In the days of increasing and increasing homelessness, most are lost for a clue as to what to do. Why not bring back the WPA projects as were done in the 30’s. In our area, numerous hiking trails into the hills were paved by the WPA who also built bridges and many stone walls. They stand as good as ever to this day. An idea.

As a medical insured with United Health, I have been very happy with my coverage for the last year. Basically, I have had no problems with them and I love the coverage with multiple gyms for workouts.

After about one year, I have received repeat phone calls from the company requesting time for a ‘wellness exam.” At first I told them I already had a regular doctor and got this exam from her each year. Not to be deterred, the phone calls kept coming and coming. Finally, I agreed to have a nurse come to my place for a wellness exam.

The date of the exam, I made sure to be there on time and have cold water in the fridge in case someone needed some. The nurse showed up with a sidekick, another nurse in training. The exam took an hour and included my weight, bloodpressure and heart. In addition, was a cognitive test for my memory. All of these items were stock in trade and usual for all exams I get at the clinic. The disturbing part came with the long, long list of deep and probing questions about my entire health history to include information about mother, father, brothers and sisters. I answered the questions. The question went on about drugs and alcohol for myself and all family members. I had to answer questions about all surgeries and injuries that I had had in the last year. I discussed two recent surgeries that were for arthritis. The nurse got practically excited when I admitted to smoking cigarettes 30 years ago. She wanted me to tell her how many cigarettes I smoked per day. I laughed at this point and said I couldn’t remember that far back but it was only ‘occasional, social smoking.’ More questions followed, I had my temperature taken and got measured for height and my BMI was calculated. I had to have a pressure test to the bottoms of my feet to check for nerve damage. The digging kept on about depression, mental illness, treatment for psychological problems. The nurse was very nervous when she showed up.

After giving her negative answers to most of these questions and we found that my BMI was low enought, blood pressure low enough and heart ok, the nurse seemed to relax. By the time the pair left I realized that I had been subjected not to a wellness exam, it was a disqualifing exam. This was an intensive investigation to see if the company had a basis for cancelling my coverage. I was shocked when it all sank in. I await the results of my exam. Hopefully I passed. However, next year, my response will be that they can get copies of my records from my GP. What an invasive and demeaning experience. And, how many people have to go through this.? God forbid I had anything serious wrong with me, short of age, of course. Wow! I can’t talk to family members about this as they are all military and have life long coverage. Review the next.

https://apnews.com/press-release/globe-newswire/business-health-7ac8e3da7f47c4064e7c49d28b82db4c

U.S. Federal Court Finds UnitedHealthcare Affiliate Illegally Denied Mental Health and Substance Use Coverage in Nationwide Class Action

BY INC., PSYCH-APPEALPublished 10:47 AM MST, March 5, 2019Share

— Landmark Case Challenges the Nation’s Largest Mental Health Insurance Company for Unlawful, Systematic Claims Denials – and Wins — Groundbreaking Ruling Affects Certified Classes of Tens of Thousands of Patients, Including Thousands of Children and Teenagers — Judge Rules, “At every level of care that is at issue in this case, there is an excessive emphasis on addressing acute symptoms and stabilizing crises while ignoring the effective treatment of members’ underlying conditions.”

LOS ANGELES, March 05, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — In a landmark mental health ruling, a federal court held today that health insurance giant United Behavioral Health (UBH), which serves over 60 million members and is owned by UnitedHealth Group, used flawed internal guidelines to unlawfully deny mental health and substance use treatment for its insureds across the United States. The historic class action was filed by Psych-Appeal, Inc. and Zuckerman Spaeder LLP, and litigated in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

The federal court found that, to promote its own bottom line, UBH denied claims based on internally developed medical necessity criteria that were far more restrictive than generally accepted standards for behavioral health care. Specifically, the court found that UBH’s criteria were skewed to cover “acute” treatment, which is short-term or crisis-focused, and disregarded chronic or complex mental health conditions that often require ongoing care.

The court was particularly troubled by UBH’s lack of coverage criteria for children and adolescents, estimated to number in the thousands in the certified classes.

“For far too long, patients and their families have been stretched to the breaking point, both financially and emotionally, as they battle with insurers for the mental health coverage promised by their health plans,” said Meiram Bendat of Psych-Appeal, Inc. and co-counsel for the plaintiffs who uncovered the guideline flaws. “Now a court has ruled that denying coverage based on defective medical necessity criteria is illegal.”

In its decision, the court also held that UBH misled regulators about its guidelines being consistent with the American Society of Addiction Medicine (ASAM) criteria, which insurers must use in Connecticut, Illinois and Rhode Island. Additionally, the court found that UBH failed to apply Texas-mandated substance use criteria for at least a portion of the class period.

