6:30 a.m. I woke up at my girlfriend’s apartment. I got my stuff together and I drove to Tewksbury.
I started my work at 8:00 a.m. at the Old chapel at Tewksbury hospital where I went to a SAMSA event hosted by Michael who works for the latin-based drug treatment center. I made some connections there with Billerica police and also Methuen police, who might be able to point me in the direction of homeless people in their area.
I left the event right when it started at 9:00 a.m. and then I came to work at 9:30 a.m. at the shelter. At 10:30 a.m. I went to the grand opening of the new resource Center at 1 Broadway Street in Methuen. I learned of the services they could provide for clients and I saw some familiar faces. This new resource Center is very small. They incorporated a recovery coach, and a mental health clinician. Their plan is to help people access services like housing, healthcare options, and other social services.
I arrived back at the shelter around noon time and then I packed up a bunch of donated sandwiches and drinks and went to Luminescence to connect with Pedro to go out and do outreach and hand out all the sandwiches and drinks. Louisa was at Luminescence and I had been helping coordinate the detox for her with Jennifer, their director of operations.
At around 1:30 Pedro and I left and we went to the encampment behind Doyle Street by the river and handed out drinks and sandwiches to the people there. We went to the encampment behind the Fruteria and handed out drinks and sandwiches there. We also went to the encampment under the bridge and along the river and handed drinks and sandwiches out there.
At around 4:30 I brought Pedro back to Luminescence where Louisa was waiting to go into treatment. Louisa was in very bad condition, she had been smoking crack pretty incessantly, she was extremely tired and sleeping. She was dirty and you could tell she was not in good health mentally or physically.
There had been one problem with the detox admission concerning a hospital stay Louisa had the previous day. I communicated with an outreach worker from the detox and it became a waiting game. The detox would not admit Louisa, because they were saying that she was not properly discharged from the hospital. They were under the assumption that she was sectioned by the hospital. It was so late in the afternoon I had no choice but to bring Louisa back to the shelter with me. I tried to secure a bed at another facility and was unable to do so. I gave Louisa the option to stay at the shelter for the night, but Louisa refused. She went back out into the street after eating some food and getting a drink. I planned on meeting her the next day at the parking garage next to the bus station where she sleeps.
I stayed at the shelter until about 8:00 p.m. and I went to the TMF dinner. I engaged with a man there named Juancarlos. He’d been at the shelter in the past and he suffers with severe schizophrenia. I told him I would engage with him the next day or sometime soon in the future.
There’s a young girl who is alcoholic and comes to the TMF dinners. They call her Columbia. She was drunk and she began getting aggressive. She threw a beer can at somebody. Another woman came over and began yelling at her. It turned into a fight. So not only did the young girl Columbia get hit while trying to fight back, but the aggression spread. Two other guys began to argue. I actually stood between them so they wouldn’t throw blows at each other. But they moved farther down the bus station and began arguing again. One of the men got hit. Then a couple other guys began to fight. The violence was infectious.
After the brawl subsided. I went and I grabbed Mauricio and I took him to the truck. I helped him out of his wheelchair into the front seat, and I put his wheelchair in the truck bed. I drove Mauricio home and then I headed over to my campsite. I arrived at the tent around 11:00 p.m. It has been a chaotic day altogether.
My girlfriend has texted me non-stop, I’ve said a little here and there to her, but once again I have become the villain in her mind. Hopefully she calms down and we can go back to loving each other. I settled on my air mattress in my tent and I drifted into sleep.