Soulshine

The rain is coming down like tears from heaven. God is tearful over everything that is broken in the world. At least that is the way that I choose to ponder the day.

I am sitting in front of the computer in the red room of our home. There are 13 windows in this room and I am looking at the extremely high tide that is covering the marsh. This is not water front property, but you can see down the street passed the 3 homes that separate the house from the marsh.

The rain lightened up just enough to take Goddess for a walk. She loves mud puddles more than she loves most things and dances through each and every one, occasionally sticking her head into it and lapping water as she walks. She will then turn her head towards me and I swear this dog can smile. She is laying at my feet while I listen to the Allman Brothers, type, and stare at the ocean covering the marsh.

These are special times on Tybee. When the tides are high they remind us that the ocean can pretty much take over the island anytime that it wants. Right now, it is up to the road on the back river and only the tallest of the sea oats remain above it.

I was standing there marveling at its majesty when Goddess spies an egret. Goddess believes that she can catch anything, be it squirrels or egrets. She never does though but she never stops trying.

So as I stand there contemplating the marsh and the ocean and being lost at sea and a light rain falls on my face, Goddess takes off after the egret and almost pulls my arm out of its socket. I cuss and pull back but she is so strong that she drags me along after the bird which is now flying over the marsh.

I love this dog. She never stops trying in spite of impossible odds or in spite of repeated failure.

That is how I am feeling today. Nothing else to do except try again. Make this house a home for when we need it. Fill it with good things so that when people come they enjoy it. And there are many who love this place. It is a place that can renourish the soul and over the years a lot of people have come here for that.

And it reminds me that today, I've got to let my soul shine. It's better than sunshine. It's better than moonshine. It's damn sure better than rain.

Whole Lotta Holes

I gotta a whole lot of holes in my life. So goes a song by Kathy Mettea.

Holes in my jeans. Holes filled with gold in my teeth. A hole in my chest where my heart used to be. There are a lot of ways that our lives have holes in them.

This has certainly been quite the week. Julie left to go back to Atlanta on Sunday and I was not ready for her to return. I leave for Washington DC on Monday and have a world wind trip through the Capitol and the agencies. Yesterday the Board of Directors met and we celebrated how far Union Mission has come in a years time. Herb McKenize stood and gave a speech about me that would make an excellent obituary. It left me humbled and tearful.

Then I stood to review the performance outcomes from last year. They are impressive.

Over 6,500 patients obtained health care from the J. C. Lewis Health Center.

More than 4,000 received treatment and counseling from Parent & Child.

Over 400 people ended homelessness in 2009.

Over 300 were placed in full time jobs and move from Union Mission's housing programs into their own.

Local tax payers saved over $13 Million because of these results.

I was talking to my mother last night and we were discussing the costs of this work. Everything has a cost. Attacking work and life the way that I do helps achieve some impressive things that help a lot of people, but there are costs.

Yesterday, I also received an email from someone I work with. "You OK? I can tell by your netbook emails that you do not sound like yourself...just remember we all need and love you..."

But today, I am thinking about the costs of always being there trying to empty an ocean of need that never seems to get smaller. I am thinking about the holes. In the work. In me. I gotta a whole Lotta holes in my life.

The Trouble with Normal

I stumbled into the door marked "Exit Only" and Nick, who is sitting at the counter doing the crossword puzzle before he has to cook, yells out. "Morning Micheal! How was Washington?"

I made my way to the other side of the counter and pour myself a cup of the "cook's coffee" which is strong enough to be used as fuel in jet planes. As I do so, Val walks from the wash room and pecks me on the cheek. "Welcome back," she says and keeps walking.

Returning to my usual seat at the counter, Justin flips me the finger and Franklin makes a rush for my newspaper so that he can see where Savannah's newest strip club is located.

Jodee, the owner and my friend, walks over and lays a cookie that he has baked beside my coffee cup. "Here," he says as he munches on one, "these are good." Then he tells me that he is off today and is heading home.

It is a normal morning at the Breakfast Club. Johnny O breezes in and sits near me and is soon followed by Whitley. New comer David is the last to wander in before the place opens.

I am in sore need of some normalcy right now and these feels good though I am a bit off kilter and can't force myself to be ... normal?

Yesterday when our plane landed in Savannah, Herb McKenzie and I sat and waited on the people closer to the front of the plane to collect their things and make there way off so that we could grab our things and follow suit. I was lost in thought and not paying attention to things, when I heard Herb say, "Yes, that's him."

Looking up, the couple in the seats directly in front of us were twisted in their seats and looking at me.

"Micheal Elliott?" a lady with cropped gray hair asks me.

I nod and she shakes my hand. "We are David's parents. Thank you. You helped us so much with him."

Her husband, a very tall man with grat hair stands and turns to face me. "Yes thank you," he says.

I have no idea who David is. As they make there way off of the plane, I tell Herb this. I seem to only remember a handful of the thousands who are helped by Union Mission every year. The episode contributes to me being slightly off kilter.

I take my run on the beach and as I am making my way towards the ocean, Johnny O's car pulls upbeside me and his window slides down. "You holding it together?" he ask in a cloud of cigar smoke.

I shrug my shoulders and continue my run. Afterwards, Goddess is playful and another dog has gone stray and keeps following us so I literally have to drag her on the entire walk. Back home she flops on the floor with a thud and a loud sigh.

