by Dan Wilson
Without a doubt one of the most powerful experiences I have had living at the Bethany House has been hearing people’s stories. On a daily basis we watch our guests go through major life changes. We watch them overcome huge obstacles, make large steps towards a positive future, and choose hope instead of bitterness. We also witness our guests experience defeat, be ignored, and face some harsh realities.
These stories of victory and defeat have encouraged, educated and sustained our core community. In the past we have shared some of these stories with our wider community and we would like to share more. As a community, we feel that right now is a particularly important time to share some of these stories. But in order to protect the privacy of our guests, I will create a composite character that contains common reoccurring elements that most of our guests face.
Staying at the Bethany House was definitely not Daniel’s first option. After spending months camping outside, sleeping in the rain, and spending nights shivering instead of sleeping he was finally able to admit that he needed a steady place to sleep. Most of our guests are from the Winona area, but can no longer stay with their friends and family. Often because, as Daniel said, “Staying clean [from drugs] means a new playground, playmates, and new playthings.” We gave Daniel thirty days, just as we do with all of our guests. Thirty days to turn your life around, start from scratch, and end up in a healthy living situation. “I just need a couple of weeks here,” we were assured, “just a couple of weeks to find a job and an apartment and then I will be gone.” Within in two weeks, Daniel had put in nearly a hundred applications, without a car or a bus pass.
“The economy is tight right now,” we kept hearing. Large corporations have reported their highest earnings in years, but here, the jobs are still scarce. For every one job in the classifieds, there are two hundred applications. With such a large pool of applicants, those with baggage from their past find it impossible to stay afloat. Accumulating a felony or two has sealed his fate for finding a job here. Most employers don’t even bother to look at his intelligence, problem solving skills, or his ability to answer almost every one of our Trivial Pursuit cards. After thirty days of running around to put in an application at every hiring business, Daniel had to make one of the hardest decisions of his life; admitting he is no longer strong enough, smart enough, or young enough to be able to support himself.
After finally being able to admit he needs help, Daniel needed to find an agency to help him. But with state budgets trimming the programs that help the less than ideal citizens, asking for help feels more like yelling. With overburdened caseworkers we thought that Daniel would need to be persistent to get help. However, it is hard to be persistent when no one returns your phone calls, and when everyone is “too busy to see you right now.” The process dragged on for weeks, then months. We keep telling ourselves that we are not caseworkers and that our purpose for living here is to provide community to our guests. Nonetheless, we felt compelled to go with Daniel to meetings, to call up the caseworker ourselves and demand an explanation. With every phone call we made, we found one person had left some paperwork sit on a desk without their signature. Only because we advocated for him and questioned the process, did they then decide to keep the process moving. To have your future in the hands of people who don’t particularly care about you is a nerve-racking situation. It is only natural that depression, anxiety, and hopelessness are a part of Daniel’s daily reality.
Sometimes hospitality means experiencing this rejection with our guests. When Daniel can’t move on to a new situation and stays at our house longer than thirty days, we also feel hopeless and have anxiety about the people we are forced to turn away because our house is full. This is because Winona County does not provide any other type of emergency shelter. It is easy to understand why Catholic Workers often expressed feeling “burned out” after living in a house of hospitality. When we wrap ourselves in the lives of our guests we feel the same rejection they feel, the same depression, the same sense of hopelessness. This is an experience that I choose to take part in, however, Daniel did not choose to be treated like this. He cannot leave this daily reality of rejection. After living with so many Daniels, I have come to realize that the perception I had of the “American Dream” came from a tainted perspective. Sometimes those who try the hardest don’t end up on top. For some it seems like the cards are always stacked against them. We hope that ultimately we may do our best to share this burden that our friends bear. But at the end it is almost always our burden that becomes lighter. Because creating these relationships and hearing these stories help us to realize our own poverty. It exposes our own prejudices and presuppositions. This is why when Daniel left us, the only words I could think to say were, “Thank you for all that you given to us.”
