When Irish eye's are smiling...

...Irish hearts are full of pain.

Brendan was a towering man, in height and girth certainly, but with a personality that was immense. Not a shy wall flower by any means.

Brendan was an infrequent shelter stayer, and most often would arrive early and drunk, and make impassioned (and loud!) speeches outside the door demanding justice, equality, early admission, coffee and a sandwich. Perhaps one of the most pragmatic protesters I have ever met.

One of my first 911 moments in the shelter world involved Brendan, and was in hindsight eerily precognizant.

My shift started at 7pm, the doors opened at 8pm. On a warm August afternoon I arrived at the shelter and started setting up for the evening. About 30 minutes into the shift Brendan made his presence known. A diatribe ensued when I told him that he was 30 minutes early, but delivered with great style.

10 minutes on I hear a knock at the door. Brendan is now prostrated on the road outside the shelter door, and a crowd has gathered around him. Lights! Camera! Action! I leap into action and he tells me that he is having a heart attack, and he certainly looked like I thought someone having a heart attack should look. I go back inside, call 911, grab some gloves and towels and a blanket and head back outside. What medical knowledge I drew on to decide that towels and a blanket had any utility in treating a heart attack I cannot say.

In 10 minutes the ambulance arrives. By this time Brendan is unconcious and breathing is shallow and rapid. The ambulance crew approach with caution (deserted alley, large collection of assorted rough looking characters, darkening sky, can't say I blame them). As they approach I am concerned that they don't look concerned enough.

The lead paramedic walks over to us, stands at Brendan's head, and taps his shoulder with a double boot tap.

"Didn't we pick you up yesterday at the Princess Gate?" he says.

From my vantage point at Brendan's side I see one eye cautiously open and size up the paramedic. Deciding that a graceful exit was required, Brendan regained consciousness and normal breathing with alacrity. Cheerfully thanking the paramedics for their help, he stood up gathered his belongings and headed in to the shelter that was now open early to try and clear the crowds. To say I was mortified would be an understatement.

What I learned though was that how we assign value to things, and what lengths we will go to attain that value, are very subjective. For Brendan, the effort he put in to get the shelter open by 10 minutes had value.

Brendan provided many more memorable moments right up until his death. He died one cold fall day as he lay in the street waiting for an ambulance. Turns out Brendan had a poor memory for routes, and often would walk to places from which he couldn't find his way back to downtown. One of his strategies at this time was to fake a heart attack and then he was able to find his way back to the shelters from all the downtown hospitals. Engaged in this strategy, and with the ambulance only blocks away, a taxi cab ran him over and he died before he could get help. A modern day boy who cried wolf.

Willy the Greater - Hero to Zero in 30 seconds

I grew up in England in the late '60's and early '70's. As a child one of my favourite shows was a puppet show on the BBC called "The Wombels of Wimbeldon". When I first met Willy the Greater, it was like seeing a wombel come to life.

Why Willy the Greater? Mostly to distinguish him from wee willy, but also because he was definitely a legend in his own mind. Willy was totally old school, one of the last of the post-war homeless men who filled the shelters still when I started but who are now mostly gone.

Willy had a crew, and in the hour before the shelter opened I could stand on the second floor and look out the window to get a bird's eye view of the complex interactions between him and his followers. For a long time I thought that his reign would outlast me. I was wrong.

Working a day shift one, day in the summer of 1994 one of Willy's minions came into the office and said Willy needed help. I went over to the bus stop at Queen and River

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and found Willy slumped on a bench in the TTC shelter outside the bank. His crew were gathered round, uncertain what to do in a suddenly leaderless world. Like the Death of Nelson, the moment seemed frozen in time, a moment of transition that held us all spellbound and frozen momentarily in time.

Willy was large in personality, spirit and body. If you have ever tried to move a completely limp body you will know how anti-easy it is to lift a body from prone to standing without the bodies cooperation. We got him up and carried him back to the steps of Dixon Hall, were the ambulance was just arriving. A flurry of activity and then Willy was gone to the hospital.

Willy's crew was lost, a crew without a captain is one of life's great tragedies. For the next few weeks I watched the crew from my second floor vantage point, a formally complex set of interactions and negotiations replaced with a despondence and apathy that seemed ominous.

Turns out Willy had a heart attack. Released from hospital he showed up one day about 20 pounds lighter and 20 years older. At first, seeing an unfamiliar shape moving slowly down the street I didn't even recognize him. When he got to his former court (a stump of log under a tree) it was like he had a weight lifted off his shoulders. He was alive, he was back, he was ready to resume his leadership. He was wrong.

From the day he returned from the hospital Willy was alone until his death. As though his crew knew he was too weak to lead them, and having had the weeks to adjust to the new reality, they had moved on.

Day after day I watched him struggle to regain his former glory, and every day it was like you could see a part of him slipping away. In time he faded into the background, no longer the larger than life figure he had been he became one more aging dying shambling shadow amongst a rag tag band of shadows.

I have never seen a ghost, but I have seen a person pass into death in a moment, though it took a long time afterwards to die.

Day ? - Death and taxes

Been a lot of death lately amongst the folks I new and know.

As an aging knuckle-dragger in the homeless wars, I am amazed watching the next generation deal with the realities and absurdities of their chosen profession, and the amazing grace with which they approach the dying and memory of the dead. I am awed by so many people each day, and shamed to see the flame that burns so bright in them that I have let consume me altogether.

Had to stop writing for awhile. Although many of the experiences I have had are funny stories told now, they brought back a lot of the pain and uncertainties that plagued me at the start of this weird journey I have been on. Wasn't sure if I wanted to go back and relive those moments, so much not to be proud of. But for better or worse, I am heading back into the great void and mean to finish the journey as it began, with hope and humour.

Next stop, the death of Willy the Greater!