemakers, all from an intersectional perspective.

As the mother of a child murdered by gun violence who has helped dozens of women through her organization Mothers Over Murder, Greenlee is well qualified to lead the fight for sane gun laws in Tennessee.

With over 20 years experience as a community activist (her boots firmly on the

ground), she deserves Nashville’s commitment in the form of

1. a reliable yearly salary,

2. the right to own her home,

3. and all the volunteer support

4. and coalition building we can muster.

To find out how you can help, please visit NashvillePeacemakers.org or Mothers Over Murder.

This is John Levy and his dog Lincoln 15 years ago. Lincoln was a joy to be around for John. Recently, Lincoln passed away. This picture is a celebration of life. ART BY CONTRIBUTOR VENDOR WENDELL J.

Picture this in your mind's eye:

It’s Thursday afternoon April 13, 2023, rush hour traffic between 4-5 p.m.

A young man in a red Jeep Renegade with a black top is attempting to exit to a local strip mall. He signals to a young man in an older model long body Lincoln Towncar that he needs to get out so could be please move back. Rather than comply with the man’s initial polite request, the man in the Lincoln sped up further blocking the entrance/exit to the strip mall. (A police officer once stopped me and told me it’s illegal to block entrances/exits that way. Now I ALWAYS ask if I can cross BEFORE I actually attempt to.)

What happened next shouldn’t surprise me, you see it almost every day on the news. Still, it was unnerving-especially for my friend/customer Belle who was an eyewitness to these events.

Seeing the man in the Jeep get out of his

Road Rage is Real

BY NORMA B., CONTRIBUTOR VENDOR

vehicle she said her voice now trembling she said: ‘Oh my God! He’s got a gun! (Going further she said it looked like a .45 saying her son has one similar.)

As I started to turn to see for myself, she put her hand visibly shaking on my shoulder and said: ‘don’t look.’ She later explained that she was afraid he would just start randomly shooting people including us.

Next, he proceeded to bang the gun several times on the passenger window/door of the Lincoln yelling: ‘On my momma, ‘I’ll spray this whole m *****r f*****g car up if you don’t move it right now!’

By now, traffic was backed up, and had the Lincoln blocked in.

Onlookers seeing/hearing what was happening began backing up allowing the Lincoln to let the Jeep out. Whew! That was a close one!

Dick (the young man in the Lincoln) did return on April 22, 2023. He asked Belle and

I if we'd seen what happened. What stood out about that visit was that he was now wearing a bulletproof vest! How sad! (Although if that guy had opened fire on him in that car I doubt it would’ve done him much good!)

I asked if he had filed a police report about the incident, he said no, he just wanted to get home after that.

Another thought crossed my mind though: Could it be that he realized he was in the wrong, blocking the entrance/exit to the strip mall?

As for the young man in the Jeep. Were you REALLY willing to shoot someone over something SO minor, possibly costing you your freedom?

Why not just use the other entrance/exit to the strip mall (there are two)?

Bottom Line: Many road rage incidents such as this one can be avoided/resolved by simply being courteous to other drivers.

However, if YOU find yourself in a road rage incident there are a few steps you can take to deescalate the situation:

1. Move to the right and decrease your speed.

2. Apologetically wave and nod at the driver.

3. Avoid eye contact and drive defensively.

4. Temper your own reactions. (*Drivers Ed.com)

Finally, if you’re ever a victim of Road Rage PLEASE report it to authorities, otherwise what’s to prevent the offender from doing it to someone else?

Since this incident occurred I try to acknowledge courteous drivers who help others out when needed, backing up letting others in/out of the strip mall, etc.

I’m also hypervigilant particularly when it comes to Red Jeep Renegades (not kidding)!

Why We Need Automatic Doors at Stores

BY WILLIAM B., CONTRIBUTOR VENDOR

There's a store in my neighborhood without an automatic door. Once, I went there on my smaller scooter and getting in wasn't a problem because a lot of customers were going in they held the door open for me. But the employees there don’t have anyone at the door helping disabled people to get in and out.

The second time I shopped at this store, I went in on my bigger chair and coming out my scooter pulled the door off its hinges at the bottom. I was mad at me about it, but I was also mad at them for not holding the door open.

The next week, I went in with my little scooter and they told me I wasn’t allowed in. That I was barred. I went ahead and did my shopping and they called the law on me.

