Thanksgiving in Apache Junction

The nighg t before, Cam and Dale Sr. and Dale Jr.

Lighting the fire in the AM

Cam came over to hang out

Ethan likes to line up his little Lego men on things. First he swang on the swings and then decided it was a good place for his Lego men.

Shelby protests

Michelle and Shayla

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Ziggy waits expectantly for a turkey scrap hand-out

You can see the smoke rising from the smoker, to the right of the fire pit. On table are a jar of sun-tea, and a restaurant-type steam-table container holding barbecue sauce to swipe the turkeys with

By the time we finished cooking everything,

The last two days have been quite cold (for here)

"Super Moon", Volunteering for DACA, and Dale Jr.'s International Scout Club Ride

We had a beautiful clear night for the "supermoon". The second photo was taken early the following morning.

Last Saturday I took a step toward fulfilling a promise I had made to myself: that if Trump won the election, I would do some volunteering to help immigrants. My friend Ann was already helping at a clinic at a church in Phoenix, helping applicants to the DACA program to collect the necessary paperwork and fill out the application forms. (DACA means Deferred Action for Children of Aliens). I believe this is the category which is referred to as "dreamers".

The first few times a volunteer helps out at the clinic, they merely "shadow" someone who has already been trained.

In order to apply, the applicant must show proof of living in the USA for every quarter of every year since their parents brought them over the border. The boy who was applying was 16 years old and had been brought over the border by his parents when he was three years old. He had received "Student of the Month" awards for every semester he had been in school. His report cards were all A's and B's.

It was the second time he and his mother had come in to the clinic. This time she had brought the paperwork which  had been found missing the visit before. Doctor's records, report cards, those Student of the Month Awards, even a bill from a power company.
They were still missing proof for the boy's pre-school years, and for the current semester (as he'd not received report cards yet this fall). Luckily, the woman who runs the clinic works as a counselor in the Phoenix school system and she was able to use her work internet to bring up his attendance for the past few months, and print it out! For his pre-school years, the mother was relieved that that she could bring in tax records, doctor's shot records, and paperwork from the WIC program (all of which she had at home.)

I was able to help by making copies as Ann checked off the paperwork. For instance, a report card might show proof of residence for two different quarters of the year, so a copy mist be provided for each quarter. There was a little portable copy machine right in the same room.

When Ann was done with checking off everything, Laura, the woman who runs the clinic, came over and double checked that everything was there. The clinic has a 100% success rate; all applications which they have sent in have been accepted. There was one application which they helped with which was not accepted, but in that case the applicant was told that some documents were still missing, but chose to mail everything in anyway, though they were warned not to do so until the missing documents were added.

I was able to use my Spanish to chat with the mother of the applicant, and soon the law student who was shadowing Ann was asking me for this or that Spanish word. So I felt useful. Next time I go I will probably make copies for him, as he has now been deemed ready to check off the paperwork himself.

The actual typed form is filled in by a woman who has volunteered at the clinic for a long time, as the applicant and/or their parent looks on.

Ann also picked up some donated diapers and a car-seat from a store-room at the church which is used by an unofficial group which houses illegal immigrants who have been discovered and are waiting for their hearing. We dropped off these items at an apartment where two students were hosting a family who were waiting for their hearing. This group is not connected at all with the DACA clinic. Ann herself has hosted some of these people, Guatemalans one weekend and two Haitian women another time. They had been in Brazil working in the sugar cane fields and now that that work was over they'd attempted to enter the U.S. and been caught. Ann is braver than I!

If these illegals have no where to stay while they wait for their hearing, they must stay in a group jail cell, without beds (Ann said) even if they have babies with them and even if it's an over-night stay.

When Trump assumes the office of president, he plans to end the DACA program. So, since the election, the clinic advises people that they are taking a chance. (If they enroll, that there is no guarantee that a successful application will protect them after January 20th.) The woman who runs the clinic feels that people who have already been accepted into the program will continue to be safe from deportation, and that when the program is cancelled that it will be stopped only for future applicants. But she warns all applicants that she has no proof either way.

Friday afternoon I went to the travel agent and bought tickets for the weekend in Idaho. I was not sure I had enough on my card to buy them on-line. I will leave Phoenix Friday morning and return Monday afternoon.

I had gotten so behind with everything during all that campaign volunteering, plus the weekend trips to Jerome for Halloween weekend and the Berkeley weekend. I'm finally starting to feel that I'm getting "caught up".

Yesterday was an absolutely gorgeous day, cool wind, bright sunshine, huge brilliantly-white clouds with some gray shadows.

Dale Jr. stopped by last night. He showed us some photos on his phone of the ride he went on Sunday, with the International Scout club of this area. I asked him to send me this photo. He has been on two of these rides, and has really enjoyed them (even though his engine came loose half-way through the first one and other club-members had to help him temporarily chain it back on. He quoted one guy as saying, "You haven't lived until you've broken down on a ride!"

His International Scout was given to him by his grandfather Eb before Eb died, and Dale Jr. has spent a lot of time and money getting it to where it was road-worthy. I'm so glad to see him having so much fun with it.

Cool photo, huh?

Love, Lennie

Last Couple of Weeks

Above: one of my hand-painted signs next to a commercial one. The man on the left was the coordinator of all the phone banks, Art Bernardino, a great guy. Before he retired he was a court administrator in Virginia. His wife was a prosecutor there and he said she could switch from her normal Brooklyn accent to a southern accent any time she was pleading her case in court.
 
 The last few weeks of the campaign were quite frenzied for me. Lots of driving into Gilbert to the office, making phone calls, going canvassing. There were also two weekends away: Halloween weekend in Jerome, and the Berkeley tea/books for Africa weekend. It's been a week since the election and I still feel "totally fried".

In the photo below, Sandy and Andy are assembling the ramp to carry up the books into the storage unit Sandy rented.

Many of our friends came to load the garage-full of books. Above, Michael Jarnigan. Wendell drove down from Davis.

Above, a sign in Berkeley. As Hillary had California "in the bag" there were no presidential candidate posters. But supporters of the different propositions were using Trump's face to make their point.

The last day, we had more phone-bankers than ever, including this nine-year old  boy whom Art is shown training.

 

Early the morning of election day, I installed signs on each freeway exit in time for the morning rush hour traffic to see them. 

Sunday evening Dale Sr. and I attended a memorial service for Jane Hilton, a wonderful woman whom I'd spent five days in Mexico with, she went down with Ann and I. I had known that she was a cancer survivor, but had not known that it came back with a vengeance this year.

Jane was only 41 when she died, but she had played violin with so many musicians in the valley, mostly Irish music and classical music. They all came to play at the memorial.

Ann with family: son Brendon, daughter Gail, son-in-law Shawn.

Dale and I stayed in a motel near the Irish Cultural Center. This is us having breakfast the next day at the Breakfast Club, on the second-floor patio of the Palomar Hotel.

Love, Lennie