Nameless, Faceless & Homeless

Regarding the homeless standing outside The Other Place, in an editorial in the Dayton Daily News, Benjamin Schuster was quoted as saying

“My heart goes out to them. I really feel for them, but what gets me is they’re lying on the streets, they’re lying against the building, they’re in groups, and we don’t even have proper screening, we don’t have any trees or bushes which can shield these people from people driving downtown…”

There was some backlash against that comment in editorials and other blogs.  In my opinion, there are two possible unspoken intentions.

1. To see somebody in a desperate situation makes you feel sad, or have pity for them, or feel uncomfortable, or feel frustrated.  None of these feelings put you in a frame of mind to be optimistic about your visit downtown.

2.  Homeless are people too and deserve dignity – they should not be subjected to the stares and judgments of passersby.  If they were shielded from the street, they could maintain a semblance of anonymity to the average car driver, thereby not be personified as homeless when they are actually multi-dimensional.

Some homeless people are scary because they are angry or mentally ill.  Some are happy despite their circumstances; others do everything possible to maintain their dignity regardless of their plight.  All of them are multi-dimensional, just like me.  The commonality among them is their lack of address – something most of us don’t ever want to imagine, but are forced to on occasion… and that makes us uncomfortable.

For 9 months during 2002/2003 I had something of a stalker downtown.  A homeless man with obvious mental problems seemed to pick me out of a crowd and follow me whenever I left the MeadWestvaco tower.  He hung out on Courthouse square and since I parked in a garage on Ludlow, our paths crossed daily.  I started to vary my route, and our paths would cross less, but he always recognized me, turned around and began to follow me.  After a fairly harrowing incident, a security guard began walking me to my car every night.  Because of that experience, I was afraid of the homeless.

When I moved downtown I realized that there were familiar faces among the homeless people – I recognized them, and they recognized me.  There was the guy who sang songs to me every other night on Second St., the blind guy asking for change at the corner of 3rd and Jefferson.  There was a frail man with no teeth who pushed a cart of recycled cans.  I saw one of my co-workers hand him a $5 bill, asking him how things were.  He said “It could be worse.  Thank you and God bless you.”   On occasion I gave him money - he never asked for it, but always had a kind word, regardless of if I gave him something or not. 

One morning I was walking down Main Street and a homeless man handed me a piece of paper.  On it was a poem he had written about his experience as a homeless person and how he had come to this point in life.  It was hand written and copied, with misspelled words.  He told me he was selling poems instead of panhandling because he did not want to beg.  I paid for the poem and hung it in my cube.  A year later my husband and I were walking through the Oregon District and we met him again.  He had 5 different poems he was selling.  They were typed and on colored paper.  He told me that the people at the print shop were helping him.  He had sold enough poems to buy a new pair of shoes.  They were shiny white sneakers and he was proud of his recent accomplishments.  We bought another poem and I told him that I had some of his work hanging in my office.

Two of my neighbors have befriended a homeless woman who often rests at Cooper Park.  Her cart wheels were worn and falling apart, so her possessions were in a black garbage bag.  My neighbors decided to share a grocery cart and gave her one of theirs.

I guess my point is that nobody is faceless and sometimes we need to look at individual trees instead of the forest.  In my last blog I mentioned quotes where “the city doesn’t care” or the actions taken were “immoral.”  By taking the names and faces out of the equation, it is easy to judge - the homeless and also those making efforts to help them.  We can all be better served to be shielded from judgments by our peers – whether it’s by putting up some trees to form a physical shield or by forcing ourselves to look a little closer and thereby not being tempted to judge in the first place.

As a follow up from a previous blog, please remember that on November 4th, The Other Place is holding a 5K walk/run “Run for a Change” at 9am starting and finishing at Wegerzyn Gardens.  See the event calendar for details.