Across the Great Divide

Shelter Report: Toothless in Gaza.

Paco came in today to brush his teeth.

One of his schticks is to speak in a regional shitkicker accent. So, as he said it, he'd come to the Day Center to brush his tayth.

He still has a full set to brush. Many of our guests are not so fortunate.

Rush is missing his top front teeth back to the canines. Because he's well over six feet, it would be easy for someone to think werewolf as they stare up into the gap. He's also scrawny, hyper and has one white eye with the cornea clouded over. Though he tends to run away from trouble, his appearance tends to provoke people. Last week, a 12-year-old girl punched him in the face and blackened his good eye. 

Toni has no teeth. Her sunken lips and collapsed cheeks brand her as homeless and a possible meth addict. She has a job interview coming up, and I don't know how she'll fare. She's unlikely to land anything that involves public contact. But she will go in there and smile and try to act confident.

I remember David, who was saving his money for new dentures. He'd been a ski instructor, but couldn't get rehired after he lost his teeth.

Jolene's teeth are small and malformed, as if her adult teeth never came in to replace the soft baby teeth.

I'm not even going to start on the decay I've seen.

According to surveys of homeless veterans, dental care was consistently ranked as one of their top three unmet needs, along with long-term permanent housing and childcare, and I have little doubt that finding would hold across the homeless population. Poor oral health can be a barrier to finding employment—both cosmetically and as a contributor to low self-esteem.

Worst of all, the homeless population has the most difficulty reversing the situation. They:

• have worse dental problems
• are about half as likely to have dentures if they are toothless
• are twelve times more likely than people with stable housing to have dental problems
• and are less likely to have access to dental care because they lack money, health insurance (Medicaid coverage for dental care varies by state) and often, a dentist willing to serve them.

Dietary limitations because of their dental condition can further deteriorate overall health. 

You have nice teeth, said Rush.

(For the record, they are a bit coffee-stained, untouched by orthodontia up front and generously crowned in the rear.)

You must have listened to your parents, he said.

Shelter Report: Disposing of the Estate.

What would you save of your estate if all you had was 32 gallons of storage?

We never get the full picture at the Day Center, even with the people who are most forthcoming. Human beings are too complex, even the damaged ones, the ones who seem like they have no life except clinging to survival.

I may write like I know people but I'm just taking snapshots of passing shadows.

Abe, for instance.

I've written about him in years past under other assumed names. How his camp gear was soaked by rain. How he made the rounds of park trash bins to recycle aluminum. How he stopped riding his bike in the winter because his feet were too cold without the contact with the ground. How a motel refused his money. How he went back to Ohio to settle up family affairs after his parents died because he was the responsible one. How he was sleeping rough this winter.

Now I'm writing about his absence. How nobody knows where he is.

About his storage bin.

We provide three dozen or more people a secure storage bin where they can safeguard papers, clothing, keepsakes—whatever they don't want to risk at the shelter, at a campsite or in a backpack. As long as they don't store food or drugs, we don't ask questions. As long as they actively use their storage and don't overfill the bin, they can keep it.

Abe signed out his bin in October 2006. He hadn't used it since November. Today we emptied it. 

Someone else needs the bin.

Sometimes it's easy. A tangle of free store clothing can go right to the dumpster. But today was hard.

Here's what we found:

• A cap, some flannel pants, a thin jacket
• On Death and Dying, Jimmy Carter's The Virtues of Aging
• An insulated lunch pack filled with hollowed egg Christmas ornaments
• A homemade machete in a crude scabbard made of nailed together millwork
• Miscellaneous costume jewelry and an antique ivory brooch on a silver chain
• A dozen painted tiles mounted on wood that might have been a mother's collection
• Two fragile plexiglas reliquaries containing dried plants
• A Sandusky Ohio high school diploma in a red leatherette case, with a certificate for participation in varsity track.

We put this in the back storage room, in case he comes back. 

God, I hope he comes back.

Shelter Report: This is What They Give You in Prison.

A selection of candles available at the supply window.

