My Homeless People Stories

I've lived in Toronto for the better part of a decade now (cripes I'm getting old!) and as most city-dwellers will admit, dealing with homeless people is pretty much a part of your daily activity.  Startling at first, you feel terrible for them and always hand over your "spare" change, but the unfortunate truth is that you do tend to start ignoring the requests for help.  There really are too many Shaky Lady's and Sticker Lady's out there, or the type of homeless who are only homeless on nice days during rush hour.  Every Torontonian has at least a couple stories of shocking encounters with the homeless.  Here are mine:

• Back when I was a fresh first year university student still living at home and commuting to Ryerson, I was asked outside of a Tim Horton's for spare change.  As I was (and still am) in the habit of using primarily electronic money, I didn't actually have any cash on me.  He did not take kindly to this, as demonstrated by his screaming "BITCH!" at me and scrambling to his feet.  I ran. 

• At another Ryerson street corner, a bunch of students were waiting for the light to change, and a homeless lady pushed her way into the middle of the crow, pulled up her long skirt, popped a squat and proceeded to urinate right there.  The whole crowd dispersed instantly, pushing each other onto the road to avoid the stream.

• While working near Queen and John I went for a coffee break at Second Cup across the street.  Being that I had a Second Cup card, I didn't bring my purse.  When an old homeless man asked me for money for food, I said I didn't have any money but I would get him a coffee.  "A coffee and a sandwich" he corrected me.  Fine.  Can't really tell him not to be greedy, can I?  So we walked across the street and when he realized where I was leading him, he starting screaming "No! Not there! NOOOO!" and ran like a bat out of hell, leaving me bewildered and red faced in a crowd of strangers with accusatory eyes. 

• Returning to work from lunch one afternoon, I happened upon an old homeless man who asked me for money to buy a drink.  I told him that whereas I didn't have any money, I would be happy to go get him a drink from upstairs.  He waited for me outside while I grabbed him a few cans of pop.  He was so encouraged by my thoughtfulness, that after receiving the drinks he thought he'd press his luck and ask me to make love to him.  Just remembering that hopeful offer makes me want to vomit a little.

Neil-wycik

Living in Neil-Wycik was definitely a bitter-sweet experience. On one hand, it provided subsidized housing for students in downtown Toronto (I think rent for my room was $420). On the other hand, the rooms were so small you couldn't rotate a twin mattress, and you co-habitated with vermin. Either way, during the formualative years of 2002-2005, I called Neil-Wycik my home.

The very first day I lined up in the foyer with all the other newbies waiting to move in, my dad grew bored of waiting, as he is apt to do. After doing a little bit of sleuthing (read: he walked over to the admin desk like he owned the place and rooted through paperwork until he found my name) my dad hiked up four stories worth of stairs and explored my new accommodations on his own. After a measly 5 minutes he returned full of glee, and that's when I knew I was in for trouble. His proud look of self-satisfaction was the embodiment of years of preaching "how good I had it" finally coming to fruition.  He didn't even hide his taunts from the other newbies waiting in line: "Your room is smaller than your bathroom at home" he told me, and my stomach knotted.

As true as his statement was, I check-mated him later when I noted that Stella and I were going to be living with three dudes. This revelation was not as amusing to him.  Growing up under his roof, boys were literally not allowed to step foot on our staircase, and now my room was sandwiched between two of them.  At the very least, perhaps he found comfort in that they were both aerospace engineers; Worse case scenario if I were to fall for one of them, his grandchildren wouldn't grow up in a house on wheels.