During the spring break of 2016, I chose to join a large handful of guys, including my brother and our roommates, from the Catholic Student Union at FSU on a trip to New Brunswick, New Jersey. We would be spending the week reaching out to and assisting the homeless in that area.
Growing up in the rougher area of Saint Petersburg, Florida, I thought I was used to being around and seeing the homeless, since there’s an alarmingly large homeless population there. In St. Pete, my treatment of homeless individuals involved giving a slight nod or a small, “Hi” or “Sup?,” after which I turned away and kept walking, never getting too close or too social, just to be safe. Likewise, I thought I knew how to act and what to expect from our trip to New Brunswick. I’m glad to say that I was wrong.
I spent Monday night of spring break with three other guys at the homeless shelter in the basement of the Catholic Center at Rutgers University. The night began with the four of us waiting in the cold with the rest of the homeless men and women that frequented the shelter. I was hesitant to confront any of them at first; I feel like we all were. What was I supposed to say? Why would they want to talk to me? Should I even say anything? These and several unrelated thoughts ran through my head as a man from inside the basement unlocked the doors and we all entered. As the night wore on, however, my thinking and demeanor changed. I ate dinner with the people in the shelter, listening to their stories and opinions. One man told us about a comic book he planned to write and illustrate with a friend of his. Another man showed me his surprisingly good drawings of things and people he saw every day. I talked about politics, pop culture, traveling and college with them. That night opened my eyes to the depth and humanity of these people. However, the Wednesday morning of that trip changed everything.
On Wednesday, my friend Kevin Kubelka and I met James Rogers on the sidewalk in front of the local Hospital. We had gone out on the streets of New Brunswick to seek out homeless individuals and talk to them, learn from them, and simply keep them company. We managed to find James immediately after we left the Catholic Center at Rutgers. He was a 54-year-old black man with a wispy white beard and poor posture. His clothes were stained and covered in grime and there was a large black backpack by his side. Kevin and I looked at each other briefly when we first saw him and I said, “Let’s talk to him.”
The conversation was slow at first, consisting mostly of small talk, but picked up quickly once he realized we meant him no harm. We traded stories back and forth; Kevin and I talked about our families and where we were from and James told us about his son, his job before he was homeless and where he came from. I showed him pictures of my family on my phone, which he was fascinated by. I told him about how I used to run track in high school and he explained to us how he would run everywhere when he was a kid. He talked about how he liked to say hi to everyone on the street, especially the pretty ladies, emphasizing his point by waving at and complementing a particularly attractive woman that happened to be passing by. Kevin and I both laughed.
Then the conversation became a bit more morose. James talked about how hurt he felt every time people passed him on the street and didn’t say hello back when he said hi to them, or when they wouldn’t even look at him. He told us about the time he got shot in the face after drug deal gone south, and how his eye was dislodged from the socket after being punched in the face and how he needed emergency surgery afterward. He told us how he hadn’t bathed in three months and had been on the street for longer than he could remember. I responded to him by saying that he shouldn’t lose hope and that things could get better, but he said there was no point and that he was tired of trying. Then tears started to form in his eyes.
The sun moved higher into the sky. An hour had passed. I asked him where he stayed at night, and he took Kevin and me across the street, to a small space behind a bush, in between two townhouses. Lying next to one house was a partially destroyed and folded over memory foam mattress, covered with a brown sheet and shopping cart a few feet away from it. Pointing to the multistoried hospital parking garage on the other side of the street, James told us how he used to sleep in there, but stopped after the security guards stole his belongings and all his documents and kicked him out. Kevin and I desperately wanted to help him, so we spent the rest of the day with him, calling all of the local shelters and walking around the city with him, trying to find him a place to stay. The morning had been cold, but by noon we were all sweating. James managed to fall asleep every time we stopped to take a break. Because his documents had been stolen and he had no identification, it was practically impossible to get him into a shelter nearby. We managed to get the address of a government building where he could have his documents replaced, but by then James was exhausted.
We stopped at the front steps of a Presbyterian Church. James was hunched over on the bottom step, barely awake. He thanked us for helping him but said he couldn’t go any further. Determined to do something, I asked Kevin to get a pen and legal pad out of the backpack I was wearing. I wrote down step by step instructions, telling him how and where he could get help. He nodded and agreed. Kevin and I gave him the peanut butter sandwiches in our backpacks, one of which he ate on the spot because he hadn’t eaten a real meal in three days. More tears started to form in his eyes as he started to apologize for not being able to walk further, but I out my hand on his shoulder and told it was alright and that he should find a place to rest. Kevin and I both hugged him, and I prayed silently that God would have mercy on this man who had suffered through so much. Then we started to walk back to the Catholic Center.
The next time you see a panhandler in the middle of the road, a homeless man or woman at a bus stop, or anyone who simply looks like life has beaten them down, don’t just look the other way and go about your business. If you have the time, stop and say hi. Talk to them. Help them. Too many people in today’s society fall into thinking that because a person doesn’t look a certain way or act a certain way, that person deserves less respect and acknowledgment. I’m here to tell you, however, that a person’s circumstances do not determine their humanity. Each and every one of the people you see on the street has a life and a story. All they want is for you to listen and recognize them as a human being. So do that.
