Breakfast at Sally's - Seven

January 31, 2010 - Getting Saved Head On ...

Chapter 13 is a description of Richards' experience at Pastor Bob's Church. After receiving an offer of a place to stay from Nurse Tina, Richard set out to find Pastor Bob at his car dealership. Tina's offer to Richard was kept a secret from Doctor "Z" at Tina's request. The pills Dr. Z had given to Richard had not started to work yet, but with the assurance that another week would make all the difference, Richard went looking for Pastor Bob. He found him multi-tasking - selling a car, arranging for a repossession, and preparing to collect rent from a tenant. In Chapter 14, Richard "finds a home" at Tina's place.

• What is your initial reaction to Tina's generosity? Why did she not want the doctor to know of her offer to Richard?
  
• Have you ever met anyone like Pastor Bob?
• Does anyone believe the line: No money, no honey? (Page 172.)
• What do you think about the Beatles song, Imagine?
• The Pentecostal Church Service that Richard attended at Pastor Bob's church sounds like a caricature. However, assuming it is a true and accurate description of what went on, what are the assumptions Pastor Bob and the people in that church are making about God? About people?
• What are the assumptions we make in our church about God? About other people?
• In Chapter 14 Richard goes to Tina's where he has been offered a small trailer to stay for free. Does what happened to Richard ever happen to people around here? (Page 184.)
• What does Richard have that neither Roberta and Madonna have?
• Where did Richard get it? Where do you get it?

Looking forward to our conversation!

Breakfast Sally's - Six

And Are We Yet Alive ...

Chapters 11 and 12 tell sad stories about Andy and Karen. Andy is an alcoholic whose father beat him and kicked him out of the house when he was fifteen. Karen was a woman Richard related to - someone of means once - someone who had lost it all.

C solicits help from Richard to collect Andy from the alley behind the 7-Eleven - I want to get to him before the police do, C explains.

• What would we do if someone like Andy was in Saranac Lake or Lake Placid?
• Is there anyone like Andy in Saranac Lake or Lake Placid?
• One year Andy was picked up by the police forty-four times; they would let him "dry out" for four or five hours, and then send him back out on the street. How many more times should the police pick up Andy?
• (P. 147) C charged Brian ten dollars a month to rent a front seat of his "Armadillo". How did C determine what would he would charge Brian?
• How do we determine how much to charge people?
• Have you ever been in "no toilet" land?
• Richard tells us: I didn't feel sorry for Andy ... Do you?
• In Chapter 12 we meet Karen. Richard writes: All the things that made her "Karen" were gone. What are the things that make you you?
• Read Karen's poems again (P 161 -163). How do you feel as you read them? Why?
• How do you think Karen felt in her final seconds of life?
• Richard ponders Karen's eternal status - Is she in hell, or heaven? Which do you think? Why?

I'm looking forward to our gather on Sunday evening. We meet at Dick and Patti Skeels home. See you then!

Breakfast at Sally's - Five

The conversation for Sunday evening, January 17 - will take us through Chapters 8, 9 and 10. Here are eight questions for the purpose of getting the conversation going:

• What is the definition of "normal"? (See pages 118 and 134 ...)
• What is the line of separation between innocence and complicity regarding our participation in systems that keep people poor? (P. 119.)
• Who is Richard describing on P 123?
• Is there anything in Chapter 9 you need to discuss?
• What will be the impact of the "No Touch" policies our schools, hospitals and churches have adopted? (How safe are our children? How safe are you?)
• What would a "glad bag of hope" contain for you?
• What is the miracle(s) you need? (P. 142.)
• Perhaps we can discuss the efficacy of psychiatric care - have you ever been to therapy? What are the positive effects? Were there any frustrations? Would you classify the care Richard was getting as helpful?

Looking forward to the conversation together this evening at Thayer's!

Breakfast at Sally's - Four

The conversation for Sunday evening, January 10, 2010 brings us to Chapters 7 of Breakfast at Sally's. And once again, the word "Sanctuary" pops up ... LeMieux writes: I needed to find some sanctuary from the cold February rain ... We have spoken about the Biblical concept of "sanctuary", coming from the idea of the "cities of refuge" (see Deuteronomy 19), and how this notion is carried over into LeMieux's writing. In Chapter 7, the "Sanctuary" is a hospital waiting room. This sanctuary is not, however, completely safe, as there are security guards on the lookout for homeless people who have come to rest or get warm. And it is in this chapter that we learn the story of Richard's family - the three siblings he had that he never knew.