So everything seems normal around me. Everything except me.

Deserving Home

Snow and bad weather is on the way to Washington D. C. so I am very glad that we are leaving this morning. I hate cold! Snow is fine for brief visits but I wouldn't want to stay with it for very long. I did my snow time in Louisville and watched homeless people freeze, sometimes to death.

Coupled with the fact that I am truly a beach bum, don't like to wear a lot of clothes, enjoy sunshine and walks on the beach and swims in the ocean and girls in bikinis and ... well, you get my point.

I have friends who love cold and snow. Bill Berry and I have been dear friends forever. Whenever it snows, he loses his mind and runs outside to roll around in it and stupid stuff like that. He likes to ski across it. I suppose he still builds snowmen. His kids post pictures of it on Face Book and his smiling face standing there in the snow conveys the message that he loves it. While I love him dearly I have always thought that he is a little off.

Anyway, we are leaving Washington where we have been for two days heading for home. Most of the time that I am here I am alone but I have enjoyed having Herb and Lauren with me. Herb makes me do things that I would never do here, like getting a shoe shine at the senate shoe shine stand at the Capitol. I've never done D.C. like this.

Lauren is focused and is learning this side of the work so we have been able to have a lot of good conversations about it and about a lot of other stuff.

We also met new friends here and were taken care of in D.C. like I have never been taken care of before. Bob Hurt, Carol Holladay and Jane Terry have been gracious hosts and I have learned a lot from them while I have been here and look forward to working with them over the next several months.

But I am ready to return to the clump of sand that is Tybee Island. I miss the smell of the marsh and the salt in the air. I want to take Goddess for walks and to wrestle with her in the living room floor. I'm jonesing for the Breakfast Club and to see my friend Johnny O break the law as soon as he joins me for coffee. I miss the love that make a house a home.

So this has been a good trip in spite of the misplaced heart when I arrived. I am hopeful and optimistic about the good things that I think will come about as a result of this trip. But it is time for a shot of home. I miss my home. Everybody deserves one. That is why I do what I do.

Sharing my misplaced heart with strangers

Dinner last night was at Finemondo's, a very elegant Italian place near the Capitol. Herb McKenzie, former Board Chairman of Union Mission, Lauren Milmine and I were being hosted by Robert Hurt, of Hurt, Noton & Associates, Inc. They are a very successful lobbying firm and we were introduced by our friends in Chatham County government.

Over dinner, Herb explained the reason that we are here. We are looking for funds so that Union Mission can complete its stabilization and expand what it does for the folks back home. The uninsured, under-insured, homeless, sick, unemployed and those who have nowhere else to turn.

Bob and his folks listened intently then peppered us with questions about our story. Near the end, Bob looked at me and said, "That's quite the blog! So you really don't want to be here."

I was taken aback. It is true yesterday I wrote about my heart really isn't in this trip. It is misplaced and I seem to be having a difficult time finding my rhythm. I know that a lot of people read by blog and many of my friends comment about it every day on my Face Book page. But I was meeting these folks for the first time and they had arranged this trip on our behalf and there I am claiming that I have arrived with a misplaced heart.

Well, at least we got off to an honest start.

In a little while, Carol Holladay will arrive to pick us up and take us to their offices for a final briefing. Then we are off to the Capitol to meet with our Senators and Congressional staffs. Then it is to the Departments of Health & Human Services, Labor and H.U.D. It will be a packed day.

Hopefully we will achieve some success. So I suppose that I should fill the hole in my chest with determination where my heart should be and get on with it. There are so many desperate and hurting people who need us to be successful. Sometimes you just have to do the things that you have to do. So lets get on with it shall we?

Misplaced Hearts

I am off to Washington D. C. today with Board member Herb McKenzie and Laurent Milmine who is Union Mission’s Director of Public Policy/Development. We are going because of some supporters of Union Mission put us in touch with their lobbyists to secure stimulus funding designated for them which they think that Union Mission should have instead.

I love D. C. and go there several times each year. The White House, the Capitol, the Smithsonian, the Mall, and the City itself are inspiring. I have been to the National Cathedral, the Library of Congress (for the first faith-based summit), the Church of the Savior, the National Alliance to End Homelessness, and the offices of Sojourner Magazine Community.

Once, Julie and I took a night time walk to the Lincoln Memorial on a hot summer night. We sweated and walked and thought that we would never get back to our hotel. We caught a cab the last four blocks. That was fun.

But I am not excited about this trip.

My heart is not in it. My heart is elsewhere. It is misplaced right now.

Still, you have to do the stuff that you are supposed to do, right? Regardless of whether or not you are in the mood for it! You get up, dust yourself off, and start again.

So, this morning, after a sleepless night, I dragged myself out of bed, showered the dust away, and here I am at the airport waiting to take off to visit some of our nation’s elected people, which is not the same as visiting leaders. Some are. Most are not. Most were simply fortunate enough to get elected.

Still, it is part of the work. Over the holidays, Skip Eloge our CFO and I were talking at some point. I was doing something for the 21st time in my 21 years at Union Mission and was working hard to pump myself up to do it.

He asked, “Is it was always this hard?”

In the early days … well no!

Anytime that you do things for the first time or two they are fun!

Somewhere around the 10th time, they become routine.

