Needle Park

Across the street from our apartment is what was once known locally as "Needle Park." The nickname came not from the tall pines, but from frequent drug deals that left the park strewn with needles. 


The city decided to take the park back with an interesting approach. They cleaned it up and directed little league baseballers to start playing here. 


Now the tink of ball and bat can be heard down the street nearly every day of the week. Now families take their kids to the playground on cool summer evenings. Now young men play basketball on the court. Now the park feels completely safe.


Last night my husband went over to join the ballers and I sat in the grass watching. The park was packed. It's probably one of the most multiethnic scenes I've witnessed, too.


This was the park that first drew us to our part of town. Every time we walked or drove by we both felt like this was the place for us. We're praying about what our role should look like here. How do we love our neighbors? I'm looking forward to posting updates as we figure it out.

Best of Visalia (according to me)

Yodigity - By-the-ounce frozen yogurt so you get just exactly as much of everything as you want. So much better than the by-the-topping places that give you a mountain of yogurt and charge 75 cents for a measly spoonful of Oreo crumbs. Yodiggity's peanutbutter actually tastes like peanutbutter, too! I usually mix it with chocolate and add all the chocolate toppings I can find plus a couple fresh strawberries. YUM! It usually comes out under $2 and they have punch card reward system. Ours is almost full :D


Mountain Mike's Pineapple Chicken Luau - Oh my goodness. Pineapple. Chicken. BBQ sauce. BACON. Their pepperoni is super super crispy and delicious, too. (I would be in pizza euphoria if I could have that pepperoni on a Me-n-Ed's crust. But alas...)


Figaro's Fish or Shrimp Tacos - The smell alone drew us in one night. And I'm not a big seafood person. But this was delicious. We've also had their burritos because they looked so tasty, but we'll have to try them again without the overpowering salsa. And ask for the tortillas to be grilled. 


Cafe 210 - Love the atmosphere, the food, the drinks. They have a really good chicken sandwich with chipotle sauce. Can't remember what it's called. And then we think this icy treat is called the Monkey Mocha: chocolate, coffee and bananas in frapuccino form. Of course, being a huge chai fan, I judge most places by their chai lattes and this one has a vanilla version that is certainly up to par. Christian owned Cafe 210 also hosts a variety of events from a rehab group to pastors' meetings to live music.


Thursday Night Farmers' Market - Downtown and just a couple blocks long, but packed with all the usual goodies. Fresh fruit, baked goods, specialty foods, kettle corn, tacos, small fruit trees, crafts, you name it.


Most of these places are chains, but they're still pretty much local to the central valley. I'll keep looking for good local spots.

Salt

The following musings were inspired by and a little paraphrased from C.S. Lewis's "Mere Christianity."

Jesus is like salt. 

When you put salt on watermelon, it tastes sweeter. When you put salt on chicken, it tastes more savory. Salt brings out the flavor of whatever it's added to. (Unless you put a lot, A LOT of salt and then the thing just tastes salty. All parables have their limits, but I'll continue to muse on this one.)

Now let's take another seasoning like mint. Mint lends its overpowering flavor to anything in comes in contact with. Have you ever put peppermint patties in the same bag as, say, M&Ms? The M&Ms, though plain, come out tasting minty.

Some of my dear brothers and sisters think Jesus is like mint. You put him on and you smell just like every other Christian out there. Overly polite, Jesus t-shirt wearing, KLOVE listening, guitar playing Christians.

There are some things that all Christians should have in common, like the fruit of the Spirit and unity. Matching t-shirts are not one of them.

And I think this is why some of us struggle with transparency and true fellowship. We think, "Sunday morning, let's put on our Jesus masks."

But Jesus is like salt.

Or some of us, I've heard it said, try to be holier than Jesus. We taste a little too salty, like the whole shaker spilled onto your french fries. Let's not forget Jesus turned water into wine, threw over tables in the house of God, and ate with sinners and tax collectors.

Jesus is like just the right pinch of salt in a golden caramel sauce.

Jesus brings out the best in each of us.

THE DARKEST PART OF TOWN

What makes people blind to see
the arrogance
the stupidity
Is it darkness?
Or Rather
Some bright false fluorescence
Ricocheting off abandoned mansions
Emanating from the empty dead
A semblance of propriety
A semblance of sobriety
The lifeblood of the city's arteries
is clogged up
stuck
They run grey with the absence
of so much
But not Stuff
Oh no Stuff is King in this city
Stuff is King
Bow down you multitude of mindless waysiders
Here goes the King
There goes the King
But you can't get enough
You measure your life by Him
So that by His fullness
You fail to see
The putrid emptiness
Futility

Don't you dare call my side the darkest part
You know nothing of a front yard
Except your water bill
You know nothing of
Loud music
Smokey barbecues
Paleta carts
Front porch dominoes
Smiles and hellos
Diversity
or faith

Look around
The sun shines on my side
The light is brighter in the darkness
But you
You've confused the sunlight for
the false fluorescence.

