Posts tagged work
Mom and Dad suffered ethnic and religious discrimination : Jann Scotts Journal
Jan 20th
My mother and father were 2nd generation Americans . My grandparents on my father’s side had immigrated from Southern Italy. Grand parents.on my mother side emigrated from Poland. My parents met at a high school dance in 1932.
They had both changed their last names to Americanize.their future.
They both had stories of extreme prejudice when they were children. Name calling, insults, race baiting , religious discrimination …..I heard all of the stories growing up. On occasion I was subject to some of it myself even with a fully Anglo name.
When I see hatred toward Mexican immigrants or African-Americans in this day, I can’t help but think the discrimination my own family faced in the early 20th century.
Both my parents were Roman Catholic so I had a lot I f religious training. I go to mass to this day. I am one oi f those people who never had a problem with the church…. and I think my parents made sure I was safe. But I have had a close spiritual connection with Mother Teresa, pope John Paul, Michael Moore, Governor Jerry Brown, St. Francis of Assisi.
During the 1960s my dad ran a company in very white wasp Connecticut and he did something unthinkable… he hired Hispanics and African-Americans ….. I think it was after he heard Martin Luther King speak….. he said “the exact same thing happened to me and my parents…. we can’t let thus go on. It stops here with me in this company.”
Of course he was a combat vet from wwii and fought in Patton’s. 3rd Army. Gen. George Patton was the 1st general to integrate his troops when he called up a crack Negro Armoured division to break through Nazi lines when Patton’s white troops were surrounded. They ended up being the most accurate gunners If the war. My dad never forgot them. “They saved our lives…yes my life” he said The Negro troops also had the only top-secret night vision. Eisenhower had put Negro troops in charge if the red ball express which had night vission…..and so did their tanks.
So when I was a little kid growing up in my father’s company I spent my summers working on all black crews…where I learned how to work.
…pace….and about black American culture. I never learned prejudice. I actually learned cool colloquial terms, gospel music, military jargon and how to drink Gin and chew tobacco at the same time. That takes practice.
In my own company today in 2015 in Boulder we practice no discrimination. That is we give equal pay and opportunities to all people’s. Who ever does the best work gets paid and promoted.
from Boulder Colorado
Jann Scott
Jann Scotts Journal
then most sensitive city in the USA
Boulders Lost: Jann Scott’s Journal
Dec 23rd
Kathy has been living in section 8 housing for 5 years. She is 50ish has a bad leg and drinks everyday. She lives in one of Boulders section 8 apartment buildings. Social security and Medicaid keep her propped up so she can drink all day and get sicker and sicker. Kathy is an alcoholic. She admits it. Most chronic alcoholics do. Her alcoholic gout is so bad she can barely walk. A visiting nurse drops in to see her twice a week. Social worker interns from the Boulder Homeless shelter see her monthly. They are all very nice and hopeful for Kathy, but her basic problem is she is an alcoholic. If she stopped drinking 90% of her health problems would go away. But you and I pay for her lost lifestyle. We enable her. Now the county mental health officials, nor the DA will agree with me on this. They think I am uncaring and mean-spirited. But I know what is going on out there. I mentor a lot of these folks. They are honest with me. They don’t have mental illness. They have alcoholism. Last month Kathy fell and drove a spike into her head. She was found by her friend Austin who took her to the hospital where she spent a week. Now she has a little brain damage, a hole in her head and she can’t drink enough.. so she takes pills…… Disappearing into pitiful demoralization.
Austin has been in and out of prison, jails, the ARC and hospitals over the past 35 years. He’s always been an alcoholic. He went to prison 30 years ago for molesting his daughter while he was drinking. That is actually a plight of a lot of alcoholic men. They just don’t get reported or caught. But Austin was an alcoholic speed freak. Today he has served all of his time and has put stretches of sobriety together. We talked earlier today at his campsite. He lives under a tarp like hundreds of drunks in Boulder. He is a registered sex offender for a crime he committed over 30 years ago and he can’t catch a break. He never re-ofended, but he has an SO jacket. 20 years ago he was sober and had a job in the kitchen of one of the dorms at the University. H’d worked there for 5 years, was an exemplary employee and CU wanted to make him a supervisor. Austin had learned kitchen management in the penitentiary. He could fix any piece of industrial equipment, cook any meal, run a kitchen and serve 2000 people 3 times a day. He was excellent at it. When the university ran a background check they discovered his past and fired him on the spot and had him escorted off campus. From that point Austin gave up and went down hill. He told me today from his campsite that he is persecuted for his past. He can’t get a place to live, can’t get a job…. so he collects SSI and Medicaid and drinks… He is waiting for death.