If you're homeless, soap is easy to come by at the Day Center. So is shampoo, conditioner, lotion, shaving cream, band-aids, camp candles and weak coffee. Aspirin, combs, bath gel, plastic bags, Q-tips, sample-size deodorant (or a shot from a spray can), burn ointment and foot powder are usually on hand, any of it for the asking.

But then we move into the category of scarce items, high demand and irregular supply. 

Cough drops, hand warmers, gloves, hair ties, dental floss, after shave and mouthwash (non-alcohol only), tampons (pads are usually available) and hair spray come and go.

Today, all we had available of these was one partial bottle of spray gel. A small supply of Chap Stick came in. I also found behind the counter a new tube of hemorrhoid cream—or maybe we've always had it and no one's ever asked.

Finally, the items guests must sign for—the controlled substances I dole out from the supply window. These include razors, toothbrushes and socks. The idea behind keeping a log for these items is to signal their scarcity and relative value. The rules for how often someone can get a new pair of socks tend to be fluid, since the volunteers behind the window change daily and their relative soft-heartedness varies, too.

So, too, does the reusability of the items. Razors of the plastic disposable variety can range from a single blade Bic to a hospital-supply-grade double blade to a Gillette CustomPlus Pivoting Razor with Lubrastrip & Aloe and a Softer UltraGrip. 

Obviously, we aren't going to hand out a new one of those babies to you every day.

Toothbrushes should last a while and we can run short, so we ration them, along with travel-size toothpaste tubes. The selection here can run between brand names and generics, with a preference for the brands. I tried to pass off a no-name tube to a woman last week and began to understand why.

"God, no," she said. "This is what they give you in prison."

Socks are very critical for people who spend so much time on their feet—walking, waiting for the bus, trying not to look like they are loitering—and whose shoes may get wet and not have a chance to dry. (Socks are usually worn at night for warmth, too.) A lack of fresh socks creates foot problems. Dark socks create more issues and reactions than white, apparently because of the dye.

If you feel like you should help a street person but don't want to hand over cash, a clean pair of socks will be valued even more than a free meal. Food can be had, but socks are golden.

I haven't covered all the items we provide but you get the idea. Even the most expensive of these costs under $2, and some are pennies. You probably have almost all of them in your bathroom right now.

If you don't have a secure place for your possessions, a lot of this is excess baggage, though. Imagine walking around every day carrying the contents of your medicine cabinet and one or two drawers in case you needed something. You wouldn't do it, either.

But imagine also having to ask for every little thing, how that would wear on you over time. How it would remind you of your addiction, your mental condition, your lack of a job, the randomness and regimentation of finding a bed for the night.

It's not just the toothpaste that's like what they give you in prison.

Shelter Report: Let's Count Who's Homeless.

At the Day Center, the mission is to serve homeless adults by providing some basic services unavailable to those without a stable place to live.

There's more than one “official” definition of homelessness, and we see people all along this continuum:

An individual without permanent housing who may live on the streets; stay in a shelter, mission, single room occupancy facilities, abandoned building or vehicle; or in any other unstable or non-permanent situation.

An individual unable to maintain their housing situation, forced to stay with a series of friends and/or extended family members. A recognition of the instability of an individual’s living arrangements is critical to the definition of homelessness. 

But neither definition quite captures one other distinction I've observed. Some people who fit the definition don't consider themselves homeless and others do, even after their housing situation changes.

Here are some of the ways this can get complicated.

A couple lives in a motorhome owned by the woman's mother. The woman wants to live inside. The man goes stir crazy when he's in an enclosed place and camps out a lot. Late last fall, he persuaded her to join him outside, where they were ticketed by the police for illegal camping. Don't know where they are right now.

A man who's had his aorta replaced gets around in a wheelchair. He's been living in an abandoned building not far away but recently got turned out. Social services have him lined up to get into supportive housing and all he has to do is come by and sign some papers. But he hasn't. Why not? Because he's gotten so used to thinking of himself as homeless that a move out of that state threatens his very self-concept.

Last year, a man who regularly recycles cans had saved enough money to rent a motel room for the winter, but no one would rent to him because he was paying, not Section 8. This winter, he was sleeping outside. He hasn't been into the Day Center for months.

