Where do you sleep when you live on the streets? Most places are either owned by someone and therefore you are not welcome, or they are public, and are still unwelcome. Fortunately our retreat planning community included several youth who have been homeless in the area. A few ideas were tossed around, but we settled on an odd, L-shaped alley near the youth house. One Saturday day a youth and I scoped it out, and it seemed perfect.
I do know, however, that the conditions of the streets vary depending on the time, so I figured it would be prudent to check it out in the middle of the night. And so it was that my wife and I took a little drive to check it out.
As we were leaving the location, I noticed that while the place I had picked appeared unpopulated, there was actually one man sleeping nearby in a thick bedroll. There was no reason to wake him up in the middle of the night, but I also wanted to keep an eye out, both so that we did not take his place and also to make sure all went well.
All in all, the place checked out, but we needed to be aware of potential issues arising from the "neighbor."
