January 29, 2024
What a night!
First, I had my dearest best friend and brother-by-another-mother, Nick with me. He was the Magdalene’s Mission chariot last night. You may have heard me talk about him before. He owns Jets Pizza in Hartland. All my events are catered by Jets. Since the pizza store caught on fire in December, the guys have had a lot of free time while waiting for it to be rebuilt. Nick used some of his down time to make a difference. Make differences, we did. We packed up his van with winter gear, hygiene kits, and spaghetti and meatball with green beans dinners. The he drove me to Detroit to check out what goes out there.
Our first stop was on an overpass bridge. The medical team saw someone we knew with a sign. We pulled over and helped him out. He is with a friend of mine who finally got her own place. Unfortunately, her ID is gone, and she can’t move in until she replaces it. They think they have a path to getting it back though. Until then, they’re still staying in a burned down house.
As I was talking to him, he brought up two very interesting things. The first was that he finished reading my book! He thought it was really good. He said that he enjoyed reading it, but he admitted that there were a couple of parts where he had to put the book down for a minute.
The other thing was that he had a dream about me. It was a really weird dream, too. There were even dancing goth midget women involved. What a great dream to be a part of!
I took notes, but I left them in Nick’s car. We didn’t see a whole ton of people. It was pretty dead out. I did see a man picking through a trash can. We offered him real food and he was ecstatic. I put some gloves on his hands, too.
We drove down an alley and there were four old men surrounding a little bonfire. I used what I remember from eighth-grade Spanish to communicate. I’m going to study Spanish. No one on the street speaks French.
But my personal highlight of the year was that I finally found her. I found… Marilyn Monroe! Do you remember me talking about her a couple of years ago? She was with the Writer Dude. He died from kidney failure. Then she was pregnant. Baby got adopted. Then she was always sick. I kept trying to get to her. Once, I even went down into the creepiest, rat-infested, dope den, just so I could find her and hold her and remind her of how loved she was. But she was gone. And then months went by.
So, I prayed. And prayed. And prayed, And I never gave up on her, even in my heart.
Remember the house we went to last week where we gave away all the flashlights and it looked like lightsabers? She’s there. So, she’s in the area. She’s with people who are safe-(ish) to be with.
When I first saw her, she just walked up to me and starting smiling. At first, I didn’t want to get my hopes up that it was her, and then be embarrassed and disappointed if I was mixed-up. She went to the medical van and came back. She smiled again. I said, “Is it really you?” And we just grabbed one another and hugged for so long. I kept telling her over and over that I loved her, and I never stopped praying for her. And she squeezed me tight and said, “Thank you. I love you so much, too.”
I don’t know about you, but that to me is as powerful as it gets. She knew that she was loved. That no matter what, no matter what she has been through, my arms are always open to her. I can’t count the number of times I wanted to give up and be done with this relentless existence. But someone loved me. So, I was accountable. I didn’t throw myself away because I was worth something to someone (I love you Aunt Bobbie). Marilyn Monroe is priceless to me.
Nick and I have been best friends for 36 years. That’s longer than any of the other volunteers, or most of our homeless clients have even been alive. That means, everything I went through, Nick went through it, too.
Everything Nick has been through, we’ve been through that, too. That includes everything. From me hiding out in his house when I was a fifteen-year-old runaway, to being at each other’s first weddings, to being there for our first divorces. Then rejoicing when we found our forever spouses. Nick and I celebrated each other’s children when they were born. Nick took me in when I had to leave my abusive relationship with an alcoholic who fell into an even worse crack addiction. He and his wife are why I landed in Pinckney. And we mourned together, as each of us had a first-born child die young.
What we learned is that you need your friends. When Ms. GG came up to me last week, she was pretending to be tough. She was going to be independent, deal with her problems on her own. I recognize that. But a real friend can see below the surface. Traci and I could smell the hurt coming off from her. I gave her a chance to be held, to be safe, to be protected. This dear little great-grandmother was raped by one of the men who was staying in the same house. If we wouldn’t have seen her, she probably would never have got treated for sexually transmitted infection. She would be in so much more pain. We got her connected to the appropriate resources. Avalon is spectacular at helping people to recover after a violent sexual attack. She needed a friend. When everyone around you is in survival mode, real friendship is rare.
The reason I was there for her? You gave me stuff. Thank you, Jimmy, for all those great food containers. Thank you, everyone, for the coats, blankets, snacks, and money for hand warmers. I drove it to the most vulnerable people I could find on the streets of Detroit. And we helped them become whole people again.
I’ll say it again- The Kingdom of God is a verb, not just a noun. That Kingdom would be filled with friends and friendship.
We don’t ever give up on our friends. And when your friend asks for help, you help them.
Because that’s how we do it in Detroit.
Amen.
Post-script: This is our biggest fundraising time of the year. If you want to keep reading these reports and be a part of the healing in the world, you can donate to the Facebook Fundraiser. Or if you click on the How To Donate button at the MagdalenesMission.com website, you can access our Amazon Wish List that will send supplies straight to my house, or Venmo, or Square, or however you want to help. We can always use more socks, and drawstring bags.