Three officers came in and told me I had to leave and told me I couldn’t come back. I think that is very, very wrong because not

Fantasies about riding in a Roberts & Dybdahl 4070 red semi - Late 70’s

BY LESLIE S., CONTRIBUTOR VENDOR

Early to mid late '70s my dad Don Schmidt was a forklift driver who also unloaded boxcars of wholesale lumber. Robert and Dybdahl was a wholesale lumber yard in the '70s. And my dad worked there as a foreman laborer. He loaded and unloaded all the semi tractor-trailers. He worked full time six days a week.

Obviously my dad had several connections with the semi drivers. I rode in both Roberts and Dybdahl semis: twice in the red 4070 Big Jake and once in the Roberts and Dybdahl nightowl green with dark and light green trim tractor.

My first and favorite trip was with the Roberts and Dybdahl 4070 Big Jake in the mid 70s on a day off I had from school. It was 5:306:15 a.m. when Don Kephart drove in front of my dad and mom's house. I rapidly ran up to his beautiful 4070 Big Jake International Cabover. We got back to Waterloo Iowa about 5:57 p.m. That afternoon we went all the way to Southern Illinois.

I really, really hate to tell you Don Kephart eventually started falling asleep at the wheel and had to retire from his driving semi career too early. In fact I’ll write another article about Don Kephart's untimely demise in the future.

only am I disabled, but I am handicapped. I have a history of falling down. I’m going to talk to my doctor to get a paper I can carry around with me to prove my disability. It would be helpful on the bus too. I got in touch with the MTA operator and they worked it out for me.

Some people treat me so bad when they see my chair. To be treated that way when I’m out here trying to make a living hurts. I’ll be clean 16 years next month and I’ve come a long way and people like this are keeping me down.

I was really hurt and disappointed and I was mad because they didn’t tell me they were gonna call the law. At a very young age I was abused by an attendant at the juvenile hall I was in and put me in the hole and it

was dark and they would play the radio real loud. At a very young age I had no idea why I was treated so bad.

They told me they didn’t have to have automatic doors. But I think they should have them. I haven’t seen them bar anyone else. I think she’s pinpointing me out for a reason, but I don’t know why. My goal is to try to get these stores to put in automatic doors because I’m not the only disabled person who has this problem probably. Some stores don’t even have a ramp. I’ve also got a problem with the 8th Ave. streets. They block off a lot of the sidewalks there and I have to literally get into the street to get around to the bus. I took this to the mayor’s office and talked to one of the mayor’s assistants myself and they haven’t done anything about it.

HOBOSCOPES

TAURUS

I get it, Taurus, it was bright yellow so you figured it was ripe. But then when you pulled back the peel, you found the fruit was bitter and a little too al dente. My philosophy on the whole thing is a little different than the conventional wisdom. I think bananas are like dalmatians and 12-sided dice. The more little spots, the better. You jumped in a little too soon on that last big break. Maybe this time you can give it a couple more days on the counter before you start peeling.

GEMINI

Did I see you out walking in the woods, Gemini? Yeah, I think you were way down the trail past those two little streams by the big sideways tree. I waved, but you must not have seen. Seemed like you were looking for something. You kept bending over and picking things up and setting them down and shaking your head. I guess most of us have lost a piece of ourselves in the woods. Something we wanted to hide. Something too wild. Don’t stop looking if you didn’t find it yet. That part of you is still out there. Wander further. Look deeper. What’s that down there?

CANCER

I read that if you eat 2 tablespoons of high-quality olive oil everyday, all your health problems will disappear. Also, if you swish 2 tablespoons of high-quality coconut oil around in your mouth every day, all your tooth problems will vanish. Also, if you rub your head with 2 tablespoons of high-quality mineral oil everyday, all your dandruff problems will evaporate. Honestly, Cancer, this is starting to sound like a lot of oil. Take care of yourself today, whatever you feel like that means. Sometimes that means letting go of getting it all just right. That’s slippery business.

LEO

Remember the last week of 5th grade, Leo, when Mrs. Bridges was so tired of trying to keep us all quiet and educated, that she finally just walked us over to the bleachers at the high school and let us choreograph our own acapella performance of “Livin’ On A Prayer.” I wonder what ever happened to the giant foam guitar we made, and whatever happened to the kid who fell off the back stairs right before the key change, and whatever happened to Mrs. Bridges? Anyway, Leo, I know you’re feeling a little done with this week and you’re ready for the better things coming this summer, and I think it’s OK if you just want to go outside and sing until the next thing is ready. Give it a shot.