What we waste

I first developed a desire to dumpster dive in 2006 while reading an article in Sojourners magazine. It really made sense to me, but when I told others about the idea their reactions were less enthusiastic.

"Why would you want to dumpster dive?" (i.e. you have enough money to buy perfectly good food)

"Ew," and "Sketchy" were other common responses.

But remember when you were a kid and someone told you, "Finish your vegetables. There are starving kids in Africa." I remember thinking, whether or not I eat my vegetables, the problem of starvation will not be solved.

And then there is the issue of so much waste. 

Perfectly good food must be thrown away by grocery stores everyday. The reasons for taking items off the shelves are good enough. It's just that there are starving kids in the U.S. as well. Sometimes those kids are right down the street from a dumpster full of rejected edibles.

Some businesses and even cities are good at putting our excess into hungry hands. For example, in San Luis Obispo a program of volunteers called Food Share collects left overs at the end of the day from Golden China Buffet, Mondeo's and two Starbucks. Then the volunteers drive over to the homeless shelter and drop off the food. Only four businesses are visited, but the amount of food that would otherwise end up in the trash is amazing.

Another reason to dumpster dive (besides being cheap or - ehem - on a budget) is as part of a simpler lifestyle. Or, if you're like me, just do it for the adventure.

Tonight two of my roommates and I had our own dumpster diving excursion. Two of us had been talking about it all year. And this is one reason why I love living in community with people who are committed to social justice: they will do crazy things with me!

Now in case you are considering your own venture out into the nighttime world of supermarket back alleys, beware that it may take several snooping attempts before any loot is found. In our case, we visited three stores in two different towns without finding anything more than cardboard, unpackaged raw chicken and hamster poop. At one point we accidentally locked ourselves into the cinderblock wall surrounding a dumpster. One of my roommates had to scale the wall out and unlatch the gates.

At our fourth stop, we climbed into the dumpster and finally found what we were looking for: salad, eggs, cookies and grapes. I especially loved the four bouquets of partly wilted flowers lying amongst the frozen meatballs and broken basket. We put them on our dining room table as a bright and fragrant monument to our very first dumpster diving experience.

Photo: our flowers!

Flowers Bloom in the City

Springtime is probably my favorite in Fresno. 

The weather stays in the 60s during the day. The sun falls softly on the sidewalks. 

It is the best time to walk down L St or Fulton Mall or over to the water tower. It is the best time to ride your bike over the 99 to the West Side and see flowers blooming in empty lots by the railroad tracks.

Yes. I love springtime in Fresno.

Yesterday we met some of our neighbors from across the street. Three little girls came over to draw with sidewalk chalk. We played tic-tac-toe and drew rainbows. I showed one four-year-old how to spell her name. We had cart wheel and hand stand contests. And we laughed.

This is why I moved to Fresno. I mean, this is not a holistic picture of why. It is a snapshot: sharing a spring afternoon full of joy with three little girls from the city.

photo by M. A. Debenedetto, chalk drawing by an eight-year-old

How much we have to be grateful for

For some reason I have always felt an inner cringe when people see some condition of poverty and say, "It makes me think about how much I have to be grateful for." Not knowing how else to respond, I usually just hmm. But today I was reflecting on the year long clothing fast I am about to complete in a couple months and the idea of gratefulness came up again.

Yes, I am grateful that I have a jacket to wear in the winter and clean underwear. I am grateful that if a hole rips in one of my shirts, I have others I can wear. But the result of this fast has not so much been to make me grateful for all that I have but to make me critical.

When I hear about a child in my neighborhood who does not have a winter coat, I am not immediately thankful for what I have. Instead I think of the three or four coats hanging in my parent's entry closet - the ones that have not been touched for years. When I look at another person's need I am not thankful for my comfort, but mindful of my excess.

This is not to say that I always respond in a practical way to the needs I see. There, I am quite guilty. Since I have not made a resolution this year, I will now resolve to respond practically to at least one need I see a month. Feel free to keep me accountable. And as always, feel free to make a counter argument. Perhaps you think I do not give due credit to thankfulness.