A few days ago, Ali and I had our regular “office” meeting to plan the next week’s work with the soccer team, and the refugees and immigrants who live in upstate New York.

We turn some heads when the two of us – a Muslim and a Jew – sit at one of the table’s at Stewart’s Convenience story, surrounded by truckers and farmers and hunters. We come in, order some food,  and  set up shop and start laughing, shouting and arguing.

They are beginning to accept us now.

I told Ali to smile and the other men at the tables joined in, hooting at my camera, telling jokes and making faces to get Ali to laugh. I think we have been accepted there, the coffee is very good, and I  favor the tuna on wheat bread sandwich. Ali has some coffee, he takes out his I phone – he is on it more than a teenager, and I take out my phone, and then my notebook, which I use to keeping track of donations, expenditures and the balance in the Gus fund, where all donations are collected and recorded.

We open the calculators in our Iphones so we can figure out the money and keep an eye on how much is left. We catch up our lives, and talk about our problems and worries. Then we get down to business.

I tel Ali how much money we have to spend – as of this meeting, it was $2,600.

Then  we figure out how we can help and at what cost.

Since we both want to help everybody all the time, we take turns doing the good-guy bad-guy. We keep each other in check, and I have become skilled at saving enough so we don’t drop too low.

So far, it’s working beautifully. We had four elements to discuss at this meeting  – the soccer team, help for Saad in his new apartment, urgent help needed for a Sudanese woman with two children whose husband was injured and is paralyzed from the neck down. Because she  was short $75 in her rent for two months, she was locked out of her apartment with all of her belongings still inside and is now living in a women’s shelter.

We are going to see her on Wednesday. She fled the genocide in the Sudan and lived in a refugee camp before coming to the U.S. She is only asking for $225 pay up what she owes and for the shortfall for another month. She is not seeking any other help, but this money will be the difference between living in a public shelter and going back to her home with her two children. I’ll share my visit with her.

First item. Ali said he would like to take the soccer team to see the new hit movie: Avengers infinity Wars  (they saw Infinity 1)I pay for this sort of thing with my own money, since I did not ask the AOG to fund it and I don’t spend donation money that I haven’t discussed on the blog.

I believe these cultural events are critical for the soccer kids, everyone in school sees these movies and talks about them, and the movies are about the only pure recreation they can afford outside of soccer. Popular culture is a seminal element in the lives of young Americans, if these kids are completely disconnected from it, their assimilation will be much harder.

Ali always blinks at spending my own money, but it’s important that I contribute also. Movies in America are not cheap, especially with 18 kids who love soda and popcorn. We figure out ways to cut the cost – discount coupons, big tubs of popcorn,  I usually call the movie theater managers and can get a discount. I write a check for $265. Sometimes we can, sometimes we cant.

Second item. We discuss the need for new soccer team uniforms, it is necessary to change the names on the uniforms for next year, since I don’t really want “Bedlam Farm” on them, but more importantly,  RISSE can’t sponsor the soccer team at this point, and it’s not appropriate to have their name on the shirts. Their new name is the “Albany Warriors.”

Wicked Smart Apparel in Watervliet is working with us for affordable  new uniforms, they are very supportive of the soccer team and I am confident of a very fair price, Ali and I are going to see Todd Van Epps Wednesday and we’ll figure out what it costs, and if it’s affordable, we’ll order them for the Fall.

Together, Ali and I have begun to establish a network of “angels” as we call them, who support the soccer team and help us with discounts.

Third Item. Saad, the recently homeless Iraq refugee who could not find a place to live, but now has an apartment.

We paid the deposit for his apartment last week and he got in.

We have found a deal with a local cellphone company, if Saad trades in a broken and unusable cell phone he was given but doesn’t work,  then for $200 he will get a new Iphone 6 Plus which Ali and me and several people around him can show him how to use it. Thanks to a generous spirit named Kathleen, we will have enough money to pay the month phone fees for one year in advance.

We will also bring some groceries.

So we will be giving Saad a check this week for $285.

I am also bringing a new 32 inch Samsung TV which I  bought, a new radio donated by someone from the Army Of Good, two watercolors donated by Vermont Artist Rachel Barlow and four framed prints of classic paintings by Susan Popper. I’m also bringing a linen map of Arabia from Maria and an Arabic-America  dictionary.

Ali told me about four refugee children who have been in the public schools in Albany for two years and have never been able to go on a class trip because their parents or parent don’t have the money. This is both painful and embarrassing for them. The school is taking a day-long trip to New Jersey to visit a zoo and theme park there, and once again, they don’t have the money for a fee, in this case $60 each. I gave Ali a check for $240 so the three boys and one young girl can go on the trip. I think this is a way we can support these kids discreetly on a regular basis.

The fees for these trips are usually small.

We also talked about the tutoring program, now scheduled to begin on May 23 at a local library in Albany. Our new tutor, Suzanne has found a library in Albany that will give us a conference room any weekday afternoon for as long as we need it. Suzanne will meet and evaluate each of the six children who have been singled out by parents and teachers as needing special help with English language speaking and writing.

When we all meet together (me, Ali, Suzanne and the kids),  we’ll figure out where to go from there.

Suzanne a doctor and former Army surgeon, she has turned to tutoring work, and has worked extensively with refugees and immigrants as an ESL (English as second language) tutor, and we will see how long the program will take to work – how many kids at once – and for how long, and to what specific end.. We have enough money to pay her for at least six months, thanks to the Army Of Good.

We don’t have a cost yet for that.

So all told, I wrote approximately $800 while drinking coffee in our “office.” And I’m excited about the work coming up this week. I think Ali and I are putting things together, figuring out who to help and for how long. I told him we are stewards not only of the children, but of the many good people trusting us with their money.

We will honor that responsibility. I am very fond of out “office” meetings, it’s midway between Ali’s house and mine. We are both committed to this work and to doing work alive, and I like the idea of a weekly discussion of our plans and expenditures. I want you all to know everything that I know.