Message from a Former Client
Just as the COVID-19 pandemic started to work its way across the country, we received an online donation which was followed-up with a beautiful, thoughtful and touching email from a former client that we felt compelled to share with you. Stories such as that of John’s are a direct result of your continuous support, and we thank you.
Here is the text:
From Christmas 1987 to Easter 1988 I was homeless and living in the rectory with Father Baxer and friends while working in the church basement shelter evenings. This time there saved my life and I still often think about this experience and pray for the frozen man found in the alley by the church which gave rise to the opening of the church basement for a night-time shelter for homeless men, some of whom became friends. I am so glad you are staying on Park Street.
In the church basement one evening a man came to me and said,
“You don’t belong here.”
Did he not know I was as homeless as he? No place of my own to call home, no address, no mail. No phone, no calls, no money. Just feeling a sense of nothingness, belonging nowhere, invisible and scorned on the street. A worthless lazy drunk. But how would he know this? And so we talked until lights out.
I met him the following morning, a brisk mid-March day, and we spent the day together roaming the streets of Hartford. We visited the Civic Center (now the XL Center), the Library, Christ the King for lunch, House of Bread. We refilled dirty coffee cups from the trash can at Burger King, picked-up cigarette butts from ashtrays, watched rushing people on the sidewalks and filled buses going to where they had to go. But I had nothing, only isolation. No place to go or anywhere to be.
We then met two other men on the street whom I recognized to also be shelter guests, and on the busy downtown sidewalk we talked and laughed. The four of us walked together back to the MAC and I began to feel better. I had community, a place that cared about me, that seeks to nurture me to greater good, to friends, self-respect, my own self-esteem and freedom to become me. In that moment, the approaching evening didn’t seem quite as dark and cold on that particular March day, and the orange-red church basement door was God’s beacon of hope.
Today, John has overcome the demons that first brought him to the shelter more than 30 years ago. He has since relocated, living a comfortable life. John credits his time at the shelter as “life-saving.”
As always, our utmost thanks for your ongoing support. It’s people like you, embracing our mission, that allow ImmaCare to provide services to clients like John, supporting them on their personal journeys of transforming their lives.
