I met Kristy several months ago, while we were doing outreach in Lincoln Park. She was living in her car with her two dogs, Joseph and Pepper. At that point she was still mobile, but when I encountered her again, she was pulled over off of Emporia Street, just past the railroad tracks. She was not only parked, she was stuck. Her purse, containing not just her wallet and all forms of ID, but also her car key, had been stolen.
Downsides of living on the streets, I guess.
I got in the habit of checking in on her infrequently, maybe twice a week; at the beginning I’d swing by with the leftovers from outreach at the park – ice water, bananas, snacks. We’d chat for a bit and I’d leave, promising to come back when I was back in the area.
Then one day, her passenger-side rear door, where her bare feet were usually visible, was closed. It was closed the next day, and the next, too. For two weeks, her and the dogs were nowhere to be seen, and day by day the knot in my gut was growing.
But what to do? I didn’t have a way to contact her. I was at the point of giving up, ready to assume that what I saw as my responsibility to her was over.
But the last day that I pulled off, just past the railroad tracks, she was there. Her update was even bleaker than the look on her face: she had been in the hospital for two weeks, where they told her that she has advanced throat cancer and needs chemotherapy and radiation.
Our old ritual resumed, but my stops became more frequent, and we visited for longer. After awhile I was stopping nearly every day and spending more than an hour there, squatting on the ground outside her car, my arm around Joseph or Pepper, while Kristy shared stories of her life with me, or we talked about the city’s scarce options to get her off the streets so that she could begin treatment for the cancer. The dogs are her family, and parting with them was not tenable, which further limited her housing choices.
It sounded a bit ridiculous to me until the morning that I spent with them in the backseat of the car while Kristy was seeing her doctor at the cancer center. The dogs had to go with us because she couldn’t leave them alone in her stranded car. With some surprise, I realized that they had grown on me, and I didn’t mind Joseph’s scruffy muzzle or Pepper’s paws pressed into my legs.
And then I realized that Kristy had also grown on me.
That one morning when I’d made extra oatmeal – minus the apples, because I’d learned she’s allergic – to share with her… or when I stopped to get her an iced Diet Coke – her favorite – on an especially hot day… or the Popeye’s chicken that I’d dropped off after work one evening…
These were signs that, against what the rhetoric of boundaries might have told me, I was involved, and my responsibility to Kristy was not as to a ministry project. She was becoming a friend.
That realization came with some degree of distress. If Kristy was my friend, then I couldn’t stop day after day and lament her situation with her, but do nothing about it. The words of Saint James buzzed in my ear like a pesky fly: “If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill,’ and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that?” (James 2:15-16).
Was it within my means to help her beyond what I was already doing? As part of the Romero Catholic Worker, the answer was unequivocally yes. I told Kristy that I had a group of friends who believed that whatever we had in excess of our needs belonged to God and the people that He brought into our lives, and that we wanted to help.
So, a little over a month ago, on a Friday, I pulled up behind Kristy’s car for the last time. We loaded up everything she currently owns in the trunk of a Honda CRV and the dogs hopped in the backseat. Half an hour later, Kristy used a key card to open the door to her own space and everything she’d done without for the last four months: a bed, a shower, curtains over the windows, a lock on the door. There were even the luxuries: a television, a refrigerator, and air conditioning.
As is her way, she tilted her chin upward, casting a bemused glance in the direction of heaven, and shook her head ever so slightly. But this time, instead of saying, “He’s got a sense of humor,” she said, “He always provides.” There were tears glistening in her eyes as she turned back toward me: “Thank you, so much. And thank your friends.”
What she is grateful for is truly meager; she lives now in a cheap motel off the interstate, she cannot claim her own place, she still suffers from chronic health conditions and is still awaiting treatment for her throat cancer. She lives off of cereal and microwave meals, her car is not operational, and she usually has to wash her clothes in the sink. But her gratitude for privacy, security, and access to a bed and a shower cannot be overstated.
I guess the lesson for me in it all is to be careful doing the works of mercy; you just might end up with a friend.
The following is something that Kristy wrote and gave me permission to share, with minor editorial adjustments.
So, from the first guest of the Romero Catholic Worker:
My name is Kristy. I’m writing this to tell you how God works through people. And how He brings people together in so many ways.
I was homeless for several months. No money. Just my car and two dogs. All I could do was pray. And I did a lot of praying. I have a genetic blood disease called acute intermittent porphyria. There is no cure. I also recently found out that I have cancer. I lived in my car! How was I going to survive? All I could do was keep the faith and give it to God. It was so hard, and still is. I was barely eating, and using the curb for a bathroom. I am also disabled and good luck on getting a shower. My purse was stolen. No key to my car and water in my gas tank. Wow.
I met Mattie at the park giving out water and bananas. Little did she know I had not eaten for 4 days. She was sent from God. Over the months she would check on me and bring me water and snacks and bananas. It kept me alive. We really started to get to know each other and became friends. We have a lot in common and especially our faith in God. We developed a really good friendship.
Then one day, I got a surprise. Her and a group of her friends helped get me off the streets! I believe that God inspired them to do this. Mattie did not know that the doctor told me if I did not get off the street, they could not help me. I never told her. She is taking me to my cancer appointments and her and her friends are making sure I have a roof over my head as well as food in my belly. And, I will be getting my social security payments soon.
God works in mysterious ways. I’m so grateful to her and her friends and God most of all. I cannot wait to be on my feet again and beat this cancer so I too can give back like they have given to me.
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