VIRGO

You know how it is, Virgo, you finally get all your ducks in a row and then the badgers break out of their pentagonal pyramid formation and while you’re wrangling them, the crocodiles, which have spent all morning marching clockwise in a nearly perfect circle, decide to start marching in the opposite direction. Maybe those ducks weren’t yours to line up to begin with. Maybe they just want to swim around in an undulating sinewave. The sphere of ladybugs was a brilliant concept, but does the world really need it, or are you just trying to control something?

LIBRA

It’s true, Libra. You are one day closer to finishing this project! You’re one day closer to your next big success! You’re one day closer to the future you’ve been building for so long! You’re one day closer to the eventual heat death of the universe! Wait, wait, I went a little too far ahead. Maybe always looking into the future to find your peace is a losing proposition. What are three things about this moment that are already exactly as they should be?

SCORPIO

Writer, teacher, and poet Bayo Akomolafe is fond of quoting the Yoruba proverb “The times are urgent, let us slow down.” I guess I’m fond of quoting him quoting it. I thought of you, because I know you’re feeling a lot of that urgency right now. And it sounds foolish to slow down. But I think, Scorpio, that slowing down is how we’re going to discover the next right thing to do. We’ll stay active, but not be quite so reactive. You can quote me on that.

SAGITTARIUS

Do you remember, Sagittarius, when the night sky went on strike? It was just a few years back. The Stars were tired of doing all the work for astrologers and not getting enough of the credit. So they just stopped showing up. Night after night, amateur astrologers like me would try to determine the astrological fate of our expectant zodiac, but we would look up to find nothing in the sky but a lonely moon and some drifting satellites. We worked things out. Turns out The Stars mostly just wanted proper recognition and three weeks of paid vacation every eon. It reminds me though, Sagittarius, that if you’re feeling like you don’t have the power to make change, see if anybody around you might join up.

CAPRICORN

You wake up in a desert. It’s just after sunset and the flat horizon gives the same dim-orange glow in every direction. You’re wearing exactly what you have on now and you feel a bit dizzy. In your pocket, you find an unopened Moon Pie, a matchbook with one match left, and a pamphlet called “What To Do If You Wake Up In a Desert.” The light is fading fast and coyotes begin to howl in the distance. What do you do, Capricorn? How do you feel? Oh, I forgot to mention, your four favorite people are there too. They’ve got a 24 pack of Gatorade, a satellite radio, and a Jeep. You’re not alone, Capricorn. Stop planning everything like you are.

AQUARIUS

One-one-thousand, two-one-thousand, POP! POP! One-one-thousand, POP! One-one-thousand, two-one-thousand, POP! POP! POP! I don’t want to take the bag out of the microwave too soon, Aquarius, because I want to get my money’s worth. POP! But I know if I let it go to long, POP! POP! then all the popcorn will get burned. POP! The truth is, Aquarius, we hardly ever time these things just perfectly. POP! There’s more guesswork than anybody wants to admit. POP! POP! I think just go with your instinct. POP! And you’ll get what you need. BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

PISCES

We used to call it “Bible times,” but apparently historians refer to it as “the late bronze age.” In any case, Pisces, there was no air conditioning then. I think that’s probably what most of the ancient wars were fought over. It was just too hot and nobody knew what to do about it. These days we’ve got lots of air conditioning, but we still fight too much over who gets to use it for how long and when. If the people of the late bronze age could see us now, they wouldn’t believe it! All this cool, clean air, and still squabbling over who’s invited. Anyway, Pisces, share your space today if you can.

ARIES

I went to my dentist’s office for my appointment yesterday but everything was in the wrong place. Turns out my old dentist sold her practice to some new guy. So now I have this new step-dentist who thinks he can tell me when to floss and how often to change my toothbrush. You’re not the boss of me! You’re not even my real dentist! Sometimes, Aries, good advice comes from someplace we’re not ready to trust yet. Get some distance and think it through. Do you mistrust the facts or the source?

Mr. Mysterio is not a licensed astrologer, a certified dentist, or a trained historian. Listen to the Mr. Mysterio podcast at mrmysterio.com Or just give him a call at 707-VHS-TAN1

