5:00 a.m. My sleep is spotty sleeping under the willow tree next to the path in the Palisade. I wake up, pack up, and head back over to the church where LA and the Woman sleep. LA wakes up shortly after I arrive. The Woman doesn’t wake up.
6:15 a.m. LA and I head out to St. Francis house for breakfast. Before we get in line LA stashes our weapons in a drain pipe on the side of a building. At breakfast Donald, a homeless man I met my first day sits with us. I talked to Donald at Emmanuel church about treatment a few days prior. A few other guys sit at our table and we have light conversation. For breakfast we have coffee, orange juice, and oatmeal.
8:00 a.m. LA and I hang out at the Commons waiting for St. Paul’s to open at 9:30 a.m. LA smokes a joint. Donald comes buy and lays down on the fountain. I decided to interview him.
9:00 a.m. LA and I head over to St. Paul’s and wait for the doors to open. I watch as two homeless people hug and dance, it’s a nice moment. Once we get into St. Paul’s I have some more breakfast, a cinnamon roll and oatmeal. We have a writing workshop, and I get a published packet of previous writings from the homeless. I also write a poem.
We’re running in cylindricals
Neither up nor down
People have beliefs
People live in towns
The purpose of our organization is for survival in each day.
The nature of the universe doesn’t see it that way.
Lies and religion are synonymous with growth and disintegration.
The Ideology give birth to countless nations.
Beyond pointless thought games exists peace so real.
To the untrained mind it seems surreal.
Call it what you like, makes no difference to me.
It cannot be caught in thought, a caged conceptualization It will never be.
12:00 p.m. Lunch is served and then they have an open Mike. A man sings with a guitar and harmonica. Most of my time at St. Paul’s is spent writing the blog. It takes quite a bit of time to upload videos to social media and put together the blog on the website.
1:30 p.m. LA and I part ways outside of St. Paul’s Church. The drunken Mad Marine is dancing to a band in the street. I start biking to the South Hampton shelter right in the heart of the impact zone on Atkinson Street.
I know I can’t leave my bike anywhere near Methadone mile. I choose to leave the bike at Boston Medical University. It’s a nicer area, that still doesn’t mean it won’t get ravaged or stolen in the night.
2:15 p.m. I walk through the tents and drug induced chaos on Atkinson Street to get to South Hampton men’s shelter. I tell the woman at the metal detector that I have mace and a batton for weapons. She says unless I go outside and hide them they get thrown away. I walk around until I find a weeded area against a fence where I can stash my self defense gear. I return back to southampton shelter and get ushered through the metal detector, and my bag gets x rayed. The staff have me wait on a metal bench to be intaked. I can feel how tired I am.
3:30 a.m. A kind case manager takes me into an office. I hand him my ID. He tells me he will have to transfer me to a shelter in my country because my mother’s address is on my driver’s license. I haven’t thought of this. The Massachusetts shelter system transfers homeless people to their area of residence on their IDs. Maybe next time I’ll say I lost my ID and I reside at St. Francis House 39 Boylston St. The case manager says he will let me stay in the South Hampton shelter for the night, and have me transferred tomorrow. I’m elated, because I plan toeave early in the morning.
4:00 p.m. The Case Manager shows me around the shelter. It looks just like prison. The only difference is you can go home. I notice many open beds. The Case manager says that dinner starts at 4:30. I’m happy to hear that. Next I’m shown my bed. I picked a bottom bunk. I notice that most of the men around me are foreign, Haitian I believe, it seems they are speaking some form of French. Dinner is hotdogs and kielbasa in pasta and some cooked zucchini. I wait till about 5:30 for seconds.
5:45 p.m. I head to my bunk, I get my bed ready, I put all the stuff in my pockets in my bag which is behind my head, I use my jacket as a pillow, and I fall asleep.