Garbage Dump of Adolescents

I visited the garbage dump of adolescents today, it was most unsettling. I went to the homeless clinic and had a little extra time before I was needed so I went to the “homeless youth resource center” on State Street to talk to girls about birth control. I had never been there before but I had read about it in the newspaper and had a picture in my mind of what it looked like. It was a pretty clear picture involving a large area with a pool table, computers, television, couches, washers, dryer and some cots. I don’t know where I got this fictional picture, apparently I made it up. Maybe I dreamed it. The actual center is in a dilapidated store front. I had to ask one of the dozen smoking kids standing out front how to get in. The entrance is a little side door next to a parking lot.

The use of the word “center” is a stretch. A more appropriate name would be the “homeless youth room.” It was maybe 650 square feet with a desk for staff, a TV, a couch, a bean bag chair a table and some shelves of food. There was a tiny office for an “employment counselor” and a very small kitchen. The atmosphere was depressing but the kids were heart wrenching. They are throw away kids. I am guessing at least some of them are last week’s foster kids. I was talking to one boy who was friendly but not very bright. It made me so sad because he reminded me of my Carter. It was so obvious this kid was totally clueless and he is on the streets fending for his self. If Carter had been raised in foster care he would be somewhere like that. When Carter was a teenager I took him to a psychiatrist who told me “this is the kind of kid who ends up homeless.” I was so insulted and knew then and there we would make sure Carter had his own place. The chips are stacked so high against these kids who don’t have any parental advocacy. They are the product of our foster care system, drug addicted parents and the children of the thirty year old homeless group sleeping on the river banks. As I was getting in my car I looked at two girls and a boy leaning against the wall looking dirty and lost and I had this visual of Kylie and Brie and Sean standing there in eleven years. It gave me heart palpitations.

I don’t want to downplay the efforts of the staff at the center. They were awesome and it was obvious they care but honestly, that facility is the best the state has to offer for a group of kids that has already been given the shaft. They had a note on the wall “trade your dirty socks for clean before you leave today.” (If anyone wants to do a sock collection project I know where to send them!)

After my depressing and unsuccessful visit to the center I went and did an H1N1 clinic at the “Sanctuary.” The Sanctuary is a shelter for battered women. It is gorgeous. The facility is clean, new, the residents pleasant and the staff great to work with. I sure wish the kids had something like that. I do wonder about the name Sanctuary. I always thought of a sanctuary as something for animals not humans. But, hey as nice as it is they can call it whatever they want.