By Paul Bendix
About this blog: A 32-year resident of Menlo Park, I regularly make my way around downtown in a wheelchair. This gives me an unusual perspective on a town in which I have spent almost half of my life. I was educated at UC Berkeley, and permanentl...
(More)About this blog: A 32-year resident of Menlo Park, I regularly make my way around downtown in a wheelchair. This gives me an unusual perspective on a town in which I have spent almost half of my life. I was educated at UC Berkeley, and permanently injured there in a 1968 mugging. Half paralyzed at 21, it took me 11 years to find full-time work. A high-tech job drew me to the Peninsula in the early 1980s. After years as a high-tech marketing writer, I retired and published my own book, Dance Without Steps (Oliver Press, New York, 2012). Having long aspired to café society, I frequent Peet's on Santa Cruz Avenue. Rolling through our downtown, I reflect on my own life - which I have restarted several times. My wife died in 2009. I remarried in July, 2013.
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When a tattooed, shaggy-haired thirtysomething knocked, then pounded, on their door my Palo Alto friends wanted to call the police. But the menacing figure on their porch turned out to be their nephew. Fresh from two years in prison, including a brief stint at San Quentin, Jimmy needed a place to stay. His bewildered aunt and uncle opened the door to him...and a disturbing chapter in their lives.
Paroled from his fifth DUI (that is correct), Jimmy had tried going 'home' to Saratoga. He didn't know that his parents had just moved to Arizona. His aunt and uncle offered a guest bedroom, but Jimmy didn't sleep. He wandered around all night, talking to himself. Next morning he demanded to know why his picture wasn't on the mantel. He insisted that his aunt's laptop belonged to him. Where was his money? He had some around, someplace....
It developed that Jimmy's imminent release had spurred his parents' move to Arizona. He had a violent history. Jimmy had punched out a Saratoga neighbor, assaulted his father and generally scared those around him. His stay with his aunt and uncle was short-lived. A trip to the family's seaside cabin failed to calm Jimmy.
The uncle met with a parole officer. His nephew had to go. Go where, the parole officer asked.
This was a good question. And the answer...for all of us...is a scary one. Jimmy's parents had already spent a fortune trying to get him treated. They had settled a lawsuit over his violence. They had run out of options. Public mental health services are scant. The parole system is overstretched. Everyone had tried. Yet everyone wasn't enough.
What is the answer?