1. What are your family's secrets - the things that can't be discussed?
2. Do our secrets have less of an impact on us by virtue of the fact that we don't talk about them?
3. Were you ever given the "gift of innocence"? (See page 100.) Have you ever given it to someone else? Have you ever intentionally taken it away from anyone?
4. My world changed that day on that swing, writes LeMieux. (Page 101.) What is the connection between grief and depression?
5. What do you suppose Marcia meant when she said: And when I die, I guess I'm going to be homeless, too - at least until Jesus comes and gets me and takes me to his home.
6. Richard saved some of his hamburger for Willow. How did Marcia respond to this action? Have you ever been inspired to be more generous because of the generosity of others? (Pages 103-104.)
7. In the Hebrew Bible, Sanctuary is a place; in this chapter, Sanctuary for Richard is a person. Which is it? Why?
8. The last 6 pages of Chapter 7 are particularly poignant for me. Re-read them; reflect on them; are there insights you can glean from these words? What are your thoughts?

Looking forward to our conversation on Sunday evening!

Breakfast at Sally's - Three: Five-Star Politics

For our Home Group conversation on December 20 we are looking at Chapters 5 & 6 of Richard LeMieux's Breakfast at Sally's.

As Chapter Five begins Richard writes: A fog had settled over the city. As his homelessness begins to extend and expand one senses a fog settling over him as well. He heads to a shipyard, but doesn't have any particular destination in mind, going the opposite direction from everyone else. He writes of coming to a fork in the road with not enough gas to head north, and incapable of facing what lay to the south.

However, the shipyard does remind him of his former life; he finds himself in a place he would pass through with his golfing buddies, and he recalls for us a particular day with his foursome. They had stopped in Bremerton for breakfast before hitting the links. The chapter concludes with him giving a ride to a young man to Sally's.

Chapter Six - titled The Food Angels - reads a little like a restaurant travelogue, with four different Christian denominations (and five different churches) referenced. Richard and "C" provide a rating for their respective food ministries to the poor.

Some questions for us to ponder:

1. As Richard remembers his golfing buddies he describes their tastes in clothing - Mephisto loafers, Cutter and Buck polo shirts; Johnston and Murphy, Dockers and Calloway (Page 71). He was leading the "designer life". From whence does the pressure to be stylish come? What perpetuates it? Who in our society are the ones most vulnerable to it?
2. How well did the "god of golf" serve Richard? Who (or what) are the "gods" competing for your attention?
3. Richard gives a young man a ride to Sally's - we know nothing about him except that his father had kicked him out (Page 75). If you had to create a one-paragraph explanation of the young man's predicament, what would you write?
4. Richard refers to young people who work in the Soup Kitchens (Page 79); he says such opportunities enable them to "get a 'warm and fuzzy feeling' from helping the poor." How effective is the promise of a "warm and fuzzy feeling" in recruiting people to work with and for the poor? Why?
5. In the very next sentence Richard writes of what young people can learn from helping the homeless. What might we possibly have to learn from the poor? What might they possibly have to learn from us?
6. On Pages 81-82 Richard briefly delves into politics. According to him, there are not many homeless and poor who are "Republican". What is his line of reasoning? Is it fair? Why, or why not?
7. On Page 82-83 the police show up at The Lord's Diner. After they remove a young man from the room, C comments: This is usually a sanctuary. He must have been a really bad guy. Was "Sanctuary" maintained or violated with this police raid?
8. An Episcopal, two Lutheran, one Church of God, and one United Methodist church all served food and provided clothing to homeless people. What, besides the food, does Richard point out as something in common between them all? (Page 87.)

I look forward to our conversation together!

Breakfast at Sally's - Two: Begging at Fancy; Receiving at Plain ...

