Thursday afternoons are my day to volunteer at one of the homeless shelters downtown. After I leave the church at 2 p.m., I drive into Omaha and head to the Siena Francis House, where I spend the next several hours doing whatever the volunteer coordinator has for me to do, and then help serve the nightly meal at the shelter.
The meal is quite the efficient operation! There are four seatings: 5:00, 5:30, 6:00 and 6:30, and each seating can serve 60 people. Towards the end of the month, each seating is nearly always full. This week, the first Thursday of the month, I noticed there were noticeably less people at the later seatings. I guess those monthly paychecks hadn't run out yet.
This particular Thursday, I had been sitting at the front desk in the day shelter, which is basically a place for people to sit during the day who have nowhere else to go -- homeless people who are either waiting to hear back from possible job opportunities or people who are either unwilling or physically unable to seek employment. Some of the people who are regulars at the day shelter have been there for 15 years or more, some of the staff have told me. The day shelter area was built in response to community complaints of the homeless hanging out in a park near an area mall... so now they sit in their little room with a T.V. down a side street off in a corner of a forgotten section of Omaha... out of sight, out of mind? Perhaps.
One of the things I like about the Siena Francis House is that nearly all the staff members are people in the (drug and alcohol) recovery program that is also housed at the shelter. I sat and chatted with the rest of the front desk staff, who quickly gave me what I gathered was the lowest job on the totem pole -- manning the front door button. This meant it was my job to sit there and press the buzzer to let people in as they came to the front door, freeing up the rest of the front desk staff to run errands and tend to other things. In any case, I did this for about two hours and then headed next door to the larger shelter building to get ready to serve dinner.
As I walked up to the shelter, I said hello to a young man sitting on the steps. He said hello back, and I asked him how he was doing. "TIRED!!" he exclaimed. He told me he had just gotten out of jail that morning, gone straight to work, and now had come here, because he didn't really have anywhere else to go. "I guess this is the place, you know?" he said. He asked me where he was supposed to go, and I pointed him to the shelter's front desk.
"I guess you should talk to people at the desk; I'm not really sure what the intake procedures are around here," I said. "I'm just a volunteer."
He seemed interested, "Oh yeah?" he asked.
"Yeah," I said. "I come here on Thursdays and help out with various things and then help to serve the meal." I told him a little bit about the Resurrection House program and what I was doing, considering ministry and whatnot.
He looked at me with considerable interest. "Oh yeah? That's really great. Yeah! That's really great. You don't find too many people willing to do that kind of thing these days. That's just great. Alright! Yeah!" He nodded and smiled at me. "You're the first person I've met here," he told me.
We exchanged names and handshakes (his name was Fred), and I walked in with him and pointed him to the front desk, thinking that was the last I'd see of him for the evening. I went on to the kitchen and walked back to the back, meeting up with the volunteers for the night, a crew of college and graduate students from nearby Creighton University, and introducing myself and getting to know them a bit as we got our assignments and "postings" for the evening -- who would be spooning the food onto the trays, who would be serving the trays to the tables, and so forth.
Suddenly, before I even knew it, I turned around, and there was Fred!
"I decided to help volunteer," he said.
"Oh, great!" I said. "Good for you!"
"Yeah," he said. "You know, I told God, I said, if I get through this, I'm going to start doing what I know you want me to do. So here I am." He nodded at me, acknowledging silently my earlier comments about working in a church and discerning my "call." He asked me more about the program and about what I did at the church. I told him some of the details of things that I do, and mentioned that I would be preaching on Sunday.
"For real??" he laughed and looked tickled to death. "You're going to be PREACHIN'? Really? Man, I want to see that!! I gotta see that! Where is this church? I'm gon' come!"
He continued to laugh and look generally amused, asking me if I was going to be "hollerin'" or something (I can't remember the exact word he used, but something that connoted a very fired-up, empassioned, call and response kind of preaching.) I laughed and said that no, that wasn't quite the kind of preaching I'd be doing in an Episcopal Church!
Throughout the rest of the evening, he continued to say how much he wanted to come hear me preach. I thought about offering to give him a ride, but then my "safety" filter kicked in -- ok, I just met this guy, I don't know anything about him, and if I come get him it would just be me and him in the car... ok, probably not the best idea. I feel like I can generally get a good sense about people, and he seemed to truly be a genuinely nice guy, but I guess that's what they say about all the ax murderers too, huh?
He picked up on my hestitation and said that it would be his goal to convince me, after I'd known him a while, that he wasn't a killer. (I never said that was my hestitation, but I guess he figured out why I as a single woman would be wary of going somewhere with him alone. And I hated to have that wariness, but at the same time, I wouldn't want to wind up having something happen to me, either. And he seemed to understand -- "I know, you just met me," he said.) But he said he was going to call the priest at the church and see if someone could come and get him.