When you get to the 20th, it takes work. This could be attending the same event, playing the same game, making love to your significant other, or running the same course. Twenty years of marriage takes work. Twenty years in the same position doing the same thing takes work.

So today, I am working hard. Especially hard! Because my heart is not in it! But the work is worth it. People who are suffering need me to succeed. Union Mission needs help because we do so many things for so many all of the time. So even though I am mentally and emotionally not really here, I am doing my best.

But that is what you do when your heart is misplaced.

You keep at it and pray like hell that eventually your heart catches up.

Some Great People!

Yesterday when I was writing the blog, Terry Cassidy leaned over and said, "Write about how great I am." I had more important stuff to write about yesterday so I didn't.

Yesterday was an intense day that lasted from early in the morning until late into the night as we poured over every aspect of Union Mission's work last year. What was accomplished? What wasn't achieved and why? Continuously asking ourselves how we can do things better?

This morning, we will gather again and work on the future. We begin with a review of a new strategic plan. Then we attack five problems that were identified yesterday and will try to determine plans to minimize or eliminate them all together.

If you are lucky, you get to work with people that you like. This is a good group of people who oversee all of the things that Union Mission does. They are passionate, smart, committed and talented. They are also quirky, stubborn, and temperamental. And I suppose that it takes some combination of all of these traits to last in a business where the stakes involve succeeding or failing. Managing steps forward and helping people get up again when they fall. Living or dying.

The economics of it all is mind boggling and we are still realizing the impact that our work has on our community. For example, last year Union Mission saved tax payers over $10 Million. The big business world of homelessness.

I am mindful this morning as we prepare to spend another day trying to make ourselves do better. It happens because of the people who do it and I am thankful for this collection who are working so hard on behalf of so many.

People like the great Terry Cassidy! Among others.

When Blind Eyes Cry

I am at Epworth By the Sea, a Methodist retreat center in St. Simons Island. It is as beautiful as it is retro. Large Spanish oaks fill this marsh side property where there are buildings filled with large portraits of Methodists who have made contributions to keep this place going. It is like going back to my Baptist upbringing. Most of the people who are here this time of year are elderly so we stand out. In the summer time it is full of teens, says Keller Deal, whose parents would pull up to the front gates and drop her off for two weeks every summer.

The leadership of Union Mission is here. Sometimes you have to step away from the work so that you can take stock of it. That is what we are doing here. Reviewing what happened or didn't happen last year. Set criteria for the coming year. Spend time recharging one another's batteries.

Letitia Robinson presented on what happened in Union Mission's housing services last year. The Magdalene Project relocated because the roof fell in but the Dutchtown development, a 48 unit apartment complex for people with disabilities.

Last year 407 people ended their homelessness in 2009. That is no small feat and it is really why Union Mission exists.

After reporting the numbers, she told a story. She was locking up the office at Dutchtown recently so that she could go to get some lunch. Just as she was turning the key, she felt a stick poke her foot and turned to see a 30-something white woman with dark hair trying to get inside.

Sighing, because she knew that she couldn't turn a blind woman away, Letitia opened the door and invited her in. Her name was Tonya and she would stay in a car when friends would not let her stay on their sofas. It is a difficult way for anyone to try to survice much less someone who is blind.

Dutch Town has just opened and only 12 of the units are occupied. Letitita immediatley knew that Tonya would make an appropriate tennet. So after completing the forms that we require, Letitia said, "Let me show you something."

She led her to one of the ADA units that had been built for people just like Tonya. She felt her way through the kitchen, the bathroom, the living room and the bed room.

Tonya started crying.

As Letitia told this story, she filled with pride as we had anticipated that people like Tonya would need the kind of housing that Dutch Town offers.

So has she completed her presentation, we all burst into applause. It is a wonderful way to begin reviewing what happened last year.

Celebrating the Now!

It is a contemplative morning heading into what I am certain will be a contemplative day. So this morning I broke the routine and after coffee at the Breakfast Club (where the inmates were celebrating last night's election results) I decided to skip the run and take Goddess for a long walk. She goes bonkers whenever I do this jumping and dancing and making happy groaning noises. Then she grabs the end of the lease in her mouth and darts down the stairs and waits on me to arrive at the door.

I love mornings and today's was a beauty. The rising sun painted the marsh golden. Wisps of fog hung over it against a backdrop of bright blue sky. The lighthouse stood guard over it all and I didn't mind that Goddess was taking her sweet time sniffing this and that.

After a morning meeting, I am heading into a staff retreat. We normally do this every year so that we can review our performance last year, establish goals and standards for the coming year, celebrate our accomplishments and plan for the emerging issues.

We missed doing this last year because of trauma that Union Mission experienced, but now we are back to normal. Whatever normal is?

I guess that I am in this frame of mind because of how different things are today than they were two years ago. Much of the leadership that was in place then will be present today. What is different is that we have radically expanded that leadership so there will be many new voices present once we commence. That part is exciting.

I am not a big fan of the past. I tip toe through it from time to time but never for very long. O, I have a trunk load of stories from back then but they are mostly used to describe how I got here as the person I am now or to illustrate something we are trying to achieve.

"According to my watch, the time is now, the past is dead and gone," says Jimmy Buffett and I actually have a watch in my office that my friend Terry Ball made for me. He scraped the numbers off of its face and painted the word "NOW" on it. It is one of my favorite gifts that anyone has ever given me.

So today, I am celebrating the now! Because it is really all that we are sure that we have.