The New Christian Year

Selected by Charles Williams

Charles Walter Stansby Williams (1886–1945), the editor of the following selections, is today probably the third most famous of the famous Inklings literary group of Oxford, England, which existed in the middle of the 20th century, and which included among its ranks the better-known and longer-lived Oxford Dons J.R.R. Tolkien and C. S. Lewis—but he was arguably the most precocious and well-read of this eminent and intellectually fertile group. He was also known to have influenced Dorothy Sayers, T. S. Eliot and W. H. Auden. Lacking a proper degree unlike his fellow Inklings, this genius Cockney-speaking author, editor, critic, and playwright was eminently well-versed in both philosophical and theological writings of the remote past as of the present day (the mid-20th century) and used this familiarity to good effect in his poetry, supernatural fiction and his lesser-known devotional selections designed for the spiritual benefit of the faithful in the Church of England. This series of profound quotations, encompassing all walks of life, follows the sequence of the themes and Bible readings anciently appointed for contemplation throughout the church's year, beginning with Advent (i.e., December) and ending in November, and reaches far beyond the pale of the philosophical and theological discussions of his day. It was under his hand, for instance, that some of the first translations of Kierkegaard were made available to the wider public. It is hoped that the readings reproduced here will prove beneficial for any who read them, whatever their place in life's journey. — Matthew Carver

5th Wednesday after Easter

JESUS is at all times assailed by false witnesses, and while wickedness remains in the world is ever exposed to accusation. And yet even now he continues silent before these things, and makes no audible answer, but places his defense in the lives of his genuine disciples.

Origen: Against Celsus

5th Thursday after Easter

THE hatred of evil things is for a man to hate his own sins, and to justify those of his neighbour.

The Paradise of the Fathers

A MAN’S life or death cometh from his neighbour; if we benefit our brother we benefit ourselves, and if we offend him we sin against God.

The Paradise of the Fathers

5th Friday after Easter

GOD’S own work must be done by God's own ways. Otherwise we can take not comfort in obtaining the end, if we cannot justify the means used thereunto.

Thomas Fuller: Good Thoughts in Bad Times.

FOR twenty years I continued to fight against one thought —that I might see all men of one mind.

The Paradise of the Fathers

5th Saturday after Easter

EITHER let us fear the wrath to come, or let us love the grace that is present—either this or that; only be it ours to be found in Christ Jesus unto live, which is life indeed.

St Ignatius: Epistle to the Ephesians.

MAN has a natural dread of walking in the gloom—what wonder then that he naturally has a dread of the unconditional, of having to do with the unconditional, of which it holds good that no night and "no deepest gloom half so dark" as this gloom and this night, where all relative ends (the common milestones and signposts), where all relative considerations (the lanterns which else are a help to us), where even the tenderest and sincerest feelings of devotion—are quenched . . . for otherwise it is not unconditionally the unconditional.

Kierkegaard: Journals.

Fifth Sunday after Easter

NOTHING is so easy to men of goodwill as goodwill itself, and this is all that God requires. Every act of goodwill permanently and sensibly increases goodwill. Trifling acts of goodwill are often more efficacious in this way than great ones. A flower given in kindness and at the right time profits more, both to the giver and receiver, than some vast material benefit in which the goodwill is hidden by the magnitude of the act. Some little, sensible individual touch from the hand of our Lord may convert the heart more than the contemplation of His death for us.

Patmore: The Rod, The Root, and the Flower.

6th Monday after Easter

REMEMBER: he who despises and mocks a mental gift in another, calling it pride and selfishness and sin, mocks Jesus, the giver of every mental gift, which always appear to the ignorance loving hypocrite as sins: but that which is a sin in the sight of cruel man, is not so in the sight of our

kind God. Let every Christian, as much as in him lies, engage himself openly and publicly, before all the world, in some mental pursuit for the building up of Jerusalem.

` Blake: Jerusalem.

6th Tuesday after Easter

IT may fortune thou wilt say, "I am content to do the best for my neighbour that I can, saving myself harmless." I promise thee, Christ will not hear this excuse; for he himself suffered harm for our sakes, and for our salvation was put to extreme death. I wis, if it had pleased him, he might have saved us and never felt pain; but in suffering pains and death he did give us example, and teach us how we should do one for another, as he did for us all; for, as he saith himself, "he that will be mine, let him deny himself, and follow me, in bearing my cross and suffering my pains." Wherefore we must needs suffer pain with Christ to do our neighbour good, as well with the body and all his members, as with heart and mind.

Latimer: Sermons.

6th Wednesday after Easter

THE nobler things are, the commoner they are. Love is noble, because it is universal.

Tauler: Sermons

I KNOW the power obedience has of making things easy which seem impossible.

St Teresa: The Interior Castle

Ascension Day

THIS Ascension Day is properly the most solemn feast of our Lord Jesus: for this day first in his manhood he began to sit on the Father's right hand in bliss and took full rest of all his pilgrimage before. Also this is properly the feast of all the blessed spirits in heaven: for this day they had a new joy of their lord whom they saw never before there in his manhood. And also for that day began first to be restored the falling down of their fellows, and that in so great multitude and number of blessed souls of patriarchs and prophets and all those holy souls that this day first entered into that blessed City of heavenly Jerusalem, their kind heritage above.

