The Meaning of a Picture

This is my first post about something local and I've been dying to write it for awhile now.

Shortly after coming back to Winnipeg I saw a news story about the Gifts of Grace Mission, a group that serves meals to the homeless twice a week in the hood...right up my alley! I thought why wouldn't I continue working with the homeless when I enjoy it so much? My help was quickly accepted and the following Thursday I showed up to see what it was all about.

I pulled up on North Main, parking in front of a rough hotel, and at the same time recall wondering whether that was such a good idea. But I left my car there anyway and went to find the location where the meals were served. I walked around the corner to find a cul de sac with Thunderbird House on the one side, Salvation Army on the other, and a grassy area in between.

Sitting along the wall of Salvation Army were groups of people easily identifiable as solvent abusers, as their smell is pretty unmistakeable. In the grassy area there were a couple of makeshift tents and stuff strewn all over, reminiscent of the Swan River rodeo grounds at the end of the weekend! People were milling around and it honestly felt like a world within another. Most Winnipeggers know nothing about this world. The people within it are basically invisible to "mainstream society." Most live on the streets of Winnipeg, in the shelters, or a little of both, and their day to day life is one that most of us couldn't even imagine. The word "tortured" comes to mind.

That first day was a few months ago now and I can no longer remember the intricacies of it, but I do remember loving the experience. Greeting the long line of Winnipeg's neediest and being apart of them getting a good meal felt so good. I pretty much skipped out of there I was so happy! I walked out of that world within a world, past the addicts, the mentally ill and those struggling in other ways I'm sure, past the awful smells and the rough hotel with the evening's patrons spilling out on to the street, to my safe and sound car. I already couldn't wait for next week!

Every Thursday at 5:00, a group shows up to serve dinner, each from a different church across the city. Gifts of Grace founders take turns picking up the food which I have to say is a pretty awesome spread which includes a hot casserole, sandwiches, baked goods, juice and coffee. People can line up again and again until it's all gone, and typically there's a lot so sometimes we see some people coming through 3-4 times.

One of the differences between Gifts of Grace and other soup kitchen type places, is that people can come for food even if they are under the influence. So we see all kinds of people in all kinds of states. The other difference is that most of the year we serve outside with only a table between us and the people. So it's not for the scaredy cats :)

Most nights we have 150-200 people and some nights much more. There are different groups of people who come; I would say that those with mental health issues are a good majority. I've seen women who look so "normal" that I wondered if they worked at Salvation Army or somewhere else and were just coming for a free meal. That was until one of them went off on us one night, angry at the quality of the food and saying that just because she was homeless didn't mean that she deserved shit to eat. It was very clear after that exchange that she was ill. Another young woman laughed to herself as she went through the food line one day, clearly having a conversation with someone in her head. What a horrible way to have to live.

Another group would be the hard core addicts, who often come through high or intoxicated. This week an older man fell into the table, almost colliding with me, and when he fell a bottle of mouthwash fell out of his pocket. Some of the others in line looked at him disapprovingly and mumbled about how hard core he was. I suppose that drinking mouthwash would be the bottom of the barrel for an addict, and I'm sure it's a place that nobody strives to be.

The sniffers are another visible group. You see some pushing their walkers around, or sitting on them while they huff from bags. Often they are just lying along the street, typically in a group. You can smell the solvent on them as they come through the line. It's so strong it permeates your nose.

Well shortly after starting I learned that I actually know one person from this group. As I was serving one day a woman came by that I couldn't take my eyes off of as she looked so familiar. I finally said, is your name Charlotte? (not her real name). Well when she said yes, I was shocked..

 

Early on in my child welfare career, when I was a baby social worker, maybe 24, I had a young mom on my caseload, a sniffer, whose baby I apprehended at birth for obvious reasons. I didn't work with her long as she didn't put up a fight and the baby was removed from her permanently. Thankfully we came up with a good plan for the baby to go live with his paternal grandmother which Charlotte was on board with. So even though we weren't working together under the best circumstances, we had a pretty decent working relationship.

Charlotte was in jail at the time that her son was leaving Winnipeg to go live with his grandmother and so I brought him there to see her for a goodbye visit. I'm pretty sure that this was the only visit she was able to have with him given what was going on for her at the time. Well that day I happened to take a picture of Charlotte holding her newborn son. She was in her jail uniform and was smiling down at him at she held him. Despite being a sniffer and leading a rough street life, she looked like a young and healthy woman in this picture. Well fourteen years later, this woman, now probably in her mid 30s, looked to be in her late 50s (and not a healthy looking 50 something either). She looked shrivelled, ragged and soulless. I honestly couldn't believe that she was even still alive after so many years of sniffing. I can't begin to even imagine what she has been through in that period of time.

I doubt that it registered with her who I was, but when I explained that I was involved with her son, she brightened up, telling me that he was 14 now (yikes!). I knew that I still had that picture of her and her son, as well as a picture of him at age 2 that his grandmother must have sent me. When I told her about the pictures she immediately asked if I could bring them for her, which I of course said yes to.

For 2 weeks after I carried those pictures waiting to see Charlotte again and excited to show them to her. But she never showed up. The third week I finally saw her in line, and greeted her by name which seemed to catch her off guard. I'm not sure even she remembered our previous conversation until I told her that I had pictures for her. But I told her that she was going to have to wait until I was done serving as the pictures were in my car. She seemed rather irritable that day (not unusual for solvent abusers), but still for over an hour stood and waited patiently in front of our table for her pictures.

Once we had finished I went to get the pictures from my car, and met her back in the cul de sac, sitting down with her on the curb. Looking at her closer up I saw an infection all over her skin, scars, tiny bones with only shriveled skin left, and just blankness. I honestly thought that she was so damaged from years of sniffing, that she wouldn't even have the capacity to show emotion when I showed her the pictures.

But I was wrong. I handed the pictures over and as she looked at them she smiled. And then I saw tears coming from her eyes. She said that she didn't have any pictures of her son anymore because a fire in her place had taken them. So who knows how long it had been since she had even seen his face.

I can't help but wonder if Charlotte was not only looking at her son in that picture, but looking at herself as well. Did it make her think about who she once was and how she had got to the place that she was now? I wonder if the reality of her life path saddened her in that moment; if she regretted the way she had ended up, which is a shell of a person. 

It was a touching moment, and one that made me so thankful that I used to take pictures of the children and families that I worked with. There are horror stories about foster children having no pictures of themselves growing up; no pictures of their parents, their family, or their history. No images to understand where they came from or to trigger memories. I can't imagine that and know firsthand what a picture can mean. And so in that moment I knew that seeing those pictures must have meant a lot to her.

I left Charlotte with her pictures, feeling thankful for choosing a career and a way of being that has allowed me to touch people's lives. In child welfare especially, you don't have many rewarding moments, but I can say that this experience certainly was one for me.

Sadly, a couple weeks later Charlotte told me that someone had stolen her bag and the pictures were now gone. Not a surprise given the life she has. But you know, for her to have seen, felt, and remembered, even for only a couple weeks..well it was well worth holding on to those pictures for so many years....