“I got my feet wet in an internship with Your New Beginning. It’s for people with court-ordered counseling for drug offenses or domestic violence offenses. I challenged myself by working with domestic violence offenders. Their sessions were for 18 weeks, but I had guys stay in my class for 30-40 weeks. They were like, ‘We just need to talk to you every week.’ I built such a bond with them.

“Then I was like, what else can I challenge myself to do? That’s when an opportunity came to work with the homeless population. I met them where they were, on the street. I did everything I could for them, like see them housed and help them get some income.

“People always say, ‘Take a walk in my shoes.’ I feel like I’m able to do that. When I meet someone, I want to see life from their perspective. I want to understand all the emotions that they feel: every hardship, every joy.

“I told my homeless and domestic violence individuals, ‘I know when people see you, they have a preconceived notion about who you are. I don’t have that. I’m a blank slate. I’m non-judgmental. Tell me everything. I want to see things from your perspective.’

“My domestic violence clients would just be getting out of jail and coming back into society. And they would say, ‘I can’t get a job. Once they see felon on my record, once they see jail on my record, I’m just cast away.’

“Same with some of my homeless individuals. They would be like, ‘People don’t know that I had a master’s degree. They don’t know that I had a family. They don’t know that I never touched a drug in my life. I’m just on hard times.’

“Those experiences really motivated me to continue to be a blank slate for people. I like for them to be able to tell their own story, and realize that sometimes the pen is in their hand. If they want to write a better story for themselves, then they have the freedom to do that.”

— Carleigh Joseph Olivas

Carleigh switched from nursing to social work, and finished first in her class at Prairie View A&M University. She also earned a master’s in social work.

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When I met Joshua Johnson six years ago, it was outside a Baytown motel. He was staying there temporarily.

He said at the time, “I was living at an RV park. Me and my friend were staying there. He lit a cigarette and threw it at the propane tank. It had a hose leak, and it blew up. The whole bedroom caught on fire. From there, it all went down hill. Ever since then, I haven’t really had a place to live. I’ve stayed with friends. I’ve slept at bus stops. I’ll get on the bus and go to the back to sleep. I fall asleep at the library sometimes. I’m on the waiting list for low-income housing. Recently, I’ve been staying at this motel.”

You may see Joshua around town, riding his black bike while listening to his favorite country tunes from Alan Jackson and George Strait. These days, he has a place to call home.

I caught up with him last week, across the street from an apartment complex. A friend from church helped him secure a spot there nearly three years ago.

“It’s great. I’m staying warm at night. I’m taking showers. I’m cooking real food. And I can actually make coffee.”

The basics that many of us take for granted are much more than that for people in the community who find themselves living on the streets. Joshua has been there and done that.

As he told me back in 2016, “We prefer not to be called homeless. We like to be treated like regular, normal human beings. We’re just having a tough time. We’re just trying to survive day to day.”

These days, for Joshua, life is a little more normal.

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“On my way to work, I would see homeless people every day. Especially during the winter months, I would see them living in cardboard boxes under bridges and sometimes on sidewalks. I’ve bought food for a homeless person, and the gratitude of, ‘Thank you, thank you, God bless you,’ makes you want to do so much more. I think that we as a society must help the needy. Since there is a huge need, I decided to become a volunteer. As a member of the UPS Houston Community Investment Committee, I help create volunteer events. We’ve helped several charity organizations, including the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Houston, and we’re now collecting blankets for the homeless. 

“I love volunteering because it gives me a sense of purpose in life. My most memorable volunteer activity was when I worked at a hospital in Brooklyn, New York. I was assisting patients in filling out medical forms at their bedside in the emergency room. Some of them couldn’t understand English or speak the language. So I was the one who would help bridge the communication gap, and assist the nurses and patients in translating. Another memorable activity was assembling bikes that were donated to disadvantaged children who could not afford them. The bikes were transported by UPS to several Boys and Girls Clubs in the Houston area.

“I enjoy volunteering because you know that your efforts can positively impact a community. I think we should all volunteer because you never know when you will be the one needing help.”

— Mariel Pagan

New or gently used blankets for the homeless can be dropped off at the UPS Customer Center at 5421 I-10 in Baytown, noon-6:30 p.m., Monday through Friday, until Sept. 1, 2019. The blankets will be distributed later this year through the Healthcare for the Homeless Program that serves Harris County. Homeless people in Baytown will be among those who receive the blankets.

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“When we were growing up, we had four refrigerators, four washing machines, four dryers. There were seven kids in that house, and each one of us got a car when we turned 13. What was I going to do with a car at that age but wash and polish it? We thought everybody in America was living good. I didn’t know that some people were out there starving. 

“When you’re raised up real good with everything you need and you have money, you shouldn’t isolate yourself from other people who are less fortunate. You shouldn’t be thinking, oh, I’m so much better than them. Because you could be a trillionaire one day and then homeless the next. 

“I’m going to see some friends today who have way less than me. And I’m going to treat them just like any person wants to be treated. I don’t think we have enough people in this world today who are treating human beings like human beings.”

— Linda Powell

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“I would like to help start a program, a housing thing, where people who were ready to get off the streets could come in and have like 10 to 14 days to get acclimated. They would have to act right to be there. And if they were feeling us and we were feeling them, and they wanted to go to work, we could find a job for them somewhere. The more people who showed up, the more talents there would be, and the more things would develop. It would be kind of like an underground job corps. You know, a place where if you need someone to work for a day or two, they don’t have to jump through all sorts of hoops.