Mirror of the Blessed Life of Jesus Christ, (tr. by Nicholas Love).

THE Church is an excellent state, when it is sustained by God only.

Pascal: Pensées.

Friday after Ascension Day

BUT what does this mean, what have I to do, or what sort of effort is it that can be said to seek or pursue the Kingdom of God? Shall I try to get a job suitable to my talents and powers in order thereby to exert an influence? No, thou shalt first seek God's kingdom. Shall I then give all my fortune to the poor? No, thou shalt first seek God's kingdom. Then shall I then go out to proclaim this teaching to the world? No, thou shalt first seek God's kingdom. But then in a certain sense it is nothing I shall do. Yes, certainly, in a certain sense it is nothing; thou shalt in the deepest sense make thyself nothing, become nothing before God, learn to keep silent; in this silence is the beginning, which is, first to seek God's kingdom.

Kierkegaard: Christian Discourses

Sponsored by Matthew Carver, publisher

Saturday after Ascension Day

WHAT is God? No less the punishment of the perverse than the glory of the humble. We may say He is reason and sweet reasonableness directing itself with fixed unchanging aim, and everywhere operative. Any perversity in collision with that must of necessity be confounded. Of course, all swelling pride and unseemliness which dashes itself against that must be broken to shivers.

St Bernard: On Consideration

Sunday after Ascension Day

CHRIST humbled himself: not—was humbled. Oh, the infinite sublimity of whom it may be said with categorical necessity: neither in heaven, nor upon earth, nor in the abyss is there any one who could humble him—he humbled himself.

There we see Christ's infinite qualitative difference from every other man: that he must unconditionally give his consent and approbation to every humiliation he suffers, his willingness to submit to the humiliation. That is the infinite superiority to suffering, but at the same time the more intense suffering.

Kierkegaard: Journals.

Monday after Ascension Day

WHATSOEVER hath its being for God's sake endureth and abideth for ever with those who are true.

The Paradise of the Fathers.

HE who has the fire of love in this world need not fear the fire of the sword in the other.

St Ambrose: On Psalm cxviii.

Tuesday after Ascension Day

"WHO hates his neighbour has not the rights of a child." And not only has he no rights of a child, he has no "father." God is not my father in particular, or any man's father (horrible presumption and madness!), no, he is only father in the sense of father of all, and consequently only my father in so far as he is the father of all. When I hate someone or deny that God is his father—it is not he who loses, but me: for I then have no father.

Kierkegaard: Journals.

Wednesday after Ascension Day

THE Work is not of persuasive eloquence, but Christianity is a thing of might whenever it is hated by the world.

St Ignatius: Epistle to the Romans.

NOT only do we know God by Jesus Christ alone, but we know ourselves only by Jesus Christ. We know life and death only through Jesus Christ. Apart from Jesus Christ, we do no know what is our life, nor our death, nor God, nor ourselves.

Pascal: Pensées.

I THOUGHT I should have thee, O God, as a help in loving men. Thou didst understand it differently, Thou didst use men against me to help me to love Thee.

Kierkegaard.

THEME: TV

DOWN

ACROSS

1. Rodeo garb

6. Roman numeral 7

9. Spring occurrence

13. Like Corgi

14. Get a sum

15. Garlic mayo

16. Poet's concern

17. Mail-back request, acr.

18. Handrail post

19. *Lionel Jefferson's mom

21. *Keith and Laurie Partridge's mom

23. Watson's, Crick's and Franklin's concern, acr.

24. Big-ticket ____

25. #38 Down follower 28. Potter's oven

30. Get by 35. Wyatt Earp's card game

37. Wooden pegs

39. Measuring tool with a bubble

40. Copycat

41. All-season ____

43. Like certain people's glasses

44. The Great ____, Muppet 46. 1 year older than frosh

47. Treat without respect 48. *Samantha Stephens' mom

50. Four Corners state 52. Unidentified Jane 53. Summit location 55. Like tuna tartare 57. *Rory Gilmore's mom 61. *Hilary and Carlton Banks' mom