Creating Hope

"Thanks for returning my call," he said. He is a retired clergyman. Someone that I worked closely with fifteen years ago, but now I hadn't seen or talked to him in years.

"Sure," I replied, "what's up?"

I was standing outside of the Rusty Spur Saloon in Scottsdale, AZ. It had been a packed day full of meetings and I had one hour to myself prior to a dinner meeting. The Rusty Spur has live music almost all of the time and is a real cowboy saloon disguised as a hole in the wall. I love it.

"Well, it is my son-in-law," he continued in a halting voice that betrayed emotion. "He worked for ten years doing industrial cleaning, but he hurt his back on the job and got laid off. He doesn't have any health insurance and can't get treated. He wants to return to work but can't until his back gets fixed. Now they are in real danger of losing their housing. We'll try to take care of them but it is difficult..." His voice trailed off.

"So I thought that I should call you and you could guide me on what to do."

"Absolutely," I said. "First we need to get him enrolled at the J. C. Lewis Health Center so that he can get his health care needs met. Then we'll evaluate the housing situation. Don't worry, we'll get it taken care of."

"This is embarrassing," he confessed to me.

"Listen," I shot back, "I've been doing this a long time. It just happens. The reasons are never good ones and the circumstances are never quite right. Don't worry about it. It is what we do."

So yesterday, on Martin Luther King day, I was returning phone calls and followed up with my friend. I'd left a message with his wife who thanked me again and again for helping.

Mid-day, I took a break to attended the Bored Meeting, the daily lunch collection at Fannies On the Beach. Just as I sat down my cell phone buzzed and it was my friend.

I told him the exact things that his son-in-law needed to do and he wrote down the instructions.

"You really are a saint," he said as I finished.

I busted out laughing. "There are a lot who think I'm a son-on-a-bitch."

"Well, then you're a saintly one," he laughed.

The heaviness had left his voice and I knew that hope had been born for a family that is doing everything that it can to stop homelessness from corrupting it.

More than anything else I think, this work is about creating hope for those who have lost it. Because without it, no one accomplishes much anything.

The Fool on the Hill

On Paul McCartney's album "Tripping the Light Fantastic", he does an amazing version of the Beatles "The Fool on the Hill." The song describes how everyone thinks the man on the hill is a fool but he is really the one who sees things in crystal clear vision. It has always been a favorite of mine, but on this version which is pulsating live, Martin Luther King's "I have a Dream" speech is layered over the music.

"Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty! We're free at last!" King proclaims though freedom had yet to be achieved when he spoke these words.

Then McCartney sings again, "But the fool on the hill see the sun going down, and the eyes in his head see the world spinning round."

I find it very powerful and very moving.

In my life, I have met Coretta Scott-King twice. I was invited to Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta and sat where King preached every Sunday. I once was at a meeting in the offices of the Student Coordinating Council for Non-Violence which King helped launch and it was the same conference room table and chairs that he sat in.

I've also made by pilgrimage to the King Center and touched his tomb. I've read all of his books, listened to his speeches countless times, and read numerous books about him and the movement (the best are Taylor Branch's 3 volume set on the Civil Rights Movement and the marvelous "Martin and Malcolm"!).

A few years ago, Julie and I hosted our dear friends Carlos, Verna and Chelsea from St. Martin for a month in our home. They are from St. Martin, are black, speak more languages than I will ever master, work hard, and I love them dearly. We had a party for them at the pavilion and people from Union Mission, Tybee Island, and across the country came. We ate Southern food and danced into the night.

Two friends from Canada came, Paul and Nancy, and at some point someone commented to them, "Only Julie and Mike can do something like this."

What "this" was happened to be a fully integrated crowd all having a good time dancing and eating and celebrating life together. And enjoying the hell out of it! Black, white, gay, straight, Canadian, American, Caribbean. Those who can dance and those who can't.

Paul and Nancy were shocked and when they told us later of the comment, I remember filling with great pride. They were perplexed that such things are still an issue.

But alas, they are. In the American south, a lot of people still resent Martin Luther King. But then again, every prophet in the Bible was resented. Why should this one be different?

In the Bible, (I paid lots of good money to learn this) there are major prophets and minor prophets. The gage is how big was the difference they made. The United States has had a great many minor prophets, but only on major one. Martin Luther King. And I really don't give much of a damn what others do or don't do on this day, but I honor him and celebrate one man's incredible life!

Was he perfect? No. But who is? Did he do things that made an entire nation better? Yes! Did those things that he did make the entire world notice? Yes! So, today my heart will dance. Because it is free to do so. At last!

Helping Haiti

As soon as I logged on my computer yesterday I had a message from my friend Dr. Jose Vargas-Vidot. He is a winner of the Robert Wood Johnson's Community Health Leadership Award and lives in San Juan. He practices street medicine there and is something of a national hero as a champhion of the poor. He also practices in other South American nations where health care is lacking.

So of course he is off to Haiti. He wrote me asking if I could help collect donations of tarps, generators, medical supplies, water and such. How could I not? The disaster in Haiti is of Biblical proportions.

Then, I learn that Dr. Jim Withers of Pittsburgh's Operation Safety Net is also heading down there to help too. Jim is also a Community Health Leader and a good friend.

So we are putting out a call to all of Union Mission and to all of our friends. If you are in a position to help, please help.

