Published in Turning Wheel, Winter 2010
Driving into the Sunnydale projects, at first glance, the greenness of it is most striking. It doesn’t look so bad from the outside. This is San Francisco in February, and everything is in bloom. The beauty of fresh grass and green trees is beguiling. Looking closer, the other side begins to reveal itself. The windows of the homes here are all barred. The buildings are cinderblock, and the paint is peeling. Walls and stairways are crumbling. It must be garbage day-big garbage bins are everywhere. But garbage is also in the streets, and the streets are empty of people. Stepping out of the car, there is a certain feeling in the air. It is familiar to me from other tough neighborhoods. A feeling like something is out of place. Growing up in Baltimore in the body of a white person, I felt this same tension when I strayed into unfamiliar areas-the environment told me that I was out of place-I did not belong there. I am reminded of a time years ago taking the subway home from the BWI airport. Stepping onto the waiting train, the feeling in the air was so thick, it could be cut with a knife-and it wasn’t just the humidity. What was it, what had just happened? Looking around, I saw that I was the only white person on the train. There was a quiet in the air, and a feeling of unknowing, like standing on the edge of a precipice where the whole world falls away into wide-open space.
Last spring Youth Yoga Dharma went onsite to the Sunnydale Projects in San Francisco. We had been a mere three blocks away at “The Village”-a newly built community center in Visitacion Valley. Through collaboration with the nation-wide agency Florence Crittenton Services (FCS), we offered a “Parent Wellness” stress reduction program for parents on welfare. This program incorporates mindfulness, yoga, and the Native American practice of Council, where we discuss how we are bringing these practices into our daily lives.
Parent Wellness is offered in conjunction with the “LEAP” (Learning + Earning = Achievement + Power) job-training program. The idea is to give the participants “life skills alongside job skills;’ so they have tools to identify and reduce stress and learn to manage the challenges of their lives. All of this is designed to give them more resources to get out of the hell they are living in. This spring FCS made the dramatic step of moving the LEAP program from the relative safety of The Village, to go three blocks down the street into the Willie Brown Teen Center in Sunnydale. The idea was to show the Sunnydale community that they are really there for them-trying to help people find new meaning in their lives, develop new skills, and get out of the projects.
Sunnydale has been in the news a lot lately. San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom has turned it into a postcard project of his second term, pledging to rebuild the decrepit housing project. The San Francisco Chronicle did a series of front-page articles as a result— interviewing residents and detailing the horrors of life in Sunnydale. Murders are nearly a weekly event here in Sunnydale. Most are gang related. There is also a lot of random violence—break-ins and bus stop muggings. The housing units were built for soldiers during World War II and haven’t been renovated since. As a result, plumbing and electrical problems are normal, as are severe mold, infestations of cockroaches, mice, and rats, and general disrepair. The families who live here often stay for generations. Such is the cycle of poverty in our country. Once you are in it, it can be tough to get out.
The Sunnydale projects are geographically isolated. What could be a beautiful selling point—located behind McLaren Park golf course, with open fields and woods nearby—becomes a nightmare of violence and fear. There is no grocery store within walking distance. Buses run infrequently, and drivers refuse to go through here at night. Similarly, repairmen and police can be hard to convince to come to this neighborhood. The residents of Sunnydale are living life under siege. Life here is as nerve-wracking as it is in any war-torn community. We do not have to go to Iraq, Afghanistan, or Somalia to find PTSD. It is happening right here in San Francisco.
Before I teach our first class, Sara Johnson—the LEAP program coordinator for FCS—takes me on a site visit. “Can you come by The Village so we can carpool?” she asks. “You bet,” I say. I understand an unspoken statement that I may not be welcome at Sunnydale without her as my escort. I would be on their turf, a stranger: a middle age white woman with no ties to anyone local—and as such, highly suspect and vulnerable to attack.
The Willie Brown Teen Center is just inside the invisible gates that divide Sunnydale from the rest of the city. Part of the reason FCS moved the LEAP program here is because of turf wars. There are residents of Sunnydale who do not feel safe to leave the projects. Gang violence makes them liable to be shot once they pass through those invisible gates. This unseen threat is enough to hold people hostage for their lifetime— sometimes for generations. The terror imposed by the threat of retaliation and violence is real.
Inside, the building is bleak. Cement and cinder block with a bad paint job. The hallway echoes, the floor is cold and bare. We go all the way to the back, and turn left. The tiny office is in the back corner of the building—far from the locked front entrance. A video monitor shows who is attempting to enter the building, and the doors are unlocked by remote control. Here I meet the gatekeepers—two big, burly black men with ski caps pulled down tight over their heads, dark sweat jackets, and baggy jeans barely hanging on to their hips. I feel as though I have entered a drug lord’s den inside the Teen Center office. They are full of attitude and pretty intimidating. I would hate to get on their bad list. While we are meeting in this cramped back office, a child of four or five walks in and knocks me off my feet in his drive to get past me to someone he knows.
