Itzl and I are both activists. I've had far more experience at it than he has, of course, being as I am old and he's not quite 7, but he could teach a few people lessons in activism.
Me, I've always been a hippy at heart - love is, flowers are stronger than bullets, trees are important, manners matter, kindness trumps everything, people are worthy, nice is a blessing, freedom rocks, consensus with autonomy is the best government model, seeds and babies are cherished not for being seeds or babies but for the adult they will be, feed the hungry, blanket the cold, and cute rules.
These are the things I remember from my younger days when I marched for women's rights, marched for civil rights, protested the Vietnam War, wandered through enormous fields where concerts played, and I never really left those hippy days behind me.
Perhaps the reason Itzl and I partner so very well is because at heart, he's a hippy, too.
We both not only believe we can all get along together, we actively work to show that we can get along. When Itzl isn't working for me as a hearing dog, when his duties are handed off to his relief hearing dog, Xoco, he volunteers at a cat shelter because he fervently believes cats are supposed to love dogs. Or at least, they are supposed to love him.
He speaks fluent Cat. Since he can't get to the cat shelter on his own, I take him. He enters the shelter all eager and excited to meet new cats. When I put him down, he trots right into the visiting cat room and promptly sits down and grooms himself. The cats that were getting all ready to hair up and hiss pause. That's not a dog thing, it's a cat thing. They creep up on him, and he yawns and walks in a tight circle, then lays down and puts his tail over his nose. The cats circle him, sniffing cautiously. Once they've had their fill, they wander off and he pretends to wake up and stretches, then wanders over to a jingle ball. He pats it. Then he taps it and watches it roll a bit. Then he bats it across the room and sits down. One of the cats always chases the ball and bats it. When it comes near Itzl, he bats it back. Before you know it, all the cats in the room are playing, either with the ball or some other toy or Itzl himself.
He's pleased to accompany me when I do my activist things, as all good hippies do.
I go by the day old bread store and buy as many loaves of bread as I can afford each week, and then I buy a giant jar of peanut butter and a huge hunk of bologna. I slice the bologna at home because that's cheaper than buying it pre-sliced, which means I can I can make more sandwiches. I turn those things into piles of sandwiches and wrap them in sturdy zip-lock bags and before dawn on Saturday mornings, Itzl and I take those sandwiches and hand them out to homeless people. When the weather turns cold, I add gladware bowls of soup to the sandwiches using chicken carcasses (you can buy chicken carcasses at Asian meat markets!) and veggies from my garden or wildcrafted.
Itzl likes to preside over the distribution of sandwiches and soups, and he greets everyone with the same shy wag of his tail and graceful bend of the head to be scritched. Homeless people aren't afraid of you if you have a cute little dog with you. They are doubly happy that I don't hold them hostage to listen to some lengthy screed or homily about how they deserve to be homeless before giving them the food. They get the food first, and sometimes, we don't talk at all. I guess it's just the hippy in me, but I think people deserve food without any strings attached.
Itzl really likes it when go off wildcrafting and seed bombing. We do these in the waste areas and abandoned lots. Frequently, we encounter homeless people, and when we do, we share our seed bombs and show them where the food grows and how to eat it. No one should ever be hungry.
Not all the seed bombs contain seeds of edible plants. That's the hippy in me, too. I include flowers among them, and edible flowers are a blessing. Sunflowers and bachelor buttons and chicory and mint and edible chrysanthemums are favorites in my seed bombs because the city is less likely to mow down pretty flowers. If you drive through Oklahoma City in the late summer, you'll see the roads lined with sunflowers. Itzl and I did that, most of it. Others have started doing it, too.
When we go sit with the Occupy OKC group, we talk about these little charities and tell people that we don't have to belong to a church or a big organization to make a difference in our world. We don't need permission from our government to be nice to other people. And we don't need permits to help others.
That's the hippy way - when we see something that needs doing and no one else is doing it, we step up and get it done.
Seed bomb the wastes with edible food.
Make sandwiches and soup for the hungry. Share tea and cookies with passersby.
Make up brown paper lunch sacks with things homeless people might need: bottled water, a razor and shaving soap, deodorant, toothpaste and toothbrush, zip lock baggies, coupons for free food or free laundry service or free haircuts (not the buy-one-get-one-free) or a free night in a hotel, and a listing of places they can go to get more help.
Hand out cheap blankets (those fleece ones are nice - they are light weight and line a cardboard shelter very snugly).
If you live in a city with a decent public transit system, buy bus tokens and give them to people who look like they need them.
Buy pet food for a shelter.
I'm sure y'all can come up with other small charities you can do now that you know you don't need anyone else's permission to do them.
While we're Occupying America, we can Occupy Charity, too, and start remembering even the stinky people are lovable.
Itzl wants you to know that even though he's a skunk today, he doesn't stink and he's completely lovable:
So, spread a little kindness even to lil stinkers. Or big ones.