Daybreak at the Warming Center
It’s 4:37 a.m. at the Warming Center on April 1, 2021. Outside, the wind howls through the alleys of Duluth, Minnesota and the temperature is in the teens.
The center is the last stop for people who have been thrown out of everywhere else. We’ve got a full house.
My job, on the graveyard shift, is to keep watch. I watch as they toss and turn and groan. I listen as they cry out in their sleep. I am not a praying person, but I pray for them even when I can’t believe that anyone hears.
These are mainly the poorest of the poor. But some of them work during the day. That doesn’t mean they can pass a background check, make a deposit and pay a month’s rent.
Many, though not all, are troubled. Many, though not all, are victims of apparently intractable drug and alcohol addiction. Many could turn their lives around if they could get some more permanent shelter from the wind and the snow, but right now, this is the best they’ve got.
When they wake up in the morning, they will turn into a symphony of human needs. They will need toilet paper and soap, toothpaste, combs, aspirin, bandages, hats, gloves, coats, scarves, and boots. They will need hot coffee and their next cigarette, or bottle of cheap vodka, or drug I’ve never heard of.
A statistically surprising number have experienced childhood trauma. Victims become victimizers, prone not only to addiction but sometimes to violence.
Like many, from the mighty to the destitute, they project their own demons onto others. They explode. When we do that, people get away from us. When they do that, they get another mark on their police record or another night in jail — which can, at times, be better than the streets.
They are targets for hate crimes. They are scapegoats. They are victims of every predator in town. They are likely to be pimped off, sold as sex slaves, raped, or just beaten to a bloody pulp because they happened to be stumbling drunk and someone in some dark alley wanted to hurt someone else.
All they need is a roof over their heads, a bed, a blanket, a bathroom, a refrigerator, and a stove. A hundred units. That would be a start. If they had that, many would be willing to work to turn their lives around. Without it, they will find their comfort where they bloody well can, and I will not blame them.
At 8:00 a.m. on the morning of April 1, the center is scheduled to close for the regular 2020–2021 season.
The sun comes up. I make the coffee and turn on the lights. Soon, they will wake up and yell at me or thank me and smile their gap-toothed smiles.
At 8:45 a.m. on the morning of April 1, 2021, the recorded temperature in Duluth is 23 degrees.