1. Basin, without vowels

2. Last piece of a loaf

3. Lowest female singing voice

4. Evis's blue shoes

5. Harrison Ford or Jason Segel in "Shrinking"

6. Bud holder

7. *Rhoda Morgenstern's mom

8. "That is" in Latin

9. Wedding cake layer

10. Famous Allen Ginsberg poem

11. Away from wind

12. Skilled in deception

15. G. Orwell's "______ Farm"

20. Valentine, e.g.

22. Bottom line?

24. Inner circle

25. Old enough (2 words)

26. Neutered rooster

27. Influencer's creation

29. *Meg, Chris and Stewie Griffin's mom

31. Egghead

32. "____ like the plague"

33. Canvas primer

34. *Alex and Mallory Keaton's mom

36. Pasta option

38. Virgo and Libra mo.

42. ____ Lewis, Lamb Chop puppeteer

45. By word of mouth

49. What catastrophe and ratatouille have in common

51. Wear (2 words)

54. Treated with EVOO

56. *Pebbles Flintstone's mom

57. Law school entry requirement, acr.

58. First name palindrome

59. Civil disorder

60.

Volunteer Spotlight: Michael Reilly

BY NORMA B., CONTRIBUTOR VENDOR

Recently I was able to spend some quality time with Michael Reilly for his Volunteer Spotlight!

This was no easy feat. He’s a bit of a combination of The Flash and a magician.

He can be difficult to track down, because he’s here one minute and gone the next. A now you see him, now you don’t kind of guy.

Michael hails from Brooklyn, New York.

He first came to Tennessee from Los Angeles, Calif., while working as a freelance copywriter, so you can be certain this story will be properly edited and not just by The Contributor’s top-notch editorial team.

After running out of gas in Nashville, he decided to take some time to check things out. It seemed like a nice town, a good place to stay, so he did!

He became familiar with The Contributor when he passed by vendor Gary C. at the intersection of Harding and Trousdale nearly every day on his way to work for about two years.

Though Gary presented roughly, Michael (who was responsible for hiring numerous people for various jobs within the Titans stadium at the time), realized that he had some mental health challenges, and he wasn’t that different from the individuals he was hiring.

In short, he looked past the outward appearance and saw his humanity.

The world would be a much better place if EVERYONE would take the time to do that! As a result, he eventually became a regular customer of the paper.

Michael retired in 2012, and came down to The Contributor office the next day to volunteer! We are SO glad he did! (While doing

this story, I came to realize he is actually only semi-retired. He currently works for a hospitality company in large event logistics planning food processes to accommodate thousands.)

Concerning the changes/growth in the paper in his time here, he mentioned the following: 1) The Contributor has gone from a stand alone paper to become a partner in the Continuum of Care and 2) Vendors now have access to Social Services with staff members hired for that purpose.

He said what The Contributor community does that is different from other agencies offering assistance is that people in The Contributor 's program are treated as individuals with each one’s specific needs in mind — not merely as impersonal case numbers.

He illustrated it well by saying, "it’s like doing a favor for a friend," and gave the compelling example of helping a friend move a sofa up two flights of stairs.

You might say he not only talks the talk but walks the walk, and he is supremely confident that if everyone works together the resources are there to provide for the needs of the people with regard to food, housing etc. and he talks about it with anyone who’ll listen.

His other interests include gardening and home cooking, but it turns out he’s not the only one with a unique skill set in the family.

His wife of many years, Amy, from Florence, Ala., is an artist in her own right with a studio Paint + Canvas in Nashville. If you’re into art or you want to learn more about it, you should check it out! It looks pretty cool and there appears to be something for everyone!

A Yo-Yo

BY JAMES "SHORTY" R., CONTRIBUTOR VENDOR

A Yo-Yo is like the Planet Earth. It's round, not flat. Have you ever seen a square Yo Yo? I haven’t, but they have something in common, they’re both round and unique in there own special way. Just like people they’re very special in their own way. They come from everywhere on this special place

we call the Earth. Like a Yo-Yo there isn’t two the same. Like people, a yo yo is different in color and things it can do. Everyone is different. We come from different ways of life. Always keep this in mind. A Yo-Yo is like a ball it must go down and up. Lets make the best of it. It’s not going to be a bed of roses.

Satirical Delight

A TALE OF SURVIVAL, GREED, CORRUPTION AND CARTOON VAMPIRES FROM THE FATHER OF CUBAN ANIMATION

BY JOE NOLAN, FILM CRITIC

Moving Pictures first introduced readers to the folk behind Write Brain TV when we previewed the 2019 screening of Nightcrawlers at the Defy Film Festival here in Nashville.