For the Breakfast at Sally's conversation on December 13 we are looking at Chapters 3 & 4. Author Richard LeMieux inserts some memories - flashbacks - in the course of setting the scene for each chapter. An Episcopal Church parking lot is where Chapter 3 begins; Sally's is where Chapter 4 will end. We meet Earl, Betty and their daughters; we also encounter Jake - first introduced to us in Chapter 1.
The closest I have ever come to begging would be hitchhiking. I've never had to plead for money, beg for a meal, barter for lodging. Richard paints the picture of the life he used to lead - in his 5600 square-foot waterfront home. He recalls the trip to Europe in celebration of his 50th birthday. He recalls the money he made as a sportswriter, a sales rep. And then, he remembers the day he spent his last dollar - it was Thanksgiving Day, 2002. With no other options that he could think of, he began to steel himself for the task of begging. His first stop: Central Market - the upscale grocery store where he estimates he had spent $192,000 over a period of 20 years of shopping there.
Some questions for us to ponder:

1. Richard calls the parking lot of the Episcopal Church a "sanctuary". What did that word mean to him? What does it mean to you?
2. What is the difference between "begging" and "fund raising"?
3. Does Central Market owe Richard anything? Does Price Chopper (or Sam's Club, or Walmart, or ...) owe you anything?
4. Two beggars are in Lake Placid; it's a Saturday afternoon. One is in front of The Gap on Main Street; the other is in front of Stewarts across from the School. Who do you think will get the most money? Why?
5. Who is the Bible's most famous beggar? (Luke 16:19ff.) What was the impact of the beggar's life on the rich man?
6. To what extent, in your opinion, were Earl, Betty, Melissa and Katie "anonymous" in Bremerton? What are the circumstances that make it possible for a family of four to exist below the radar of Social Services in our community?
7. Sharon was the day-time bartender at the Maple Leaf Tavern (Page 63). She "knew the important things in her world ..." What are the qualities of a bar and the attributes of a bartender that the church might want to emulate?
8. On Page 66, C asks Richard to deliver something to Jake. What did you think was in the bag?
9. Page 67 - Richard writes: "With my stomach full and warm and a few bucks in my pocket, there seemed to be the faintest rebirth of hope, or at least a willingness to not give in to despair." What does it take to knock hope out of you? To restore it?

Looking forward to our time together!

Breakfast at Sally's ... One

The Sunday evening Home Group is reading "Breakfast at Sally's" and discussing it when we gather. Our first conversation is this Sunday, December 6, 2009. We will be discussing the first two chapters. If you haven't gotten the book yet, you can pick one up at the parsonage.
This is a story that, in the words of author Richard LeMieux, is "98 Proof". 98% true. Some names have been changed, and chronologies adjusted "to make the story more accessible".
The first character we meet is "C". And the location for the opening scene is "Sally's" - a Salvation Army Soup Kitchen in Bremerton, Washington. C will serve as Richard's spiritual guide, mentor of the road, "angel".
"Sally's" is a place where "just about every age and nationality is represented ..." It is also a place where human need lands with a vengeance - people who are clinically depressed, mentally ill, physically damaged, emotionally scarred.
The second most important character we encounter is Willow - Richard's Bichon Frise "wonder dog". Willow will be the source of unconditional love that carries 59 year-old Richard through some of the darkest moments of his experience of homelessness. Some questions and ideas we will be discussing this Sunday include:

1. What if our church looked like Sally's in terms of the mix of race, culture, need, talent?
2. What is your individual unspoken judgment of poverty and people who are poor?
3. What is our corporate unspoken judgment of people who are poor?
4. C quotes Martin Luther King (Page 40): "We all have a task and let us do it with a sense of divine dissatisfaction. Let us be dissatisfied as long as we have a wealth of creeds and poverty of deeds." What is "divine dissatisfaction"? How does it manifest itself in our church?
5. What do you think of C's pondering regarding Christ's coming again (Page 41) - "Would he be white, black, Asian, look like Saddam Hussein instead of Keven Costner or Tom Cruise? What if he didn't fit our image of him? What if he was bald? or gay?" Which of these images do you find most disconcerting? Why?
6. C quotes Steinbeck saying an author's relationship to society is to be its watchdog. Writers should satirize its silliness, attack its injustices, stigmatize its faults." (Page 43.) Would you agree or disagree? Why?
7. We will explore in some depth the first three full paragraphs on Page 40.

I look forward to our conversation at Jen and Steve's this coming Sunday at 7.