While the Paul Wellstone and Pete Domenici Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act of 2008 requires parity for mental health and substance use benefits, insurers are permitted to evaluate claims for medical necessity. However, by using flawed medical necessity criteria, insurers can circumvent parity in favor of financial considerations and prevent patients from receiving the type and amount of care they actually require.

In his decision, Chief Magistrate Judge Joseph Spero concluded that “the record is replete with evidence that UBH’s Guidelines were viewed as an important tool for meeting utilization management targets, ‘mitigating’ the impact of the 2008 Parity Act, and keeping ‘benex’ [benefit expense] down.”

Psych-Appeal, Inc. and Zuckerman Spaeder LLP were appointed class counsel by the federal court and represent plaintiffs in several class actions against other insurers.

For more information, visit www.psych-appeal.com.

Contact: Chantal Allan (310) 598-3690 x.201|callan@psych-appeal.com

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2022/08/02/masculinity-men-emotions/

How men can save relationships by learning to be vulnerable

Perspective by Andrew Reiner

August 2, 2022 at 9:00 a.m. EDT

(Isabel Espanol/Illustration for The Washington Post)

When Nick Firchau and his wife were dating, he trekked from his Brooklyn apartment into Manhattan to buy fresh scallops to make her dinner. This was a big deal for Firchau, now 43, who rarely cooked and wanted to impress his girlfriend. According to him, she grew vocally upset because he neglected to cook a vegetable, too. “I couldn’t believe she didn’t appreciate all the effort I went to,” he told me.

He never said anything to her, though. Instead, he fumed for days — a dynamic that continued for years into their marriage. When conflict arose, and he felt hurt, Firchau let those feelings “marinate,” which led to pent-up “anger and resentment, because the air hadn’t been cleared the first time.”

Neglecting to examine and tend to emotional needs is common to many men, it turns out. For a number of reasons — many rooted in socialized norms about masculinity — men are often taught very young to diminish, or even ignore, their emotions in relationships. They do this, however, at the expense of their relationships’ health and their own well-being. When men learn to better understand their emotional needs, the payoff can be profound.

The common myth about men and emotions goes something like this: Men are wired differently than women, and, as a result, they don’t have the same emotional needs. But Israeli researchers who pored over scans of more than 1,400 brains discovered that human brain structures and features are a “mosaic,” resistant to easy binary expectations about gender or sex. Another study published last year in Nature reported that men’s and women’s emotions are, as one of the researchers put it, “clearly, consistently and unmistakably more similar than they are different.”

Instead, psychologists say these perceived differences often arise from social constructs, which starts early. “We don’t train boys to have vocabulary around their emotions beyond anger,” said Fredric Rabinowitz, chair of the psychology department at the University of Redlands in California, whose research and private practice focus on men’s mental health. This occurs, Rabinowitz said, because many boys are raised to believe that deeper emotions are separate to their being, which morphs into “unprocessed trauma.” And when men lack emotional language, they cannot explain what they are feeling.

Firchau can identify with this. Until 2018, the podcast producer and host of the “Paternal” podcast “didn’t think about my emotions in general,” he said. (I have appeared as a guest on his show.) That year, he lost his job, the stress became overwhelming, and he felt as if his identity was under siege.

“I always believed guys are supposed to have everything figured out, for ourselves and our families,” Firchau said. He worried that he couldn’t handle everything with “stoicism, confidence and emotional toughness,” which scared him, because he feared that betraying vulnerability “would make me unattractive to my wife. I was afraid I would lose her if I shared what was unraveling me.”

Like so many men who feel beleaguered, he could not express these negative emotions and, he said, became overwhelmed with stress.

Another self-inflicted barrier that prevents men from meeting their own emotional needs occurs when they check out of relational conflicts, or “stonewall.” This occurs when someone feels overwhelmed by their emotions during interpersonal conflict and then physically or emotionally disconnects, such as by walking away, changing the subject or reaching for other diversionary behaviors. Many people who practice stonewalling consider it a peacekeeping tactic, but it merely buries problems that need resolving.

Even if they no longer believe that repressing or suppressing deeper emotions makes them “stronger,” many men believe, or at least hope, that it comes without consequences. They’re wrong. Research shows, for instance, that holding in negative emotions worsens mental health, heightening symptoms of anxiety and depression, and kick-starts physiological responses linked over time to cognitive decline and cardiovascular disease.

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Men aren’t the only ones who contribute to masculine stereotypes about vulnerability. Psychologist Paulette Kouffman Sherman said in an email that, despite the well-documented request for male partners to be more emotionally available, some women “don’t find it attractive.” They perceive a man’s vulnerability as “weakness, neediness,” as less masculine, a threat to traits they value in fathers who were the family “rock”: “strong, silent, fixer” types, she said.