Keller Deal in our office 912-236-7423 is collecting the things to send to Haiti. I vouch for Dr. Vargas!

From the way that it looks, it will take all of us doing whatever we can to help Haiti.

Tank you.

The Best of the Best

Earlier this week Union Mission was recognized has 2010's Best Non-Profit Organization to work for. We were one of 50 companies chosen from across the country and we will be covered in the April edition of the Non-Profit Times.

Last year, the U. S. Chamber of Commerce recognized Union Mission with a Best Company of Savannah award.

Prior to that, Georgia Trends Magazine honored Union Mission as a Best Company to work for.

Of course I am very proud of these things. What makes it happen are the people who actually do the work of preventing and ending homelessness in Savannah. They are an amazing collection of passionate caring people who encounter dispair every day. They face it head on and mold it and shape it until hope is born. From hope comes success and year in and year out, hundreds of people find their way home again.

I am in Phoenix right now at a meeting of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Local Funding Partners Program. Over the course of the year, the RWJ staff and several of my fellow Committee members rececive weekly updates on what is going on at Union Mission. We all collected for dinner last night to kick off two days of meetings. As I walked into the room, I was immediately congradulated by several of them over all of the things that Union Mission has accomplished in the past year.

"You must be very proud!" one of them told me.

"I am," I replied. "I work with some amazing people!"

Collecting Stuff

If you haven't seen it for yourself then you've seen pictures of it. A homeless person is pushing a grocery cart that is packed to the point of overflowing, full of stuff. His stuff! Her stuff! They do not have a home but they have stuff.

I can walk into the Grace House dorm right now, as I have done a thousand times before, and be absolutely amazed at how much stuff a homeless man can have.

"You got too much stuff to be homeless!" I once told a room full of homeless men.

Of course they looked at me like I was an idiot. They do not have a home, a family, a significant other, or much of a significant anything. They no longer have hope, desire or much dignity left. So they buy, find, or collect stuff. And their stuff is what they hold on to when they no longer have these other things.

There was this homeless guy that I was working with many years ago. Cliff came in off the streets and we slowly brought him along. An addict, he had lived on the streets for years. He regained his dignity. He rediscovered hope. He got a job and was very excited when he got his first pay check, but he was even more excited a week later when the package that he had ordered arrived. It was from the Hair Club for Men! He had spent his entire first paycheck on the desire for more hair!

But I learned something then. Homeless people want the same things that the rest of us want. They want a nice home and good friends. They want to feel better about themselves. They want to be healthy. They want to be valued. They want better hair. These desires are no different from you and me.

Yet, when people live in poverty for years, they have a tendency to find their value in the stuff that they have. This reinforces stereotypes that the rest of of us have about poor people. So what if a family has amassed three different television sets in the first apartment that they have ever lived. Julie and I have three televisions in our house! (We used to have five but we have downsized!).

But when a poor person has three televisions, it means something different. It means they are wasteful or make poor decisions. But what they are really trying to find is worth. Because they don't feel like they have any.

Hopefully, one day they will discover, like I hope that all of us discover, that it is not what we have that gives us worth. It is who we are.

Orchanized Chaos

Keller Deal's desk looks as though it was hit by a mail truck. Stacks of papers spill over everything and there is the appearance of total disorganization yet when I ask her for anything she somehow magically pulls it out from underneath a large stack that appear to be on the verge of tipping over.

Luella Sander's desk on the other hand is immaculate and I sometimes feel that I am standing in an office exhibition in a furniture store when I wander in there.

Jow Panky's went to the same school of organizing that Keller Deal did and a second mail truck crashed in her office. Joy is older than Keller however so Joy's endless stack of papers are at least in organized stacks though no one understands the except Joy. It would likely take an excavation team several months to identify everything that is in there.

Skip Eloge's office is also immaculate but this is likely because he spends all of his time trying to master email and has no time to clutter his office with other things. Skip is setting the tone for a "green workplace" at Union Mission.

Going the other way, Jeanette's desk is organized and classical piano music seems to come from one of the drawers. Across the room, Donna has mulitple desks and seems to use them all at one time. This office has mastered the art of appearing both organized and unorganized at the same time!

Lauren Milmine's office seems sparse. I'm uncertain as to why this is as she also uses two desks at once and has other furniture in it but whenever I wander in, it is like Lauren is on the bridge of the Starship Enterprise.

And my office is, of course, perfect! Mainly because any piece of paper that comes my way I give to Keller, Skip, Lavanda, Joy, Luella, Jeannette, Lauren or Donna. That way it looks as though I am in complete control.

Collectively we are organized chaos. But then again, that is what this work is all about. People's lives fall out of control and a chaos takes over. They come to Union Mission and we work with them to bring order to the chaos so that lives have meaning again.

Yesterday I was at Dutch Town and found myself locked out of the community center. The staff had gone and no one trusts me with a key so I stood there pondering what to do when this elderly black man approached me. He told me that they had all gone to lunch.

I went to introduce myself but he already knew who I was. I asked him which unit was his and be proudly said "501".

He had come to us from the state prison where Union Mission has a pilot project for releases. That was three years ago when he entered the J. C. Lewis Health Center as a sick parolee.

From there he moved to Grace House and then Beyond Grace and now is one of the first tenants of Dutch Town, a brand new 48 unit apartment complex for chronically homeless people. Order had triumphed over chaos.