Director Stephen McCoy’s impressionistic movie of life on the streets outside of Boston, Mass., is a haunting tone poem of a film, and it’s the movie that helped to launch Nightcrawlers producer, Kevin Ronca’s “underground, anti-imperialist streaming site” filmmaker collective, Write Brain TV. The site also calls itself “a safe space for art to be dangerous,” but a new selection on the platform is as silly as it is scary, as entertaining as it is enlightening.

Vampires in Havana is a 1985 animated short feature with a just-over-one-hour runtime.

Director Juan Padron is known at “the father of Cuban animation,” and this satirical delight is a great introduction to Padron’s knack for wrapping whack and warped animation around broader socialist themes. The film opens with a montage of the history of vampires through the ages — it reminded me of the history lesson Francis Ford Coppola gives audiences at the beginning of his unhinged throwback masterpiece Bram Stoker’s Dracula . We see vampires depicted in ancient cave art, in Egyptian hieroglyphics and on the sides of Grecian urns. A narrator explains that European vampires started forming unions in the 1800s: one faction of European blood-drinkers em -

igrated to Chicago to establish a criminal mob; another group stayed in Europe to create a system of oligarchic financial institutions.

Count Dracula’s son, Werner Amadeus von Dracula is a mad scientist living in Havana, Cuba. He produces a formula that allows vampires to survive exposure to the sun. When news of the breakthrough leaks, the gangster vampires of Chicago want to suppress the formula before it murders their indoor vampire beach resort racket. The European vampires want to make a killing marketing the serum as Vamprisol. But, Werner dreams of giving the new miracle medicine away, and his hip, trumpet-playing-freedom-fighter nephew, Pepe becomes an unlikely hero when he learns his true identity and vows to protect his uncle’s work to share it with all vampires around the world.

Pepe’s hip attitudes reflect those of the film itself. Padron’s off-beat characters and the lewd and vulgar tone of his film remind me of Ralph Bakshi’s sleaziest productions in the best possible way. Pepe’s nocturnal life as a musician finds him carousing with a sketchy posse, drinking, dancing and romancing the lady admirers who can’t get enough of his hot horn. It’s the decidedly-adult nature of its comedy and violence that won Vampires in Havana a cult following among international audiences. And Nashville music freaks will want to stream this one with the volume turned

up to hear Pepe’s blazing brass stylings recorded by the inimitable Cuban-American trumpet maestro Arturo Sandoval.

Write Brain TV is also currently streaming Embargoed Films of Cuba which includes seven movies that were forbidden to be shown in America because of the cultural/travel/ trade blockades the U.S. imposed on the island nation after Fidel Castro’s communist government came to power in 1959. The selection includes the indelible hybrid film masterpiece I Am Cuba and most of the movies are accompanied by illuminating introductions from Cuban film historian Victor Fowler. Viewers can support the

site via very affordable monthly and annual subscriptions or they can get a one-time movie pass for just $3.50. Go to writebrainstudios.tv and create an account to enjoy the site’s rotating free movie selections every Classic Movie Monday. Write Brain TV also includes several series of radical shorts, books, music and Marc Rubenall’s fascinating The Origins of Cinema podcast.

Vampires in Havana is streaming at writebrainstudios.tv

Joe Nolan is a critic, columnist and performing singer/songwriter based in East Nashville. Find out more about his projects at www.joenolan.com.

“The Contributor” está trabajando con uno de los principales periódicos en español La Noticia para llevar contenido a más lectores en Middle Tennessee. Nuestros vendedores de periódicos han pedido durante mucho tiempo que nuestra publicación incluya contenido que apele al interés de residentes de habla hispana en nuestra comunidad.

LOCALES

G R AT I S

Mayo 2023

“The Contributor” is working with one of the leading Spanish-language newspapers La Noticia to bring content to more readers in Middle Tennessee. Our newspaper vendors have long requested that our publication include content that appeals to the interest of Spanish-speaking residents in our community.

L L a a N N ticia ticia

Grupos marginados enfrentan barreras para tratamiento de enfermedades raras

Los miembros de las comunidades marginadas luchan por navegar en un sistema de salud plagado de desigualdades. Estas comunidades incluyen no solo minorías raciales y étnicas, sino también grupos menos visibles, como personas discapacitadas y personas LGBTQ+.

Muchos miembros de estos grupos tradicionalmente marginados también sufren de manera desproporcionada de enfermedades raras, definidas como aquellas que afectan a menos de 200,000 personas en los Estados Unidos.