Bill Johnson, a psychologist in suburban Chicago, said that his mostly Black clientele, a third of whom are part of the LGBTQ community, experience similar pushback from their partners. “Many men don’t feel they have an audience to talk about deeper pain and hurt in their romantic relationships. It’s difficult to have people in their lives who will do that for them. This is true for both straight and gay men.”

But there’s no question about vulnerability’s role in successful relationships. Therapists know that opening up to partners and spouses, and to potential rejection, builds and deepens trust, empathy and intimacy.

Since Firchau took the step of working with a therapist, walls have come down in his relationship. “My therapist helped me develop the language to talk about my deeper feelings and helped me validate them. And he helped me realize that they weren’t anything to feel ashamed of, that they were normal.”

Emboldened, Firchau approached his wife with his newfound literacy and confessed the truth: He had been afraid that she would regard his true feelings as weakness. He was wrong. “She told me, ‘What’s unattractive is that you were unwilling to face the problem at all.’ ”

This language, Firchau said, has broken down unproductive barriers — and created healthy ones.

“Whenever my wife and I have a heated conversation about kids or money, I know now that rather than engage in a heated argument, I need time to step away and think for myself on how to articulate what I’m feeling.” He now creates some needed space for himself and, a day or so later, shares with his wife why he felt hurt or upset. “But we hold each other accountable. And after that day has passed, we have that follow-up conversation.”

Andrew Reiner teaches at Towson University and is the author of “Better Boys, Better Men: The New Masculinity That Creates Greater Courage and Emotional Resiliency.”

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https://healthyrelationshiptips.org/why-do-men-push-away-women-they-love/#google_vignette (Empress Ari – Internet 23).

Why do men push women away?

The reason why men push away the love of women they love is that they didn’t think the process all the way through. Most men think about now and that’s it. When you can feel in your gut that a man is pushing you away, you are usually right. It’s your woman’s intuition. It makes women wonder why doesn’t he want me?

Reasons men push women away

1. He believes it’s too good to be true. He just can’t believe he can be happy with the woman of his dreams. He doesn’t believe it could happen to him.

2. She is being too clingy to him. She never leaves him alone. He’s not used to that much communication with a lover.

3. He is realizing how much he misses being single. He doesn’t want to commit. He has a “commitment phobia”. This is a man who likes to do whatever he wants to do.

4. He is too selfish. He realizes it will cost him time and money to continue on with her. It’s all about him in his life and that’s how he likes it.

5. He doesn’t see a future with her. He can’t see himself being with her forever but he didn’t know that immediately. He only started feeling this way lately.

6. He felt pressured into the relationship. It’s not necessarily that she gave give an ultimatum to be in a relationship. It could be that he is not ready but he feels that he owes her that. Women want men to do things when they want them to. That’s just not the way men work.

7. He has too much on his plate. Living a busy lifestyle has him feeling like he won’t be able to devote as much time into the relationship that’s needed to keep a healthy relationship.

8. He has been hurt in the past by someone else. He thinks every female is out to hurt him. He guards his heart like its a newborn baby.

9. He feels like he is in competition with her. She may be more “accomplished in life” which plays with his manhood. Men are generally the providers or at least the breadwinner.

When he meets a woman with more than he has to offer, he gets intimidated by the situation. He feels almost like he is not good enough for her.

10. He has a fear of love. He is genuinely terrified of his own feelings. He has never felt like this about someone before. He doesn’t know how to handle the feelings he has inside for her. These feelings are almost overwhelming to him.

11. He doesn’t fully love himself. It’s hard for someone to fully love someone else when they don’t love the man in the mirror. He is insecure and has to fix this by himself. He feels inadequate in showing and expressing his love for her. He is unable to connect with her emotionally.

12. He is not as into her as she is into him. He just doesn’t want to hurt her feelings. He is slowly contacting and responding to her contacting him less and less in hopes of just easing out of the situation. He doesn’t want to be a man and say what’s on his mind and heart. He just hopes she gets the hint by showing less or no more interest.

13. He can smell a challenge. Some men will pull away when they think another man may be involved in the equation. They don’t like to compete. Men are very territorial.

14. She is such a good woman that he is scared he will mess things up. He doesn’t want to hurt her. He knows he has never been in a serious relationship that lasted very long.

What to do when a man pulls back

1. Work on yourself. Remember who you are as well as your worth.

2. Have a conversation with him. Ask him what his issues are. Let him know that you are there for him. Do not pressure him in any way. You need to know what’s going on. You have a right to some answers.