So I returned to the office and it took me a full five minutes to find Keller Deal under the stack of papers that she was working under. Once I did though, we started again bringing order to it all.

Losing Home

Sometimes you don’t want to go home again.

For most, I guess, it happens in college or when you first move out of your parent’s house and you are on your own for the first time. Those first trips home, you expect and demand that your parents preserve everything as it was so that you can have you cake and eat it too. But then the day comes when you arrive and realize that it is no longer your home. You are a visitor and it has an uncomfortable feeling about it. Suddenly, you no longer want to be at your old home but you are wishful for your new one wherever that is.

Home has changed.

I remember driving through the state of Tennessee on a freezing December night to get home for Christmas with my parents. The wife and kids had left a week earlier so I was alone. This was as lonely as I have ever been. I sang Christmas carols at the top of my lungs and couldn’t wait to return home. When we arrived, my folks were into my kids, and I really didn’t want to be there any way. I wanted to be beside the ocean. So we went and got a room in what is now the Atlantis Inn and spent the day after Christmas there. Mom and Dad kept the kids.

I was glad that I was there. I strolled along the beach. I wandered into Doc’s Bar and listened to the music and played bumper pool. I think that my first wife stayed in the room. At least that is the way that I remember it.

The next day, we picked up the kids and returned to Louisville, where I was experiencing way too much success way too early in my life. And I resumed crashing and burning, which is what I was doing at the time without knowing it, but somewhere in the back of my head I knew where I wanted home to be. Not at the old home, but on this island. On Tybee, like most islands as my friend Jane Fishman taught me, where everybody is either running to, or from, something.

I was running to. And it happened. I have lived on this clump of sand for 21 years now. Only St. Martin competes with for my love of this place.

Anyway, home is a relative thing. It comes and it goes. Every morning I walk into a shelter and greet people who have lost home. I welcome them to where they are. Because where we are, is home. And if we do not know that, then the problems begin. And we all have enough problems.

So, stop reading and take a look around you. Smell it. Feel it. Touch it. Welcome home! Because that is where you are!

And if it doesn’t feel right, leave. If you have lost home, find it again. Because everyone wants to be at home, because in the end, there is no place else worth being!

Pink Bunny Slippers and other thoughts

Herb met me at my office for an early morning meeting. Both of us were requiring coffee before we could really get started so I led him next door to Grace House, our shelter for men, down a hallway and into the kitchen where there were steaming pots of the morning elixir.

When we entered, there was a tall slender, feminine black man who was washing the dishes left over from breakfast. He was humming and singing to himself as we came into the room. Long straight black hair fell upon his shoulders and the eye liner on his face accentuated his large brown eyes. He wore a fluffy pink bath robe and matching bunny slippers.

"Good Morning Mr. Elliott," he sang.

Herb stopped dead in his tracks. I replied with my own good morning wish and poured two cups of steaming coffee.

"Have a good day Mr. Elliott," he sang as we left.

When we got into the conference room and sat down, Herb took one sip of coffee staring at me as he did so.

"Was that a man?" he asked.

"For the moment," I replied.

That was several years ago. Last night I was at the Don & Kaye Kole Center, a home for women with addictions. The Ruby Show was filming an episode with the ladies who live there, including one transgender person who, as far as I know, is the only Union Mission resident to successful complete Grace House to move into a center for women.

Anyway, I greeted all of the excited ladies who were thrilled at the prospect of being on national television. Ruby entered and seemed like most everybody else and they all got along and cooked. The only difference is that there were television cameras and lights shinning on everything.

I couldn't help but marvel at this work. I see transformations of all kinds taking place every day. Some stand out much more than others. But I cannot think of a happier way to end a happy week with watching people celebrate the fact that they are finally becoming who they want to. I hope that all of us get to do as much.

The Long and Winding Road

Do you know what it like to work on something for years, hoping that it will happen, but it never seems to?

Still you keep at it only to encounter frustration after frustration, road block after road block, villains who turned into hero’s and hero’s who turned into villains, and…well you get my point. It becomes the long and winding road.

The end of this particular road happens today with the grand opening of Union Mission’s Dutch Town campus. It is our masterpiece! A 48-unit apartment complex for homeless people with disabilities began moving in right before Christmas.

It is beautiful, is also home to a health clinic, behavioral health services, oral health care, case managers, and other staff to help people who have never been able to do so, maintain their housing.

To hell with homeless shelters, this is the way that it should be. Dorothy was right! There is no place like home.

Earlier this week I was standing there talking to Keller Deal and Letitia Robinson, planning today’s grand opening, standing in the community center which has walls of windows that let in natural light, looking out over the lush manicured lawn. A city bus pulled into the curbed area that had been cut for it. The doors open and we watched a mother and her two small children climb down the streets onto the white sidewalk.

“Oh, they’re residents,” Letitia exclaimed.

They made their way into the community center where we were standing. Mom had her daughters sit on the new leather sofa while she took care of business.

We resumed our conversation and in the next few minutes I was walking in solitude towards my car. Climbing in, I absentmindedly decided to take one last drive through the entire complex before we turned it over to those who will live here. It had been mine for these past four years. Now it was time for it to become what it was always intended to be. Home!

So as I made my way towards the last quad of apartments, there was mom, unlocking the door to her brand new apartment, and leading her children in by holding there hands. One started jumping up and down before hurling herself over the door. I stopped the car and smiled as I observed the scene.