“Whoa Nelly, I’m in his way!” I say as I step forward to make room for him to pass.
Everyone laughs. The tension breaks. I have passed my first test. From here on in, I am “the Yoga Lady” and am treated like a little sister (even though I am older than both of them) by these powerful men in the local community.
A few weeks later, class begins. On the first day there are four women and myself—Ayana and Cheryl are African American, Sonya is Latina, her parents having emigrated from El Salvador, and Josephine is proud to say that she speaks three languages—English, Russian, and Spanish. She is a true ethnic melting pot including Mexican, Russian, and Native American ancestry, among others. Everyone is between 20 and 30 years old and has young children. All are single parents. Some dropped out of high school due to their pregnancy. After introducing ourselves, I guide them in a short meditation. Through the open window the sounds of children playing in the pre-school next door float in, as well as other sounds from the community—a garbage truck, cars, a plane passing overhead. There are sounds from inside the building as well—people walking down the corridor, talking. Doors opening and closing. I guide the women to open up and accept all of it. We let the sounds come and go around us, as we tune into feeling the breath inside our bodies.
Afterwards, the talking stick is passed so that each woman gets a chance to speak about her experience of sitting still and breathing.
“I thought this was stupid, but man, meditation is tight! I feel really relaxed,” Ayana says.
Heads nod, and Josephine concurs, “That was really cool. I feel quiet inside, and I felt the chimes ring all up and down my spine.”
Later on, we do our yoga practice. We roll out yoga mats to protect us from that cold, hard floor as we get down on our hands and knees to practice cat and cow pose.
“This is how I got pregnant,” Ayana confesses. And the bonding begins.
As we are coming to the last portion of our class, a small, older Russian woman appears at the door. She is wearing a kerchief on her head and a floor length shapeless maroon dress. She does not appear to speak English. Josephine gets up and goes to the door. After a brief discussion in the hallway, she re-enters the room.
“This is my mom,” she says. “I am sorry to leave class. The Food Bank truck is here, and I have to go and get food for our family. Because we have no food, and we are hungry. I am sorry to leave class. I will be back next week.”
Once again, I am reminded of the reality of life in Sunnydale, where necessities like food and shelter are daily challenges: where the arrival of the Food Bank truck is a community event, met each week by crowds of neighbors; where murders and funerals are regular occurrences; where the gates open in only one direction—all roads lead in, and none lead out.
Each of these women has suffered tremendously in her life. They were born poor, got pregnant young, and were left to fend for themselves and their babies alone. Many dropped out of high school due to pregnancy. They would like to improve the lives of their children— and their own lives—through getting a job with a livable salary and moving to a safer neighborhood. They are seeking the American Dream, even as they are living the American Nightmare.
The truth is that they have all had jobs before. They have little education. Some have been in prison or juvenile hall. So what will make this time different? How will they truly change their lives,and keep a good job? In the LEAP program, the women learn basic job skills, but they also learn how to dress professionally, how to talk respectfully to employers, and they learn about self-esteem—how to confront the issues that can come between them and creating the life they want to live. Meanwhile, in the Parent Wellness Stress Reduction Program the women learn how to pay attention and care for themselves internally.
Through this combined approach, something amazing happens. After several weeks, these women start to have real, deep insights into their lives and what limits them. At our final class, Josephine shares this story.
“I was at a job interview, and things went all right. At the end of the interview, the woman said she wanted to get me some more information. She asked me to wait. She went away, and it took awhile. After a few minutes I was getting upset, thinking she had lied, and she didn’t really want to give me a job. Then I noticed my thoughts. I realized that I was thinking, Oh, she’ll never give me this job. She thinks I’m stupid, she’s just waiting for me to leave… But I realized it was just my mind thinking, and I didn’t know that any of that was true. So I stayed. And she came back!”
Josephine is ecstatic at her revelation. Other heads nod, everyone grins. The myth of worthlessness that has played a potent role in their lives is beginning to fall away.
Despite the bleakness, the violence, the hunger, the poverty, and neglect, I felt warmly received by Sunnydale Projects, and by these women. When I explained the Parent Wellness program to the participants in our first class, Sonya said, “You mean, we get meditation and yoga every week for free?” Her eyes beamed in gratitude. ❖
Names have been changed to preserve confidentiality.