3. Give him what you think is a reasonable amount of time. People go through things. Be a little patient. However, you are not a toy to play with.

You still need to put a time frame on the situation. Do not allow him to come in and out of your life if he is confused or still pushing you away. No one should be allowed to reserve you emotionally and not act on it.

4. Keep yourself busy and your mind off him. What do you like to do? Enjoy your hobbies. Spend more time with your family and friends.

5. Pull back too. Give him time and space to figure things out. Stop contacting him. Just act nonchalantly about the situation. Make him miss you again.

He needs to reappreciate your presence to make him remember and realize what he will potentially be missing out on. When he “snaps out of it”, he will come around.

6. Leave him alone and move on with your life. This may be easier said than done but you deserve to be happy. No need to keep lingering around someone who is confused about what he wants to do with you. You should never put your life on hold for someone unsure.

Life is too short. Don’t keep pressing him about this issue. You will make him feel like you are desperate.

7. A man pulling away is like a scared animal. He might be emotionally immature. You must be positive, calm, constant, and reassuring you can help him change those feelings.

You will see that he slowly will trust what you are saying and doing. Make a safe environment for him to perceive forward. He will slowly move forward if he is the right man for you.

As you can see there are many reasons why men push away women they love. Watch his actions around you. In dating and even in relationships, A guy would rather pretend that he doesn’t like you while silently suffering inside because he does like or even loves you very much. Sending you mixed signals is not fair in the love game.

The worst thing you can do is blame yourself. This has everything to do with him, not you. You can control a man that has unstable emotions. You didn’t do anything wrong and there is nothing wrong with you. His ego could be in the way of his heart right now.

Valuing yourself and scarcity is very important. He knows that you are a great woman, he knows someone will love you if he doesn’t. Hopefully, you know and understand this too.

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Should you give money to a panhandler? Central Louisiana Homeless Coalition says no

Jeff Matthews

The Town Talk

https://imasdk.googleapis.com/js/core/bridge3.585.0_en.html#goog_1019592331

You’ve probably seen someone standing on a corner at one of Alexandria’s busiest intersections, probably holding a sign detailing the desperate circumstances they’re in and asking for help.

Maybe, motivated by a charitable instinct, you handed them a couple of dollars or some change through your car window.

You think you’re doing good, but you may actually be contributing to deeper problems, says the head of the Central Louisiana Homeless Coalition.

“Please, please, please — do not give to panhandlers,” said CLHC Executive Director Joseph Buzzetta. “Our community does want to help out individuals who are homeless. I understand the public’s desire to help. Homelessness speaks to something in our souls. But giving money to these individuals is not the way to deal with homelessness.”

PREVIOUSLY:Increase in panhandlers leads to discussion on Alexandria homeless

Why is giving money to someone panhandling bad?

Regardless of sign, they may not be homeless

“Honestly, a lot of these people flying signs are not homeless,” Buzzetta said.

Tiffany Crooks, housing program director with Volunteers of America, said she’s known some individuals who have made as much as $500 in one day of panhandling.

“We always tell people, don’t ever give money,” Crooks said. “Because you’re reinforcing the panhandling behavior. If you feel like you need to give something, give tangible items — a granola bar, a bottle of water, I’ve even seen people give gift cards to McDonald’s. If they’re not willing to take that from you, nine times out of 10 they don’t really need help. They’re just out there trying to make a quick buck.”

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Your money may be putting them at risk

Many people on the streets are there, at least in part, because of serious substance abuse issues. And one of the worst things you can do to someone who has a drug problem is make it easier for them to get drugs.

“I have seen people give money to people who are active substance abusers,” Buzzetta said. “Not just using baseline street drugs, they’re using hard, hard drugs. Especially with all the fentanyl out there, all the opioids out there. They’re trying to survive so they do self-medicate, they do seek out these substances that make life easier for them, and it is just so, so dangerous.”

RELATED:Resource Center opens with goal: ‘End homelessness’

Buzzetta said “panhandling is one of the most dangerous activities a homeless person can engage in,” and not just because the money might go to feeding their drug habit.

Information passes a lot more effectively among the homeless community than people think, he said. When someone is known to have made a decent amount of money panhandling, that could make them a target for attackers looking to rob them.

Homeless people are particularly vulnerable to such attacks because they spend nights in out-of-the-way areas with no walls or doors to protect them, and are less likely to report crimes against them to law enforcement.