And the long and winding road, with all of the frustrations and delays, was worthwhile.

Home Again

I can still remember the smile on the face of the captain of the Army of Salvation. He was touring me around the newly renovated shelter facility and I must admit that it was impressive enough. Massive rooms that could accommodate almost one hundred people. Smaller rooms that could accommodate twenty. A handful of rooms which two would share. Fine offices, a small waiting room area where people would be greeted by someone behind glass after they had entered a steel door. I congratulated him and left.

A warehouse for human beings, I thought to myself. Even if it did have fresh coats of paint.

I've never been a fan of shelters. No matter how much you dress them up you stack as much misery into them as will fit. Then you tell yourself that you are doing something for homeless people.

Union Mission has one shelter now. Grace House, a 32 bed facility. We have consistently downsized it through the years and I very much look forward to the day when we do away with it entirely. Grace House was being built when I was hired or I would have done my best to talk them out of it.

Back in 1990 we built the Magdalene Project, a shelter for women and children. It had 8 individual family room and a small shelter that could accommodate 16. The family rooms were a huge success in helping families remain ... well ... families! We did away with the shelter after only a few years.

Also in 1990 we build Phoenix Place, an emergency shelter for people with HIV+/AIDS. It had no dormitory. Everyone had their own room. I remember once when my friend Terry Ball was visiting. Terry was the head of homeless programs for the state of Georgia at the time.

After touring Phoenix Place, he told me, "You know Mike, what makes this place different from St. Jude's Place in Atlanta, is that everyone here has made their room their own. They decorate it as if it their home."

Finally, I told myself! If we're going to end homelessness, we will do so by equiping people with the skills to successfully live in a home. Shelters don't do this. Shelters throw people out during the day and herd them like cattle at night. Most throw a blanket of religion on top so people can get saved several times each week.

There are some exceptions. My friend Vince Smith at the Gateway Center in Atlanta, for example, where they have created a super shelter, overlaying it an array of services that successfully respond to the reasons that people are there in the first place. It is kind of like hospital for homeless people.

Back in 1993 I wrote a book called "Why the Homeless Don't Have Homes and What to do About it." In it, I advocated for super shelters like the one that Vince runs and for much of the 1990s we implemented one on our Fahm Street campus.

Over the years however, I have come to beleive that everyone should have their own room. Or their own apartment. Or their own house. Because to end homelessness, everyone must have a home.

There is still plenty of work to do required to keep them housed, but the first step is for everyone to go home again.

This morning at the Breakfast Club, my friend John commented that my friend Trolly Joe had quipped that "none of Mike's people look homeless."

That's the point, right?

Doing What We Must

As soon as I stumbled into the Breakfast Club this morning and heard the blues blasting over the sound system, I knew that Jodee didn't want to be there today. I can always tell by the music that he is playing. If it's the blues, he doesn't want to work. If it's New Age, he's in a funky place by himself. If it is hard rock-and-roll, he's mad at something. If it's oldies, then its good times.

But today its the blues and while he didn't want to, he was there, showing off his smile, somehow making carrot flavored bacon, and a thousand other culinary delights for those who will order them today.

I settled onto my stool for after grabbing a cup of coffee for myself and the place filled with warmth and good smells. Johnny O came in and did the same. As did Whitley and we bantered and laughed with everyone there which is the way we all start every day. It is a family tradition with a carnival of friends.

Then it was off for my run. The cold here is bitter which is unusual and as I made my way down the beach, I saw that the sun had wrapped itself in a blanket of clouds that it seemed to be having a hard time climbing out of them. Checking the clock on my I-Pod, I could have sworn it to be true that the sun had slept in and was five minutes late rising. The cold had gotten to it to, but here it was rising anyway, doing something that it would rather not be doing but doing it because it is the right thing to do.

And I am off to Union Mission where everyone of our programs is extended beyond capacity as we house as many as we can, treat patient after patient, counsel client after client, and doing all of those things that Scriptures tell us to do. Feeding the hungry, Clothing the naked. Housing the Homeless. Day in and day out. Year after year after year.

There are days when we'd rather be doing other things. Happier things! I have watched many a person collapse under the weight of the never ending need that presents itself at our doors. They tried their best and gave their all, but hearts can only bear so much.

So those of us who remain have found ways to continue feeding our hearts with enough happy things to bear all of the sadness that we must manage day in and day out. For me it is kissing Julie good morning while she still sleeps, coffee at the Breakfast Club and laughing with my friends, saying good morning to the sun as it rises over the ocean, walking Goddess along back river, and then taking this time to think and reflect.

And now it is time to go. As much as I'd rather be doing other things today, it is cold outside and our places our full, and more will come and I have to do the things that I am supposed to do.

Danicing Through January

The holidays are now over and winter is upon us and even those who choose to sleep outside are looking for warmth and comfort somewhere. This is a dangerous time for many … the old, the exposed, the young … and those of us who try to help these people are busy trying to accommodate as many as we possibly can.

Christmas is over and all during that time it sometimes felt as though everybody in the world cared about what we do at Union Mission as they donated, volunteered, dropped off toys and tried to embody peace on earth and good will towards men. We are into the New Year now and we will have to wait until next Christmas when so many people focus their attention on our work at the same time and with the same passion.

