unheard voices
Hope
This is Hope, a wise Native American woman. I find her sitting in a back alleyway with some friends in Old Town. She has been homeless for 15 years, describing her experience as cold. When I ask what her she learned throughout those years, she responds, "...my feelings….to help each other. In the middle of the night, any time of day. If I have food, I give you food. If I have clothes, I give you clothes. If I have shoes, you take them."
There is a certain gentleness in the way she speaks, making me all the more intrigued to uncover her story. A few minutes into our conversation, I come to discover she broke her jaw awhile back, making it difficult to speak properly.
“I call my homeless people my people. Just because somebody is scroungy or dirty from the road, sleeping in the dust,the leaves, bushes — doesn’t mean they’re not worth anything. They're people."
Hope's name is no coincidence. She is an embodiment of hope, aspiring one day to sing the truth and tell the truth.