In any case, Fred and I wound up standing next to each other in the serving line all evening. He scooped the gravy onto the mashed potatoes, passed the trays to me, and I deposited a nicely drained ladel of peas and carrots. We chatted the whole evening over those pototoes and peas, and I found out that his "fresh out of jail" job was working construction (through some very animated descriptions of his first attempts at jackhammering some asphalt!), and that he apparently had a failed marriage and a kid somewhere (because he mentioned child support). He said he wanted to go see more theater (he mentioned Hairspray, which is in town this week, but was shocked to find out that the tickets would be upwards of $60. "Man, do you know how many hours I'd have to do this *makes jackhammer motions* to be able to pay for that???" he exclaimed.) We talked about the social constraints of being an ordained person -- "Man, if I'd known you were a preacher when I first met you, I would have been like, HMMMM," he said, making a kind of skeptical face. "But I found out you were a nice person BEFORE you said you were gonna be a preacher." He said he hoped I did become a "preacher," because he'd never had a friend as a preacher before. "I could be like, 'look, Mom, this is my friend. She's a preacher!!'" He seemed just delighted and amused by this prospect.
Through the entire evening, I was amazed by the upbeat attitude and friendliness of this man. And for someone who had just worked an entire day in construction, after having just gotten out of jail (and after having told me how tired he was when we first me), to agree to stand up for another two hours on his feet and help serve a meal to others, and to have an incredibly upbeat attitude through the whole thing (heck, he was a happier person than me!), just really made an impression on me. I've served dinner some weeks when the volunteers kind of smile at each other and don't really talk much, but by the end of this evening, due largely to Fred's outgoing personality and friendly laugh and smile, the entire group of volunteers felt like a community.
In any case, Fred and I wound up standing next to each other in the serving line all evening. He scooped the gravy onto the mashed potatoes, passed the trays to me, and I deposited a nicely drained ladel of peas and carrots. We chatted the whole evening over those pototoes and peas, and I found out that his "fresh out of jail" job was working construction (through some very animated descriptions of his first attempts at jackhammering some asphalt!), and that he apparently had a failed marriage and a kid somewhere (because he mentioned child support). He said he wanted to go see more theater (he mentioned Hairspray, which is in town this week, but was shocked to find out that the tickets would be upwards of $60. "Man, do you know how many hours I'd have to do this *makes jackhammer motions* to be able to pay for that???" he exclaimed.) We talked about the social constraints of being an ordained person -- "Man, if I'd known you were a preacher when I first met you, I would have been like, HMMMM," he said, making a kind of skeptical face. "But I found out you were a nice person BEFORE you said you were gonna be a preacher." He said he hoped I did become a "preacher," because he'd never had a friend as a preacher before. "I could be like, 'look, Mom, this is my friend. She's a preacher!!'" He seemed just delighted and amused by this prospect.
Through the entire evening, I was amazed by the upbeat attitude and friendliness of this man. And for someone who had just worked an entire day in construction, after having just gotten out of jail (and after having told me how tired he was when we first me), to agree to stand up for another two hours on his feet and help serve a meal to others, and to have an incredibly upbeat attitude through the whole thing (heck, he was a happier person than me!), just really made an impression on me. I've served dinner some weeks when the volunteers kind of smile at each other and don't really talk much, but by the end of this evening, due largely to Fred's outgoing personality and friendly laugh and smile, the entire group of volunteers felt like a community.
He brought the Creighton students into the conversation with seemingly insensitive and non-P.C. questions about their ethnic origins ("What are you, Asian? Do you speak Asian?") and ribbing a Japanese-American girl relentlessly because she couldn't speak Japanese ("I'm fourth-generation!!!" she kept saying.) I shot right back with asking Fred if he spoke any Swahili or Yoruba or anything -- I mean, he's from AFRICA, right?? Why doesn't he speak any African languages, then? ;o) One of the girls was actually FROM China and did speak Chinese, and so he learned how to say, "How are you?" in Chinese. "Hey man, that's pretty cool!" he laughed.
After all the people had been fed, we volunteers sat down to our own helpings of the fish, potatoes, peas and carrots, and day-old pastries and laughed and joked over dinner like old friends. Other weeks I've been there, I've sat and eaten dinner with other volunteers and not said one word the entire time. But with Fred's magnetic personality, we were all drawn in to the conversation and community.
I came home that night with my spirits truly lifted. I felt like my day had been much better for having met Fred. He had brought a bit of light and life into my world. He radiated a true joy and interest and concern and compassion for people. And given everything he had been through, it was truly inspiring to see. I couldn't help but think that Fred might make a mighty good minister himself! He was certainly the one doing the ministering that particular night.
After all the people had been fed, we volunteers sat down to our own helpings of the fish, potatoes, peas and carrots, and day-old pastries and laughed and joked over dinner like old friends. Other weeks I've been there, I've sat and eaten dinner with other volunteers and not said one word the entire time. But with Fred's magnetic personality, we were all drawn in to the conversation and community.
I came home that night with my spirits truly lifted. I felt like my day had been much better for having met Fred. He had brought a bit of light and life into my world. He radiated a true joy and interest and concern and compassion for people. And given everything he had been through, it was truly inspiring to see. I couldn't help but think that Fred might make a mighty good minister himself! He was certainly the one doing the ministering that particular night.
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