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(My letter to Gretchen regarding Gateway Terrace--with mistakes and all LOL)
THOUGHTS, IDEAS, THEORIES AND OBSERVATIONS
(Warning: I am verbose and don’t think in/on a linear plane.)
Hearing
about the controversy going on at Gateway my mind immediately filled
with so many thoughts and here they are in no particular order;
A while back I wrote in the Gateway Gazette that my biggest complaint about Gateway is that I have no complaints about Gateway.
Oh,
I suppose I could complain about the nerve of Lisa insisting that I
have a good day every time she sees me. And then there is Babs, who
wouldn’t take no for an answer when the bus route #55 stopped passing
by Gateway, shoving an application for TOPS in my hand so I could get
anywhere in the city I wanted to go. Oh, yes, it is also her fault that
I get 50 pounds of food every month from the Pantry of Broward and I
have a free, amplified phone. When will that woman leave me alone?!?!?
(Never, I hope.)
Let’s not get into how annoying it is having
Alicia dazzle me with her smile whenever she sees me or having Valerie
answer my questions no matter how stupid they may be without making me
feel stupid.
I know, I really should complain that all of them
were too concerned (how can you be too concerned??) when I had my aorta
valve replacement surgery because their concern helped in my recovery
and I couldn’t moan and groan for additional months.
Here’s a
legitimate complaint--the maintenance crew. How dare they come to my
place both times I flooded the apartment (Don’t ask!!) and clean it up
without making me feel guilty, or recommending a mechanic when I mixed
water in the oil tank in the car who came and fixed the problem and
didn’t charge me an arm and a leg, or fixing something in my apartment
generally within 24 hours of my filing a report?!?!
And how can any complain about Suzie who, though younger than many of us, mothers us all.
I
don’t think I have ever met anyone who goes above and beyond the duties
of his job than Lee and I guess we can all complain about Carol because
she enforces the rules we are suppose to follow and sign the papers
saying we will.
I look around and when I hear ANYONE complain I
don’t comprehend it. I have been living here for 10 years and with one
exception have never felt less than lucky to be living here.
Now
on to the subject that saw me seeing red. How can anyone who is a
senior, who has lived 60+ years on earth, has seen what hate and
discrimination can do to human beings put other people down? How can
people who have faced prejudice themselves refer to others as ‘they’ or
‘them’? Are you Irish? Italian? Are you Catholic? Baptist? Can your
faith, race, nationality be stereotyped? Were you parents, grandparents
immigrants? Did you family come over on the Mayflower? Would you
qualify as a WASP? Or are you a thoroughbred, or like most of us, a
‘mutt’?
Every evening, around 5, there is a group of us who meet
and talk on the breezeway. It isn’t a private club just a group of
neighbors and anyone, everyone is welcome. We are all different: male,
female, old and older, gay and nongay, Hispanic, Black, White, etc.
Yes, we argue and fight, mainly about politics, but the next evening we
start over as if nothing happened, grudges not held over.
What
do you care and/or how does it affect you if someone with more money
than you moves in or someone younger than you lives in your or another
building? Should someone be Hispanic, White, Black, tall, short, fat,
skinny, male, female, gay, nongay, single, married, how does that
affect your rent?
I have hundreds of pages that I have been
given by Gateway over the years putting in black and white the rules
and regulations that we must follow to live here and that we sign
saying we read them. I did not see one line about my having to like,
speak to, acknowledge or be friends with anyone else living here.
I
am Jewish and Gay and a Yankee. I have lived in the Bronx and Manhattan
in New York, Laguna Beach and Hollywood in California, in Memphis,
Tennessee, Miami Beach and Fort Lauderdale in Florida and I have fought
on the front lines of discrimination for over 60 years. I have always
used my name in these fights and didn’t hide behind being anonymous.
(Why do I feel I just put a target on my back? Hey, if they are going
to discriminate I am a perfect one of ‘them’ and ‘they’.)
It is
a big mistake acknowledging these dissentients who are few while
involving the over 260+ people who get along with their neighbors. If
these people are known they should be dealt with as a group and not
involve us. If these people truly believe in what/how they feel than
why don’t they write an article for the Gateway Gazette and sign their
names to it? Their names should be made public and they should be given
a forum to say what they want and be listened to by people who want to
listen to them. They should come out of the closet!
My feeling
is that if you are unhappy here, for any reason, there is an exit. You
can put in for a transfer to another place and I will tell you right
now it will be worse wherever you move because this is the best.
Everyone
who works here cares about everyone who lives here. They have to in
order to put up with the nonsense they put up with. I would like to see
YOU (especially the dissentients) work behind the receptionist’s desk
for 40 hours a week and have to listen to all the silly complaints,
(“Can’t you stop that bird in the tree from making noise?”--it’s
happened folks!!), requests, immediate problems (or so the resident
thinks they are) and keep your cool. I don’t think any are making the
money they should be making and/or deserve or do they get the respect
they deserve from everyone who lives here.
Do I have more to
say? Yes, I always do but I have either gotten my message over by now
or no matter how much more I say I won’t.
There is no room for
discrimination at Gateway or in our senior years. Everyone should,
“Love Thy Neighbor” and/or treat each other as they would like to be
treated, with respect, no matter what our differences.
Tomorrow:The meeting, Gretchen's answers, the dissentients
