Shelter

When Joe asks her what she used to do for a career, all she ever says is she used to love to go hiking and skydiving.

This woman, 75 years old, now uses her sense of adventure to survive living on the streets of Tallahassee. Caught in the dilemma of medication or housing, but never both, she sleeps on the concrete front porch you see pictured above. Bike boxes make for good insulation from the cold chill seeping up through the concrete. Lake Ella is fairly safe, more prone to deviant rendevous in the parking lot than outright violence. Most importantly, she chose Joe. Lots of people choose Joe. For as long as I have known him and his tiny bike shop on the lake, Joe has taken care of the outcasts, the loners, the misfits. Some ride bikes, but not all of them. Some don't seem to notice it is even a bike shop. They come to chat with Joe, just like I do.

This woman is different. She has chosen to live at Joe's. She comes around at closing time, always asks permission to stay. What do you do? Joe said yesterday if he had a bigger place he would bring her home, and I don't doubt it.

I'm so pissed about this I can barely type.

Joe, and Huck, and Scotty B. (Not his real name) have made some upgrades. They moved the bench she used to sleep on, and Joe bought her a foam pool float (one of those real thick, non-inflatable ones). They got her a lamp. I mean, what can you do? She's not mentally ill, although her body is racked with cancer apparently. She's done with chemo. No more of that she says. If it comes back, she won't seek that kind of help. She's got no family left. She's on her own.

Yesterday Joe showed me a note she asked him to write for her stating that she wanted her body to be used for the advancement of medical science if it is at all useful to anyone. Joe dutifully wrote the note, she signed it, inscribed a social security number, and he put it in the drawer. What else can you do?

She's not mentally ill. She keeps herself clean and put together somehow. She can express herself just fine, and she is angry to still be alive. She says she has done everything she wanted to do. She says she's too scared, or not the type, to just eat a bunch of pills and go to sleep forever. She doesn't ask for money, and when Joe offers it she refuses. She definitely doesn't want to go to the homeless shelter.

I am making the social service calls, exploring the options, but who knows what she is willing to do? She has her pride to consider. Chances are that someone will find her dead on Joe's porch before the state comes up with a place for her.

What is my point? I don't know.

That I'm disgusted?
That I want to help her?
That you will NEVER be as proud of your bike shop as I am of mine?

Juancho