By Thea Jarvis

As a late winter twilight encircles the city, volunteers steadily make their way to southwest Atlanta. Their destination, St. Anthony’s Church in West End, opened a night shelter January 24 and willing workers are arriving early to prepare for evening guests.

In the church basement, which serves as the shelter center, St. Anthony’s parishioner Norma Richardson is already on hand, quietly and competently directing newcomers to their various posts, bestowing kindly smiles and grandmotherly reassurances on the novices. Norma has spent two other nights at the shelter and knows the ropes.

Sister Suzanne Giro, pastoral associate at St. Anthony’s, looks in to be sure things are running smoothly. At 6:45, she begins to worry. The food hasn’t yet arrived and a call is put out to Kathy Leonard in Dunwoody, the evening’s chief chef. She’s on her way.

Thomas, a guest of St. Anthony’s who helps with setup each night, lays the tables in the center of the room with plastic utensils, napkins and cups. His curly hair wreathes a rugged, handsome face and when he introduces himself a mellow Mexican accent overlays the greeting. He is happy to be where he is welcome and useful.

Sister Jean Booms from Saints Peter and Paul arrives seeking information. She is to drive the evening’s guests waiting at Central Presbyterian downtown to St. Anthony’s in the parish station wagon and is wondering when to start the trip. It is her first tour of duty and she is a bit apprehensive about making the right connections. Suzanne and Norma give her directions and encouragement. In the spacious kitchen just off the central room where guests will eat and sleep, Jude Summerfeld from All Saints and Marion Edwards, a secular Franciscan from Sacred Heart, wait for guests to start arriving.

Asked how he became involved at the shelter, Jude answers that he read about it in the paper. “The biggest mistake I made the last time I stayed, though, was to go to work the next day,” he adds with a smile. “Tomorrow I’m taking a vacation day!”

Sister Suzanne, looking hopefully to the door for the entrance of the all-important dinner, mentions that the program was recently blessed with 340 pounds of meat from Food Shapers, Inc., a happy sign the “the business community has extended itself,” she says.

A cheer goes up as the kitchen door leading from the back parking lot opens and Kathy Leonard enters, soup and sandwiches in tow.

Her 16-year-old son Dale, a student at Marist, carries the oversized cauldron. His sidekick Todd brings up the rear with a supply of sandwiches that would feed the Russian army. They had taken the wrong exit off the expressway and Kathy apologizes for the delay.

Norma wastes no time in lighting the fire under the soup, a fragrant blend of vegetables, pasta and meat with a rich tomato cast that invites tasting. It was a joint effort of several women from St. Paul’s Circle at St. Jude’s. The sandwiches come with the compliments of circle families in a subdivision near the parish who put them together as a Lenten project.

The outer room begins to hum as guests filter in. Most meet at Central Presbyterian and are transported by van or wagon to the smaller shelter. A few hop a MARTA bus to arrive at St. Anthony’s around 7:30.

It will be a while before all 30 or so men settle in. To pass the time, checkerboards and card decks come out and small groups make themselves at home at the tables, exchanging easy conversation and friendly jibes.

The group is small and somewhat intimate. Many constitute an overflow from the shelter at Central, which exceeded capacity on a regular basis this year and gave rise to St. Anthony’s program.

In the rear of the room is a high stack of vinyl mats, each just long and wide enough to accommodate a tired body for a night’s rest. The pile diminishes as the men claim their mats and carefully arrange their sleeping quarters along the outer walls.

James Tiller, tall and gentlemanly, places his mat close by the reception desk towards the front of the room. It is convenient to the side door as well, and James explains that he chooses this spot under the window so other guests won’t be disturbed by his early wake-up.

Each night, he asked to be roused the next morning at 4:30 – an hour earlier than the general call – so he can catch the bus that will bring him to the labor pool at North Avenue and Peachtree Street.

There, with a little luck, he might find a job with Labor King, a temporary company that frequently puts on extra hands for the day’s work.

Unemployment, Eviction

Before he lost his job some time ago, James had an apartment furnished with his own belongings. Without funds to pay the rent, he was evicted and his possessions set out on the street. Almost everything was stolen.

He finds St. Anthony’s “a lifesaver – a castle,” he says as he begins to shed some of the layers of clothing that have kept away the chill of Atlanta’s streets.

He explains that he is well-outfitted for any cold that might come along – two coats, a sweater, jacket and shirt, two pairs of pants, along with sturdy brown shoes and a light canvas hat. All the clothes are worn at one time. When you have no place to call your own, you tend to travel with your belongings intact.

James is 47 and a gracious man, taking time to speak with a stranger who shows some interest in his experiences on the street, playing cards with one of the new volunteers. He has family aplenty in town, having grown up in southwest Atlanta, but prefers not to ask them for help. He has his pride, and St. Anthony’s makes him welcome.

Tomorrow, he hopes, there might be a job awaiting him at the labor pool. If he can get together $5, he can buy a MARTA card that will entitle him to unlimited transit for a week. This would, perhaps, enable him to look for something a little more permanent.

As James has been talking, Andrew Meyers from St. Anthony’s has arrived. Young, enthusiastic, ready to do his part, Andrew is marking his third evening at the shelter, calling the experience “a blessing to St. Anthony’s.”