So it is a normal day when we are like everybody else. Our noses are to the grindstone as we focus on the tasks at hand. I find myself cussing the water damage to the roof of the Magdalene Project, our shelter for women and children, and the fact that it is closed until the money can be found to repair the place. In the meantime, 65 women and their children are all doubled up somewhere, or staying on somebody’s sofa, or they are out on the streets. Almost half of the people who are homeless are women and children.

Yet there is also cause for joy and good tidings as the Dutchtown campus has its grand opening this week. The 48-unit apartment complex was built for homeless people living with disabilities. Families began moving in just before Christmas and the celebration of its completion will provide comfort and community to many for years to come.

So the year begins like every year. There are bad things happening and there are good things happening. And they are happening at the same time as they almost always do leaving us challenged to not be torn apart as they tug us in their direction.

And we find ourselves surrounded by good people and some not so good people. We’ll do our best to gravitate towards the good and shy away from the bad. And we will also again come to the realization that in the end we are all in this together and it will be some connection of us is what will get us through. And we will cling to those we love and pray that more of those kinds of people come our way.

In my office is a gift that Sister Pauline O’Brien once gave me. It is an image of a woman gracefully dancing on the ice. One arm is extending high above her head while the other sweeps around her. One leg is lifted and the other is on tip toes as she swirls. The faintest of smiles adorns her face. At the bottom are the words, “When you find yourself on thin ice, you may as well dance.”

So my friends, let’s start this year by dancing shall we? You may as well.

Washing the Heart

So, there are some things that you simply can’t fix, regardless of how talented or wonderful or clever you are. That is not because they do not need fixing, because they require it more than almost everything in the world. They are bad relationships or bad systems or bad friendships or banking accounts or lawns or windows that leak or toilets that you have to flip the handle on or whatever.

It is difficult to take an inventory of these things but before we all die we will. Or we won’t because we will ignore it and that will cost us far more in the end.

So, lets get started shall we?

These are the things that I have not been able to fix, aside from windows that leak or toilets where you have to flip the handle because they are things that are beyond my repair no matter what. So I hire someone who is far more experienced than I in these matters. The other matters however are mine to manage through.

First would be all of those relationships where I was so in love and she was so in love but we were way too immature so that love was lost. The one that I regret the most is Ginny because we were pretty passionate but it ended because High School ended and college began and I continued becoming me and she continued becoming her and we lost one another. Still, I would like to call her and say thanks because those were wonderful defining days and I would not be me without those times.

Then there is my first marriage. We both invested a lot and have three wonderful children as a result. We did things that were great and things that were not so great. We laughed and we loved and we fought and we spent long moments in silence because no one knew what else to say. We both tried our best to fix it but there was no fixing. So we moved on long after we knew that we should have.

The kids remain though and they are the best, most wonderful reminders of what love can produce, although I have met many kids that were also produced in love but did not turn out so wonderfully. It makes me very, very thankful for the relationships that I have with them.

Then there is SABHC, an attempt to fix mental health care in our community. I worked hard giving it my every thing at the cost of many other things, emotionally, financially, and relationship wise. In the beginning, like most beginnings, it was wonderful and we accomplished a lot, but it unraveled and I crashed and burned along with the attempt before other caring and wonderful people reached in and pulled me out. But I did my best, am proud that I did, but am sad at the cost.

But there is this one face that I will never forget, a mentally ill woman crying and burying her head in my chest, begging me not to take away her hot lunches on the last day, when I knew that it was beyond my fixing.

Tears still come to my eyes.

But tears are not a bad thing. I have learned that. They cleanse the heart. Washing it and making it cleaner than it was and leaving you in a place where you pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and tell yourself that it is time to start again.

When I am having a hard time, as we all do, I think about these things. Then I wash my heart, and I pick myself up, dust myself off and tell myself that it is time to start again.

Beach Patrol

So there is this group of us. Conner who builds stuff for a living. Hugh who keeps the lights on for the state of Florida. Joe who heals people in emergency rooms. And me. Many years ago we all met on boat in St. Martin and it was instant friendship. We would all park beside one another on the beach and talk multiple walks up and down Orient. Soon we were dubbed the Beach Patrol.

People have given us shirts and hats that say Beach Patrol.

Over the years, there have been changes to us. Joe dropped out but Jacob from Norway lobbied hard to get in and after sponsoring a terrific alternative wine and cheese party to protest the real wine and cheese party, we let him in.

The gender barrier was broken last year by Denise who proudly wears her hat as we walk down the beach doing moisture checks to ensure that everyone is staying hydrated in the heat.

The three original members make use of technology and travel opportunities to remain in touch throughout the year always planning for new and exciting Beach Patrol opportunities.

All of that to say, a large part of life is about your friends and I have been blessed with many. At home there is the Breakfast Club family, Johnny O and O Johnny and Judy and Judy and Trolley Joe and Roma and Jenny and Shirley and on and on and on. At work there is another collection of friends who guide me through bad times and good times like Jerry, John, Philip, Herb and others. And across the country there is Bill, Jim, Terry, Valarie, Suzanne, and on and on and on again.

What I have noticed is that more often than not, friends make one another laugh. Regardless of how good things may be or how horribly rotten they can be, friends somehow find laughter in it that gets you through.

So as 2010 gets going, I start with a toast to the Beach Patrol and to all of my friends who are always making it funnier than it would have been without them!