Panhandling could keep them from seeking needed treatment

“The challenge we’re seeing is some of our clients who we engage with on a regular basis will stop coming to us for our services and instead go panhandle, because it is good money,” Buzzetta said. “A lot of homeless people are in survival mode. For them, it’s a calculation. Do I come and meet with case manager get signed up for disability, try to get signed up on these waiting lists, or do I go make a cool $60 or $70 or $80? Whenever that’s the calculus that the community is encouraging, I understand why our clients are going for that.”

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The danger with that is many homeless people have serious mental health, physical health or substance abuse issues, sometimes all three.

MORE:Woman ready to give back after journey through drugs, homelessness

If they can make it panhandling, it keeps them on the streets, and keeps them from seeking help.

“The longer these individuals stay on the streets, the worse their mental health conditions get, the worse their physical health conditions get, the worse their substance abuse issues get,” Buzzetta said.

Eventually, the danger is they don’t receive treatment for so long that their problems, which may have been addressable, become too severe.

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It may keep them out of stable housing

In addition to using it for drugs or other destructive behavior, Crooks said, she’s seen homeless people using money they got panhandling to buy themselves a night in a hotel room.

While that buys them shelter for a night,” the next day they’re right back in the same situation,” she said. 

“Until these issues are addressed, these people are not going to make it into housing stability,” Buzzetta said. “And that’s what we’re here for. We want these people stably housed and thriving in this community. When that happens, our entire city benefits.”

RELATED:Opelousas minister seeks housing solution for female homeless

Many homeless people have experienced significant trauma, Buzzetta said. Dealing with that trauma for an extended period fosters a mindset that they can only value what gets them through another day.

“Panhandling encourages that mindset, encourages that behavior and stops them from coming to us so we can work on moving them from that present-day orientation to more of a future-based orientation so they can move forward in their mental and physical health goals,” he said.

The average cost per day, per client is about $30 for CLHC, Buzzetta said. For that, the agency has about an 80 percent retention rate.

That means eight out of 10 times, once a client sees what a better life looks like, they’re willing to accept the challenge of staying off the streets.

But to get that glimpse of a better life, they have to engage in services that move them on the path toward stable housing. And as long as they’re making money panhandling, they’re less likely to do that.

“The bitter irony is every dollar you give individuals on the street could go to a housing agency and we could use that to develop more housing and get these people off the streets,” Buzzetta said.

Homelessness news from USA Today Network

• $700K for an apartment? Cost to solve the homeless crisis is soaring in Los Angeles
• More local governments are housing people in motel rooms
• Joe Murphy, No. 1 pick in 1986 NHL draft, is homeless again — and refusing help
• As homeless are suffering, risk of hepatitis, typhus and other diseases is growing

…….

