When the temperature plummets to -26 and there is a windchill and I am inside my warm home, with a hot cup of coffee, I can not help but think as I curl into my warm robe to read and correct yet another english paper, how fortunate I am to be out of the cold!
Just last night they opened up the Stampede Grandstand to the homeless and the news coverage captured a long long line of shuffling cold homeless slipping in and through the opened doors.
We have a core of homeless people in our big city who would be deemed the ‘regulars’, people who have been on the streets, living, for years. But these past few years, our city has become the harbour for an influx of people who are escaping a sad economic situation somewhere else in Canada and they are moving here in hopes of employment during this crazy ‘boom’ of ours. Most unfortunately, there is little in the way of living accomodation that is at all affordable when you are out on the streets looking for a job!
Some of my friends who volunteer for the "In From the Cold" programs and feed these people in church basements and then set out mats for sleeping that night, have described whole families who come in search for a hot meal. Children do their homework after their meal and carry a simple lunch of a piece of fruit and a slice of balogne on bread in a brown paper bag next day.
There are many who believe that, ‘They made their beds, let them sleep in them!’ I am of the mind, that where and when you can, you help…you open your doors…you share what you have and can. Pay it forward.
