Sleeping in the woods, under bridges

Home in the cold
Sleeping in the woods, under bridges - count proves homeless people are out there

By Raymond Castile
Saturday, February 16, 2008 1:16 PM CST


He wears eight sweaters and a coat. The Army taught him how to survive outdoors, he says, biting into a sandwich.

"You got to dress in layers, eat meat and keep your body in shape, or you get sick out here," said Michael Myers, flashing a Veteran's Identification Card displaying his name.

Myers, 48, served seven years in the Army. He has spent the last eight years homeless.The veteran begins his day around 6 a.m. in northern St. Charles, where he often spends the night in the woods. If he has money, he buys a cup of coffee. If he is broke, he goes to SSM St. Joseph Health Center and drinks free coffee.

"They don't like that, but I don't care," he said. "I was born at St. Joseph, so I should get a lifetime of free coffee."

At 8 a.m., Myers begins searching back alleys for cans and metal scraps. By 11 a.m., he exchanges them for money at Cash's Scrap Metal and Iron on Junior Drive. Then he walks to the Salvation Army on 2140 N. Fourth St. to eat lunch at the soup kitchen.

That is where Myers sat Jan. 30, eating a sandwich in the company of other homeless men, like Terrance Marshall, 55.

"I could be sleeping outside today. I don't know," said Marshall, a Petty Officer 3rd Class who served in the U.S. Navy 1974-78.
click post title for the rest

Most of us are one paycheck away from being homeless. Most of us try to work hard for what we have and what we need but it doesn't always matter. I ended up out of a job after working for a church for two years. I don't even get unemployment because the church didn't pay into the system. We're having to refinance our house to make up the difference in my lost income. I only worked part time so that I could do this work 12 hours a day, seven days a week. When people asked me what I did for a living, I'd laugh and tell them "I work for God and in my spare time, I work for the church." Now I'm out of a job, trying to find part time work in a recession so that I can continue my life's work. After all, we moved from Massachusetts for this reason. It just didn't work out the way I hoped it would.

I tried to get donations for the videos I do so that I wouldn't end up in the poor house on top of everything, but the donations didn't even get me even with what it cost me. The DVD drive broke and I couldn't afford to replace the PC with one that would be able to handle the workload. No one has money to donate. The people who do have money, don't donate as much as they should to charities so helping out a person like me is not even a dream anymore. Still this is not why my heart is breaking. The numbers of homeless go up and so do the numbers of billionaires in this country. I wonder what the hell they are going to do with all the money they accumulated in this lifetime when they are dead and can't take it with them? Could you imagine what could be done in this country if they would just pitch in and help people out?