Back at the station he jumped on the next train to Davis and finally relaxed into a seat. He realized his heart was pounding. His instincts about this guy were right and he still didn’t want to have a mano-a-mano conflict with the dude. God knows what he would pull out of one of those boots. A little shiver went down Danny’s spine. He wasn’t sure if it was excitement or fear. Ah, well, let’s get us home.        Next morning, he was in the watch commander’s office getting chewed out.       “You did what! When, while on duty! Tell me you are kidding me.”       Roosevelt, the watch commander, an overweight middle-aged man of about fifty was getting progressively redder and redder in the face.       “What would make you even contemplate doing such a stupid thing?” he demanded.       Danny put his hands up in an imploring manner. “He has been riding this same train for months and never seems to have the usual stuff with him that most people carry, and he always gets off at the same stop.”       “He doesn’t carry the usual stuff, the usual stuff!” Commander Roosevelt was speechless. “Well, maybe we can match him up with my wife someday. She carries enough stuff for three people!”       Daniel Davies sat quietly; his hands folded in his lap. He had given his report of what he had found and the suspicions he had been having for some time. It was up to the commander now. The train company had been transporting this guy back and forth to his drug drop now for several months.       “You know what you are like, Davis?” the commander asked belligerently.       “No sir.”      “You are like that ball of lint under my bed that keeps rolling around and collects other pieces of lint and keeps getting bigger and bigger.”       “Yes, sir.”      “That and a royal pain in my ass, is what you are.” The commander clutched his coffee cup so hard Danny was afraid he was going to break it. The man sat there in a brown study for several minutes.       “Ok, this is what we will do,” he finally spoke. “You will call the LAPD and get hold of the drug division and get hold of a detective, someone with some authority. Got me?” he said with hostility. “You will make your report to them and then ask them what it is they want us to do. Thereafter, I want you to fill out your incident report. Then report to me with their recommendations, and I want it back on my desk by morning, am I clear?”  “Absolutely, sir,” Danny replied.       “And don’t go off doing anything else dumb on company time because I am the one who will have to fill out the report and I hate filling out reports. !”       “Right sir.” Danny grabbed his cap and practically backed out of the room into the door which the secretary had opened.       “And what’s wrong with you?” she wanted to know. Danny didn’t answer and kept going.                                                                                                                                                                                                                          #      Danny made his report to LAPD and was assigned to Detective Sergeant Terrence Dillon.       “So, did you actually see this guy, you made eye contact with him yourself?” Dillon wanted to know.       “Yep, several times. He would end up in my train cars somehow over and over again and then always get off at the Sacramento station.”       “So, you called me, why?” was Dillon’s question.       “The seat designation indicates he got onboard at the Los Angeles train depot and that is your area.”       “True,” Dillon replied. Danny didn’t mention the news conference he had seen on the TV the week before.       “You know his name?”       “No, I don’t but I know how we can get it.”       “I’m listening,” the detective said.       Danny told him the plan.       “You think you can do this without making him suspicious? I don’t want any dead conductors on my case.”       “I think so,” Danny told him of the surveillance projects he had done in the Navy. The detective seemed impressed.       The next day, Danny had his report done and typed up and on the commander’s desk. Roosevelt came in with his first cup of coffee and scowled but said nothing and said down heavily in his swivel chair. He picked up the report and read and Danny sat and waited.       “Ok, so this is what he wants you to do right?”       “That is it, get the guy’s name.”       “Damn it, Davies,” the commander huffed. “Can you do this without getting into any fights with this guy?”       “Absolutely sir, no problem,” Danny’s arms were folded over his chest. He nodded to his boss.      “I don’t like it but take Franklin to be your backup man and no cowboy stuff, right?”       “Right sir, no cowboys, just a little info and that’s it.”       The commander huffed, and wiped the coffee from his walrus style mustache.       “Call me as soon as you get it.”       “Will do, sir.”        Danny got hold of the Frump and gave him the skinny on operation Teardrop.       “No kid,” Franklin looked amazed. “Cocaine?”      Danny confirmed it.      “Wow, drugs on the train. I never.”      “Anyway, Franklin, you understand what we are going to do right?”       Frumpy gulped, “Got it. We will be on the lookout for Tear Drop and if he is not in your car, I or another conductor will call you on the walkie-talkie and you will come and punch the tickets for the car where he is sitting.”       “Right,” said Danny. “Don’t bother talking to him or trying to engage with him or he will get suspicious and jump the train.”       Frumpy nodded nervously, “No engagements, got it.”      Danny laughed and hit his friend on the shoulder, “I’ll be doing all the tough stuff, relax.”       The Frump didn’t look a bit relaxed.  # It was two days later that Danny got the call from Franklin. “He’s up here, dude.”       “On my way,” was the curt response.       Danny started at the front of the cabin as he always did and slowly made his way back to Tear Drop, not rushing, not in a hurry. He talked to the passengers as usual. He got to Tear Drop and paused and reached up to the card above the seat and frowned.       “Hmm,” he said thoughtfully. “Sorry, sir, looks like I may have to check your ticket one more time. You don’t mind?” and he smiled the big smile.       “No esta problema, man,” the Hispanic guy replied. “Whatever you want, you got it, heh?” He pulled the ticket out of the back pocket of his jeans and smiled so his gold tooth showed.       Danny scanned the ticket with the meter machine, and it clicked that the memory had taken.       “Gracias, senor,” he nodded cordially and handed back the ticket.       The man smiled again and put his ticket away. “De nada.”       Danny moved on and collected the rest of the tickets from the remaining passengers. As soon as he was done with the car he made his way without haste to the downstairs mini office and pulled up the meter memory.       “Jose Gonzalez Gonzalez. Original at least,” he said to Frumpy.      “You got it, right?” whispered a nervous Frumpy.     “Yes, I got it.” Danny smacked his partner on the shoulder. “Relax.”       He got on the phone and called the commander and gave all the details on when, where and how the ticket was purchased and the man’s name.       “Ok,” Roosevelt replied. “We’ll get on it to get his id info. And remember, smart college boy, no funny stuff with this guy. He sounds dangerous.” Danny promised to be good, or at least careful, and hung up the phone.  It was then up to the two of them to go back to their jobs like nothing had ever happened. #      It was two weeks later that the Commander called Davies back into his office.  He appeared and his boss waved him to a chair without ceremony. He sat down, crossed his legs and foldedhis hands in his lap.      “Okay,” the Commander said as though they had just been speaking.      “Here’s this.” He handed over a letter from the Sacramento Police Department and it was a Witness Request form addressed to David Daniel Davies c/o of Pacific Railroad Company requesting his attendance at a suspect lineup.       “So,” Roosevelt huffed, “they want you to go.”       “Okay,” Danny replied.       “I think you should take Franklin too since he also saw the guy.”       “Okay,” said Danny slowly, waiting for what else was coming.      “Davies,” the Commander started. “Davies…I’m not happy about this.”     “We were just doing our duty sir,” Danny said sincerely.       “I don’t care,” replied Roosevelt, “this guy is a Mexican National, a professional criminal. Damn it, the passport he gave our people was fake!”       Danny nodded.       “Someone could have gotten hurt with all this nonsense,” the Commander seemed to be running out of steam. He looked down and fiddled with the pencil on his desk.      “People were getting hurt sir,” Danny’s said quietly. “They were selling top grade cocaine out of that warehouse. Lots of people get hurt with that stuff.”       Roosevelt stroked his mustache and avoided eye contact. “Well…” He seemed to be hunting for something to add. “In the future, can you try to keep your nose out of other people’s business? Try?” At this point, he straightened the pencil and looked up sharply at Danny.       “Yes, sir,” Danny got up to go and almost gave a military style salute but stopped himself in time. Instead, he gave a short quasi-salute and left. #      Later that evening, Danny and Frumpy were lingering at the entrance of Lupe’s Cantina. They were trying to figure out how to tie up the Frumps cocker spaniel so they could go in the restaurant. The temperature was getting warmer; summer seemed to be in the air. “I told you not to bring the dog,” Danny was irritable. “She misses me,” the Frump countered with a pout. Suddenly, the front door swung open. The restaurant cook came out and walked straight over to Danny.       “Is okay man, I talk to her.”       “Her?” Danny was confused.       “My cousin, Randi. The one you got you eye on all the time.”       “I, I, never….” Danny stumbled, grasping for a response.      “Is okay, Man. I tell her you too old for her and plus,” he leaned really close, “you gay.”       “What, what…..where did you get that from?” Danny was starting to get annoyed now.       The cook pointed his finger down at Frumpy, Frumpy’s cocker spaniel and then shrugged his shoulders like to say, “The facts speak for themselves.”       Danny’s mouth was still open when the cook turned to go back in the kitchen. “Is okay, man, you know. Is a new day.” He winked at Danny and disappeared back inside.        Danny was mumbling to himself as they went in and sat down. Randi appeared and carefully laid down a menu in front of him.       “And what will you two be having tonight, sir?” she asked quite formally, hands behind her back.       Danny sighed, shook his head, and opened the menu.    The End