Las enfermedades pueden afectar a diferentes comunidades de manera diferente. A los estadounidenses de origen asiático, por ejemplo, se les diagnostica carcinoma hepatocelular a una tasa tres veces mayor que la de los estadounidenses de raza blanca. Una de cada 1,800 personas de ascendencia puertorriqueña vive con el síndrome de Hermansky-Pudlak, un trastorno de la pigmentación de la piel.

Hay más de 7,000 enfermedades raras. La gran mayoría no tiene cura.

Los investigadores han logrado avances increíbles en los últimos años. Pero los grupos marginados tienen razón al preguntarse si se beneficiarán de todos estos avances prometedores.

El número limitado de pacientes con cada condición rara a menudo hace que las empresas de biotecnología se

detengan, porque un tratamiento exitoso podría no recuperar el costo de la investigación y el desarrollo. En 1983, los legisladores mejoraron este problema al establecer un crédito fiscal para reducir los costos de realizar un ensayo clínico para un medicamento para enfermedades raras. Desde entonces, la cantidad de medicamentos aprobados por la FDA para enfermedades raras ha aumentado en más del 2,000 %.

Desafortunadamente, los legisladores socavaron el valor de estos créditos fiscales en dos disposiciones de la Ley de Reducción de la Inflación del año pasado.

El primero limita los reembolsos por medicamentos que tratan con éxito múltiples enfermedades raras. Ya, al menos una compañía de biotecnología ha cancelado un ensayo clínico en etapa avanzada que habría probado si uno de sus medicamentos existentes para enfermedades raras también

Conoce tus derechos:

podría ser efectivo contra una segunda condición rara que causa ceguera.

El segundo impone una sanción a las empresas que desarrollan los llamados medicamentos de molécula pequeña, por lo general píldoras que guardamos en el botiquín, desde ibuprofeno hasta antibióticos. El IRA somete esta clase de medicamentos a negociaciones de precios cuatro años antes que los medicamentos "biológicos".

Los fármacos de molécula pequeña son importantes en el tratamiento de enfermedades raras. Pero la sanción significa que las compañías farmacéuticas podrían desviar los dólares de investigación de esta clase de medicamentos hacia los productos biológicos.

Pero los productos biológicos generalmente se administran en un entorno clínico, por lo que es más difícil para los grupos vulnerables acceder a ellos.

Estas dos disposiciones amenazan con privar a millones de pacientes con enfermedades raras de futuros avances.

Los pocos fondos federales que se destinan a la investigación de enfermedades raras a menudo se destinan a condiciones que afectan principalmente a los estadounidenses blancos.

Por ejemplo, compare la fibrosis quística (FQ), una enfermedad pulmonar con un impacto enorme en los estadounidenses blancos, con la enfermedad de células falciformes (SCD), que afecta de manera desproporcionada a los estadounidenses negros.

El número total de estadounidenses con SCD es tres veces mayor que el número con FQ. Sin embargo, un estudio encontró que la financiación del gobierno entre 2008 y 2017 fue casi $2,000 más alta por persona para la FQ.

Incluso si los investigadores tienen suficientes recursos para desarrollar un tratamiento para una enfermedad rara, los pacientes en comunidades marginadas enfrentan barreras para participar en ensayos clínicos. Los estadounidenses de color representan aproximadamente el 40 % de la población de EE. UU. Pero las estimaciones sugieren que representan solo del 2% al 16% de los pacientes en ensayos clínicos.

Debemos unirnos contra las políticas que dañan desproporcionadamente a los grupos marginados.

Jenifer Ngo Waldrop es la directora ejecutiva de la Coalición de Diversidad de Enfermedades Raras.

Envíenos sus sugerencias por e-mail: news@hispanicpaper.com ó 615-567-3569

Por Jenifer Ngo Waldrop - Ex. Dir. The Rare Disease Diversity Coalition @rarediseasediv1

1. Mantenerse callado

2. Sólo dar nombre y apellido

3. No mentir

4. Nunca acepte/lleve documentos falsos

5. No revelar su situación migratoria

6. No llevar documentación de otro país

7. En caso de ser arrestado, mostrarla Tarjeta Miranda (llámenos si necesita una) Basados en la Quinta Enmienda de la Constitución, los derechos de guardar silencio y contar con un abogado fueron denominados Derechos Miranda luego de la decisión de la Suprema Corte de Justicia de Estados Unidos en el caso Miranda vs. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436, de 1966.

Las comunidades de color sufren desproporcionadamente de enfermedades raras y están muy poco representadas en los ensayos clínicos.

Fuente: Black Women's Health Imperative/PR Newswire

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