Supervision

Day One of my job at COTS (the Committee on Temporary Shelter) at the Day Station, One Main Street, Burlington, VT.We stood on the loading dock and my tall, handsome fast-paced ADHD supervisor says to me, "Grab your stuff! Sister Lucille needs to meet with us on North Street."

I had been interviewed by Tim and Lucille and I really only remembered one bit of advice from him, "Never again come to work looking so dressed up."  He had said, "You can wear anything you want here, but no dresses!"

I had come from a past of teaching at Sacred Heart Middle/High School where the priest/principal once chased me into the women's bath room and yelled at me for daring to wear leggings under my skirt on a 20 degrees below zero day. Then I'd taught at EFHS and jeans were never allowed. So hearing Tim say that the dress code was essentially NO dress code, was odd. I had asked Tim why I couldn't dress up and he said, "Too intimidating! These clients have trust issues. They'll think you're too high and mighty!"

"OK, I understand," I said. Tim and I got into his blue beat up Volvo filled w/ two large laundry baskets full of (I guessed) dirty laundry.  We must have been  running late because Tim swung the Volvo around in a circle almost careening into a group of pigeons and one of the clients who had the type of schizophrenia known as paranoid delusional. The guy rubbed his fingers together through woolen fingerless gloves as if to say, "Shame on you and Tim said, "Yeah, right, Roger! Like I'm gonna kill a pigeon in front of you!"

Tim dug into his jean pockets and frowned. "Oh, Jesus,"  he hollered. "Hey, grab those jeans back there! The ones on top!"  So I did and pulled them into the front seat. He fished the keys out of the jeans pocket and handed them to me and skidded to a stop. "These are yours. Don't lose them!"

And off we went to meet with Sister Lucille.

I didn't know it at the time but Tim Coleman was to supervise me once a week. Mostly it was him and me riding around in his car, hitting the ATM, eating gravy fries at Nectar's or going to his apartment in Queen City Park because he needed to check to see if he'd left his coffee pot on. Supervision with Tim Coleman was definitely something to look forward to. He gave me some of the best advice I have ever gotten. Mostly he said if people believe something it's true for them. Meet people where they are. You can't change the wind, adjust your sail. And if you can't believe how stupid or drunken or crazy or ridiculous people are, remember they are getting something out of it or they'd stop. People are who they are. Remember that and you will save your self a lifetime of aggravation.