Back home that evening, Danny fired up the computer.       Ha! As he suspected, he read ‘the tear drops are gang tattoos. The drops indicated a person you had killed. The big drop, the first kill and the smaller ones, later kills.’ Danny pushed himself away from the computer. He felt a rush of revulsion.  “I knew there was something about that guy I didn’t like,” he told the room. With a full-body shake, he went to get himself a beer. Flopping backdown in the big chair, he hit the on button for the TV to watch some baseball and clear his head.           It was probably a week later, again on the N/B route through SacTown; he first noticed a dim light coming from the abandoned warehouse close to the train tracks. They were slowing for the station when he noticed it.  He began to wonder. Was that where that same kid went every time?

     The next day, after seeing the kid again with another bag of Mexican food, Danny was on the Sacto-south loop coming back through the capital at dusk. They stopped in front of the station and Danny peered out. Once again, he could see what looked like the same dim light coming from a far window in the red-brick warehouse close to the tracks.

     He got a bee in his bonnet. He went to find the Frump. 

     “Look,” he said to him confidentially, “it’s one stop away from Davis and I want to get off in Sacramento to go do some shopping.” 

      Franklin looked pained. “You know they don’t like it when we do stuff like that, Dan. You’ll get me in trouble.” 

    “Come on Franklin, I’m good for it.” Danny pleaded his case. “I’ll make it up with some yard duty tomorrow, promise.” 

     The Frump heaved his large belly around some and sighed. “Promise?” 

     “Promise, I swear,” Danny replied, holding up his scout’s honor fingers. 

     “Ah, well,” the man sighed, “I’ll cover for you, don’t make a habit of this.” 

     Danny shook his head, no. Grabbing his backpack, he jumped off the train, quickly stuffing his cap and other paraphernalia into the bag. 

     He shouldered the bag and sauntered through the train station stopping for a hot coffee and a bag of chips. He waved a salute to a couple of girls at the station who knew him. They both giggled and waved back at him. He walked out of the front of the station and stood awhile to get his bearings. It was a cool evening, but not cold and he didn’t need more than his regular train jacket.

     The location looked a little different from this angle. He decided the warehouse was across from the tracks to his right a block or two. He started walking and veered right. The streets here were not in the best of shape, a lot of cracks in the sidewalks and places where the old trees had pulled the sidewalk up. Obviously, no one had bothered to get them repaired. There weren’t too many bums in this area of the street for which Danny was glad, he didn’t want to be seen by anyone, in case someone asked questions. 