Andrew is himself a blessing to the program. When on duty for the night, he manages to get two or three hours sleep, he says, before returning to his job as a welder at 7 a.m. His off-work love is cycling, but he still finds time to deliver food to needy families for St. Vincent de Paul.

Of the shelter, Andrew says it gives him “a chance to meet people – to do what Christ would have done.”

“People need encouragement,” he continues. “If you’re down and out, you’re still somebody.”

It is Andrew who welcomes shelter guests and reviews the rules before dinner is served: no smoking, no drinking, no gambling, no fighting or arguing, no leaving the shelter area.

Minor grumbling surfaces during the brief address. The men have heard it before and some feel they needn’t be reminded of the obvious. Most accept it as part of the routine.

Andrew begins a blessing and the grumbling quickly ceases. He gives thanks for the food and for the fact that the group is together. With a sincerity that is hard to miss, he asks blessings on the men as they seek work and requests success for their efforts.

The amen is heartfelt and acknowledged by all.

Dinner Is Served

Checkerboards and card decks are laid aside for the moment. Dinner is ready, and so are the hungry folks gathered around the tables.

Sister Jean, having returned from a successful run, serves up some soup with a shy smile. The Marist boys offer two sandwiches apiece to each guest. They look good – ham and bologna – and the soup is warming and hearty.

Over a meal, people either concentrate so hard on eating that talk becomes irrelevant, or they allow the nourishment to loosen their tongues and let conversation flow.

At one of the long tables in the middle of the room, 12 or so of the men are alternately quiet and voluble.

“I’m not a soup man,” Wilson Patterson says as a volunteer offers to fill his bowl. He is nattily dressed in a yellow windbreaker and jaunty black hat and looks younger than his 25 years.

He is waiting for “a ticket out of here.” Home is Brooklyn, New York and it is there he hopes to return. Six months in Atlanta has been long enough. For now, he works for a temporary agency and comes to St. Anthony’s at night to save money.

Wilson is bright and well-spoken. He has fared better than some in an arena where the faint of heart are often early causalities. Getting home is a present goal, and there is little doubt that he will make it. He might even return to Brooklyn College, where he already has a year and a half of schooling to this credit.

“Yesterday I worked as a waiter in the Congress Center,” he volunteers, adding that the pay rate is somewhat lower for a daily hire than for regular staff.

The table talk turns to food and the quality of St. Anthony’s luncheon program is unanimously approved, though some of the dishes are preferred over others. Many who come to the night shelter depend on the church lunches for their midday ration.

As culinary likes and dislikes are compared and debated, a voice echoes from the end of the table: “I’ll tell you what I don’t like – I don’t like being broke and poor.” The observation is made with good humor, but the truth behind the statement is clear.

When dinner is over, the men disperse, some to card and checker challenges, others to a small television in the rear of the room. Andrew usually brings the set when he comes, knowing it is a source of entertainment not generally available. (On super Bowl Sunday, Andrew had shelter duty and his t.v. was the most popular diversion in the house.)

Table Talk

Wilson remains at the table, along with his friend Joshua Binyard. Joshua is 19 and neatly dressed in a pullover and white shirt. He could easily be mistaken for an upperclassman at one of Atlanta’s private schools.

As it turns out, Joshua arrived in Atlanta with a magazine troupe, the kind that inundates suburban subdivisions with an all-out sales blitz. “I probably knocked on your door,” he says good-naturedly to the stranger on his left.

Joshua is glib and witty, with an optimism that is refreshing in a room frequently filled with thoughts of failure. After finishing up his magazine stint around Christmas time, he decided to stay in the city, but “found myself on the streets for three or four days with no food and no water,” he remembers.

He made his way to the Atlanta Union Mission with the help of someone he had met on the street, and worked at Burger Chef for awhile. But the job was short-lived because the establishment had over-hired.

Like Wilson, Joshua works when he can, but, unlike his friend, wants to stay in Atlanta rather than return to his native Connecticut. He hopes a man he met in Norcross when he was selling magazines might offer him permanent employment and plans to get in touch with him.

Both Joshua and Wilson agree that city shelters are home to many out-of-staters who find themselves in a no-funds, no travel limbo without any apparent hope of resolution.

A Place To Count On

For now, native Atlantans and transients alike need the shelter of St. Anthony’s, a place where few questions are asked and friendship is as easily given as the food and bedding that is guaranteed each night.

As 9:30 approaches, the men settle into their places on the mats, drawing the blankets around them and using their outer garments for makeshift pillows.

Tomorrow is another day. Five-thirty will see the room tidied and the men off in search of their dream, bolstered by a sweet roll and a piece of fruit from the church larder. A bus token will provide needed, though limited transportation, and a ticket issued upon leaving ensures each man a place for the following evening. Most will return.

Before the lights are extinguished and volunteers go off to finish up kitchen chores and head for a night’s rest in the chapel, Larry Askew clowns for a quick picture on his sleeping mat.

He asks for a copy of the photo to use in a story he hopes to write for local publications, an in-depth report on shelters from a recipient’s point of view.

Go for it, Larry.