A woman was in to take a shower and do her laundry today. Her water was cut off for non-payment. Her rent is $500 a month, and she makes $850 a month from her part-time job at Sam's Club where she's worked for almost three years. Her hours were just cut and she said 27 workers with more seniority that she has were recently laid off.

She has a job interview tomorrow for a second part-time job. She'd prefer a full-time job, of course, and to work for a place that cares more about its employees. According to the definition, she might have "permanent" housing right now but her situation is far from stable.

A man who has trouble with alcohol is living with his sister now. I like him and we always have cordial conversations. Half the time he means well and half the time he fucks up. No one, including and especially himself, expects that to change. Ever.

"I've got to be me," he says.

And "me" is homeless.

Shelter Report: Talk is Free at the Supply Window.

When I first thought about volunteering at the Day Center, I had a hard time getting excited about handing out towels, soap and toothbrushes.

Homeless men drinking weak coffee while hanging out waiting for showers or phone calls—how much fun could that possibly be?

Like most jobs described by their assigned tasks, my job in the supplies room doesn't sound that great. It's a step up from working an expressway tollbooth, for sure, but a few steps down from curing cancer. (Although squirting solutions into petri dishes and squinting at slides all day may not be very entertaining work, either.)

In truth, the great part of my job is getting to know the people and talking to them about what's on their minds.

I can't always write about it here. Some of what I hear is too personal or might place a guest in a vulnerable position. And some of it makes no sense—at least in a way I can tease out for you in a few hundred words.

There's Pedro, who talks a great deal. I'm told it starts from the moment he gets up. Most of the time, he's not speaking to anyone in particular, and forget it if you're looking for coherent subject matter.

Here's a rough approximation of a Pedro riff.

He's generally thinking aloud—or more accurately, giving voice to what flows through his mind. I imagine what he's saying is reasonably close to what goes on in "normal" heads that aren't engaged in organized thoughts, and once you lose the expectation that it should make linear sense, it's pretty entertaining. Sort of a sideways, free-associative thinking in which Sharpie becomes Shar Pei becomes a face that looks like a brain.

G-man talks about the Bible. He's a former homeless guy who now lives in the veterans' housing and volunteers with us. Mostly, he's trying to talk sense to the people he thinks might be vulnerable.

Deerslayer talks about his adventures and his travels around the country. He looks and sounds pretty normal, and he seems to know a lot about a lot of things. But watch out. He will tell you about it until closing time.

Ecstacy talks to herself, which is different than the way Pedro keeps up his running monologue. He's semi-conscious of having an audience, like a rapper is, while she remains in her own world. It is a world you don't want to be in, where you wear open-back fuzzy slippers in winter, your parka still has a piece of masking tape on the sleeve that says "Donation" and you drag a suitcase with a teddy bear on top.

Special K tells me his shortcomings, his screw ups, his obsessions. Of all the conversations I have there, our talks feel the most authentic and our rapport genuine. On a given day, I may have two or three of these talks with people that get beyond transactions, banter and small talk. 

Accurately or not, I extrapolate from these to the other people in the room who are unable or unwilling to converse. Underneath each of them, I believe, a human being is finding ways to stay alive, and connection, even of the perfunctory sort that occurs in this room, is part of the strategy.

Another resident of the supported housing came in to give free haircuts today. We talked about the male pattern baldness that goes back generations in his French ancestry. He also cleans carpets in the apartments and transitional housing run by Catholic Outreach. He told me he charges $20 an apartment and $60 for a three-bedroom house. The residents are low income, he says, so he charges a low-income rate.

Catholic Outreach bought him the steam cleaner he uses. He used to work in a commercial cleaning business owned by disabled man who was also a Shriners clown. At 81, the man was rear-ended in his scooter and killed by an inattentive SUV driver. We talked about the retail markup on carpet shampoo, the RX20, the Cadillac of steam carpet cleaners, and the finer points of doing the work. He thinks he might go back into it. For now, though, he just cleans for the poor.

"I do a good job," he said, and then abruptly walked out the door and down the street.

Sometimes doing a good job isn't quite enough out in this world.