     It took him about five minutes to get to the front parking lot of the old warehouse. The asphalt was faded with cracks and potholes everywhere. Weeds were trying hard to reclaim the land but half of them were dried out and brown. There was an ancient metal fence around the property with the gate sagging open. Danny stretched his long legs and planted a boot on the other side of the gate and frog-jumped over.

     He had by this time finished his coffee and chips and stuck the remains quietly into his bag.  Loose gravel covered the broken asphalt and he tried to make as little noise as possible as he approached the building. He couldn’t see any signs of life. An owl hooted in the distance and the moon was starting to rise.

     Quietly he moved around to the side of the building. The place had a gloomy, empty feeling.  Early twilight was descending and a light breeze played with the dark, curly hair on his neck. He could hear absolutely nothing from the building. He narrowed his chocolate brown eyes to focus better.  

     Danny skirted the building and occasionally peeked in the windows, searching  for the source of the light. The dirt and grime were so bad he couldn’t see much. Finally, he came upon a small side door with little windowpanes above the door handle. The handle was locked.

     Pulling a handkerchief from his backpack, he wound it around his fist. With one quick ‘pop’, he knocked out the bottom pane. Carefully he stuck his hand through the pane and slowly unlocked the door, pushing it open. Working hard to avoid the broken glass inside, he found himself in what appeared to have been an old mini-kitchen, maybe for workers to have coffee or eat lunch. 

     The light dimmed the further he went into the building. He entered a large, gloomy space that looked like a packing area of sorts. At the far end of the building where the metal roll-up doors were, he could see stacks of boxes. These looked new. 

     Still hearing nothing, he worked his way back to the rear of the big room. The boxes were all about 2’ x 3′ wide and stacked on top of each other. They were new with a bunch of writing on the side. He examined the writing – Spanish. He could easily see where the dust had been disturbed all around the boxes and leading to the roller-doors. It looked like they might been moved here by truck. On the side were heavy wooden shelves and he could see several used containers of food from a fast-food take-out place. Mama Rosas’s face smiled back at him from  an empty bag.

Maybe that was why that kid was here, he thought to himself, delivering dinner.

     He went over to the boxes and found they were sealed with packing tape. It looked like from the picture on the side they were packages of kitchen baking soda. He saw one box that had been opened and he went over and poked his nose in. Boxes and boxes of light orange boxes were stacked inside advertising the benefits of Salvo’s Home Baking Soda. Danny was mystified. 

     Why ship out boxes of Mexican baking soda here, was the duty or tax on this stuff that high? He shook his head. It made no sense. He picked up a box and shook it and could feel the heavy powder moving back and forth inside. 

     I wonder, he thought. He pulled out his old Navy multi-purpose knife and pulled out the smallest, thinnest blade. He slipped it carefully into the top edge of the box, hoping that it would look like an accidental cut from packing. Making a thin slice, he shook some powder in his hand. He licked one finger and tasted a tiny bit of the powder. Phew! He spit it out, cocaine! No doubt about it. He was putting the box back into the cardboard box when he heard a noise in front of the metal roll-up door. Someone is coming! 

     He shoved the soda back into the box and ripped his shoes off so he wouldn’t make any noise running through the warehouse. He beat it back to the little door, slipped his shoes back on and crept out of the door. He ducked down and worked his way back to the front of the building keeping below the level of the windows. 

     It was dark by now but there was no other way off the property other than the front gate. The back of the lot faced the train tracks and there was no easy way through the fence. He got to the corner of the building and with his heart in his mouth, peeked around the corner. 

Surprise, surprise. Mr. Teardrop was standing behind a black pickup truck and unloading more boxes into the warehouse. He was working with another guy and they were talking to each other in Spanish. His fancy clothes were gone and he was working in a black t-shirt, black pants and the cowboy boots. There was a large gun-rack on the back of the truck’s cab. Danny could see what looked like a couple of shotguns resting there.

     Danny sucked in his breath and waited until both of them were busy in the warehouse with boxes. He moved quickly to the fence and kept to the shadows while he beat a path out of the lot and back to the station. He felt sure they had not seen him. 

     Back at the station he jumped on the next train to Davis and finally relaxed into a seat. He realized his heart was pounding. His instincts about this guy were right and he still didn’t want to have a mano-a-mano conflict with the dude. God knows what he would pull out of one of those boots. A little shiver went down Danny’s spine. He wasn’t sure if it was excitement or fear. Ah, well, let’s get us home.

     Continued in Part III