Sometimes Kathy lets him sleep on her floor. But she is being thrown out of her apartment because the landlord hates section 8 rentals. They all do. Austin can’t qualify for section 8. The homeless shelter can’t help him. So Austin crashes where he can. Sometime I let him sleep in my heated garage in my big beautiful house….. but he is always drunk and he knows better than to come around me when he is drinking.
Scottie lives in a trailer. His kidneys gave out from drinking. He is nearing 50 and is friends with Austin and Kathy. He got fired from his gas station job last month for drinking. Austin says he’s not long for this world.
Scottie rents a room to Harmony who is 20 something. She tells everyone she has cancer and shaves her head everyday. But Harmony is a chronic alcoholic and drug addict. She doesn’t work but she always has money. Scottie and Austin theorize that she is a prostitute because she disappears with various older men routinely. Some of Harmonies friends who were strippers and hookers from the Bustop got killed over the past few years. One flipped her pickup truck in the Canyon last year. She was drunk and high. The other got killed by a John. The police are still looking for him. The case never even made the papers. Why ? Because these are people no one cares about.. no one knows… they live in the dark shadows of Boulders trailer court. Richard lives 3 trailers down from Scottie. He is a bad alcoholic too. He used to be a finish carpenter and cabinet maker. Richard says he could just never stop drinking. He gets his SSI check each month and drinks.
20 street alcoholics died this year. The public officials call them homeless and want you to believe they died from exposure and mental illness. Nothing could be further from the truth. You know what they died from right ?? They died from what is killing my friends above.
Citizens of Boulder are killing these people with kindness. so what are we supposed to do? Here is the rub. Make all public assistance contingent upon being sober. sounds reasonable right ?? Nope .. not to all the drunks and drug addicts who run our city. They feel threatened too. After all we live in Dope Boulder. we live in beer Boulder. so we will just lie about it all and make up some nice story.
Jann Scott
from Boulder Colorado
Jann Scott’s Journal is Boulders official voice of reason and conscience.
Tech Star Brad Feld ends up In Boulder ER with blood clot: Jann Scotts Journal
Dec 13th
Blood clots are very dangerous and often not caught. They can make their way to either the heart or the brain or clog a blood vessel someplace and cause catastrophic damage. They lead to strokes and heart attacks
They are often fatal. This is a near miss for Feld who is reportedly resting at home taking blood thinners.
Last year Feld wrote about depression and how he was dealing with it. Then this year he’s finally struck with a blood clot. 2 years ago Feld wrote a book with David Cohen called Do More Faster a manual for entrepreneurs on how to burn the candle at both ends. When I saw the title I shuttered and thought ” Oh my God this guy has no clue”
But the do more faster lifestyle philosophy is not exactly the Boulder way. it is more the New York City Way or The Wall Street Way. Feld who is known for working incredible amounts of hours, getting little sleep and running marathons is Boulders startup Guru. But one has to question this startup genius. Does he plan on publicly working himself to death at an early age? He is well on his way.
Boulder has had many gurus over the years who all seem to have the answer to life. There was Trungpa Rinpoche who dragged a lot of people down the road buddhism and alcoholism and aids through unprotected sex. A lot of people died following that guy.
Feld is leading people into workaholism. He and Tech Stars have a nationwide following. Unfortunately we are getting to watch him implode along the way. He should be used as a good bad example on how not to lead your work life. Maybe he’ll smarten up. After all Boulder is a place where people come to live an alternative lifestyle of peace, prosperity, health,wellness at a sane pace. I like Brad Feld and I’d like to see him live and not go the way of Janis, Jim, or Mama Cass.
Jann Scott
from the workaholic capital of America
Jann Scotts Journal is a column on American culture seen through the eyes of this Boulder sage since 1999.
Boulder Colorado