“Walk a Mile Foundation is what I’d like to call it. It would be a nonprofit organization run by street people, recovering addicts and ex-convicts for the purpose of creating jobs and financial opportunities in the communities where we live and where resources like this are desperately needed. I don’t want it to be associated with religion or recovery or government. I’m not knocking any of those things. It’s just that there’s so much of all that out there already. I’m under no illusion about the percentage of people who might actually follow through. But still, it would be kind of cool if people had a chance.

“There’s this slogan I’ve seen on the internet, something like ‘using the homeless and jobless to create opportunities for themselves.’ I’ve been thinking and talking about this forever. It’s been in my heart for a long time. My personal belief is that God put me on the streets because I had this idea developing. I kind of consider it a calling.”

— Donald “Dirty D” Wilfong

(Note: Donald passed away on Jan. 7, 2022. He was 52.)

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“Some people may not realize it, but we’ve got a lot of homeless people around Baytown. With everybody that’s out there, maybe some don’t deserve to be in that situation. But I believe you’ve got to do something to pull yourself up. You can’t just keep expecting people to help you if you don’t try to help yourself. One thing I’ve learned is that if you’re trying to help yourself, other people will go to bat for you. But when you’re just trying to use people, you can forget that.”

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“As I’ve gotten older, I’ve gained a real level of respect for the homeless. For these people to be able to wake up every morning and only have whatever they can fit in their bag or whatever they’re carrying, and go about their day, that says something about them. I really don’t even like that word, homeless. It’s tough to see people and know that they don’t have anything, that they don’t have a place to call home. I can’t imagine what that’s really like.

“It’s tough to see anyone having to live on the streets. But the thing that probably hits home the hardest for me is seeing veterans out there. After serving our country and then finding themselves in that kind of situation, it just breaks my heart.

“I’ve pretty much decided that right out of high school or college, I want to go into the military and train dogs. Then once I get out of the military, I would like to train service dogs for veterans suffering with PTSD. That’s my goal. It’s another way for me to help people who are in need.”

— Layton Lewis

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“It was 2011. At the time I was a single mom, and I had lost my job. I was living with my mom, trying to get back on my feet. It was one of those Christmases that was really, really hard. He was at that age where he didn’t understand hardship. We had never really experienced it before. And he was really aggravated with me. He had asked for an Xbox or Playstation or something, and he was upset when I told him he wasn’t going to get it. So I decided I was going to try to teach him something.

“I took $50 out of my savings account — it was pretty close to the last $50 I had — and I went to Walgreens and bought a whole bunch of candy. When I went to check out, the lady behind the cash register asked what I was going to do with all that candy. I told her, ‘I’m going to teach my son a lesson.’ She said, ‘Are you going to make him eat it all?’ I said, ‘No, we’re going to pass it out to the homeless.’ The guy behind me thought it was a really good idea, so he gave me $20 toward it. And the lady behind the register also gave me $20. So I woke Layton up early on Christmas Eve and told him I had a surprise for him. We drove to downtown Houston, just me and him, to the area across from Minute Maid Park. And we just started handing out candy to the homeless people there, telling them merry Christmas. It was a really awesome experience.”

“I was pretty young at the time, but I remember the effect that it had on the people. To see them smile or tell us merry Christmas or give us hugs, that really stuck with me. For them, who didn’t have anything, to show that kind of gratitude for such a small thing as candy was pretty cool. There was one man in particular who told me how he really appreciated what I was doing. He asked if I made good grades in school. He asked if I had been good. And he made me promise to stay in school and always listen to and respect my mom, or else I might end up like him one day. He made me shake his hand in front of everybody that I would stick to that promise.”

“When we were walking back to the car Layton said, ‘I want to do this again. But I don’t want to pass out candy. I want to pass out socks.’ I was like, ‘Socks?’ And he said, ‘Yes. New socks make your feet happy.’ That’s what started it all.”

— Kimberly Kerby and her son, Layton Lewis

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“I saw homeless people when I lived in Oklahoma. But it’s nothing compared to what it was like the first time I went into downtown Houston. What I saw there really bothered me. These people are living in boxes on the sidewalk. And other people are walking by, just trying to get them out of their way. Hey, these are human beings. You don’t just push them out of the way. You don’t put a foot on their head. You give them a hand up.

“When I have the money, I’ll pick up necessities like socks, wet wipes, antibacterial hand sanitizer, anything that would be of use to people on the street. For women, personal products are especially important. That’s a huge worry for women who are homeless. It’s something many people may not think about. But seriously, that’s a life-altering stress for them one week every month. So I put the items in an extra bag or purse for the women, or backpack for the guys, and go find someone to bring it to.

“I wish I could do it more often. I don’t have a lot. But these people, they have nothing. I wish I could take them into my home. But my apartment just isn’t big enough for all that.”

— Tammy James

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The post Heart for the homeless: ‘You give them a hand up’ appeared first on The Baytown Project.

“We got divorced in 1994, and it was like everything hit the fan. Instead of bucking up and doing the right things, I fell off. That’s when I really got into the alcohol, drugs and stuff. I struggled for years, and I went to rehab in 2008.

“When the police stop you and you ask them to give you one more chance and they say you’ve had enough chances, then you know it’s serious. I faced either six months of rehab and four years of probation, or I could do four years at TDC. That was a pretty easy decision.

“I knew I couldn’t fix things by myself. I needed help. One of the programs I went through was Brigid’s Hope at The Beacon in Houston. That’s when I realized I needed to deal with me. It wasn’t an alcohol problem, a drug problem, sex, money, whatever. It was me.

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