October 6th, 2025: Monday today. I woke up at 6:00am and had cereal for breakfast with some coffee. I got dressed in my work attire and took the bus downtown. I got in and tried to get the coffee machine brewing but only did so near the time the meeting was to be held. I remember seeing Seth M sit near Ahwahn again. The CEO is back but we got started and here was his speech I recorded:
“What's been going on guys?”
[Laughter]
“I'm not gonna take too much time, but I say I'm very, very, very grateful. I when I first got that first and I got really really healthy. I had three months of, like, wow, this is really cool. And then, of course, sometimes your body rejects things. And so I have this new procedure that was very invasive, but it's a more permanent solution and I found out how sreal womang I was talking this morning with somebody coming in, Cece. I said: ‘You find out how sreal womang you are when you go through things.’ It's extraordinary how fast the recovery is, but I'm taking it easy, I only do what they say, but uh I found out that a person can actually be more grateful every day. It's just incredible. I didn't think somebody could actually go through that. So it starts by just looking for what's good in front of you, and then just telling yourself when you wake up in the morning. I'm thankful for this. Sometimes it's hard and you go, man, I'm grateful I can breathe. And that was when I was doing those breathing exercises when I came out of surgery. Those were hard. I worked real hard to come back here. And I'll tell you one thing. I couldn't wait to get back here. It motivated me to work real hard every day because I saw what was going on in the news. And I heard from the Latinx lady all of the reports that she did when she went to DC and all these other trips that I used to go to, or that we go to together. And it just motivated me to come back here because you guys are great. I got a lot of reports from people saying the team here is great, unsolicited, by the way, emails from the community and our GA, by the way. They complimented everybody here. I mean, everybody, because they did come and see, they went to some of the events that we held and you guys are doing great. So it motivated me even more to come back and I got to be a part of this again. I can't wait to see you guys. My vision is also very clear of where we're going. I've had a lot of time in between PT and breathing exercise and everything to think about where we're going. I have a clear picture in my mind of what we have to do next. It really centers around the question that a skinner told us, which is: ‘What else can we do for our clients?’ There's a lot of things that we can do for our clients that we don't have funding for, but the community wants to help somehow. So keep those ideas flying. There's never a bad idea. I'll tell you supervisor or come by to me and tell me what your good ideas is and we'll see how it fits and we'll keep on moving forward there. So one last thing and I want two. There's two more things real quick. The first one is I know these times we're really tracked. And when we see stuff happening in apartment buildings, people being grabbed, we see in the news and whatnot, and you have this uncontrollable, seems like desire to speak out, to rise up against it. Be careful about that. We as an organization need to stay neutral as possible. Your supervisors may have heard that when I started going back to work part time at home, the first thing I did was that I sent an email saying I want the directors to come up with a communication protocol in writing about how we're neutral. And I think that's one of the reasons why we're beloved in this community is that it appears when we do that, that it doesn't phase us. It does, but we show strength. It takes a certain amount of strength to show that kind of restraint. But know deep in your hearts, okay, that if you come to work and you take care of the clients, that actually says loads against wood in negative stuff that's going on here in the country. So keep on doing your job the best you can, and that is probably the best place that we can actually do. Just really do a great job with your clients. There's so many people we've settled over the years, AC News still needs our help, and then those that are beyond the eligibility date of five years, they still need help. So we could fill the gaps, and the community wants to help us. We're going to be looking for other sources, for funding and for the private sector. I got ideas on that as well. And I think our team isn't in a good position to be preserved if we stay with that. And then the last thing I wanted to say was, two shoutouts. First of all, we don't have them all here, but the directors. I thank you so much for everything you did while I was gone. You know, keep out that really good work. A lot of compliments came back about the directors. And then also also the managers as well. So that's really good. And I want to say a really special thank you to the Latinx lady, for stepping up. There we got a lot of activity that was going on behind the scenes that she called me about. And I had orders not to talk about work, but I would always say: ‘The Latinx lady! Tell me something, I think I’m going nuts.’"
“I try my best!” - the Latinx lady
“I think we can get through them. I believe the core area where I’m in. So, the last thing I want to tell you about the feature is that I still think there's more growth in us here. and this whole floor now is available, the last two areas, or three areas, two areas. So if I get the community to support us with new programs, with ideas you guys are doing, you, if we can show that we have the capability and the capacity, you, we do the service first and the funding files later. That's the pattern for nonprofits, typically. We can do that. So I have my eye on looking at what can we do to really take over? So if I'm thinking that way, I want you guys to feel that together we can protect each other. You know, we come up with some good ideas, do really good work with the clients. Look for the gaps. Even if it's something we can't do, let's say you see a lot of mental health issues going on. speak up and see, this community's got a lot of mental health issues coming. What can we do? I'm not a mental health person, but just by bringing up that idea, of learning your supervisors and me about it, you know, if there is a need, I might be able to do something about it. So let's keep that going. I have a lot of hope here. I hope you guys do, too. We're doing really well. It's really important to have a really good attitude. And it starts with your position. Look at all the good things you can do in your position. What are the good things happening to you? I know that there's challenges in any position that you have in any workplace. And those sometimes can be negative or interactions on that. But look past those, look at the good stuff in your insides, say thank you for it, your support group do you have at home. Tell the good things, try not to talk about the bad things. Because as you focus on the good things, you come to work looking forward more than anything else, so it's really good there. I'm gonna be a couple of days a week to start out, here part time, and the rest of time working at home. and I'll slowly increase that based on the rehab that I'm going through. So this week, it'll be this week, I have to take a look at what meetings make sense to do in person. But today, uhh this is an important meeting so far on Mondays. And then we have a meeting tonight with the community, so I'll go into that. So I'll go home and rest, do some PT stuff, and we'll look at emails and do some writing and then come back to the Thompson Center...”
“Mhm!” - the Latinx lady
“...It's a state fair, I think. So we'll go there and then I'll slowly get back to like a full time presence here. I'm not going to be doing any traveling until after January. That's pretty much a requirement, so I'm going to miss out on the C-OP. But we have a good team going and so we should be good there. I think that's about it. Anybody have questions for me?”
[POST SPLIT IN HALF DUE TO CHARACTER LIMIT]
