Last Wednesday I left our morning drop-in to go home because I felt awful. I got home around 12:30 pm, crawled into bed and slept until 4:30 pm. I hardly ever sleep during the day like that. I continued to doze into the evening, slept all night and remained in bed throughout the next day. I don’t know what I had. A cold, or maybe a touch of a flu? If I’m honest, I know that mixed into the sickness was stress. The combination meant my body had no other option but to stop and rest.

Just days before I fell ill I received the call that a friend, fellow musician and core member of The Dale had taken his own life. In disbelief I called the police, longing to hear it was a mistake. It wasn’t. This news arrived on the heels of officiating two funerals already this year. Since last summer we have said goodbye to Cowboy, Rob, Leonard, Barry, Jackie, Will and now Clive. All of this death means that one grief seems to bleed into another, rarely with enough space between to come up for air.

A few people have recently asked me if in order to manage these losses I keep a safe distance away- I guess sort of clinically detached. I am actually quite the opposite, deeply weeping and mourning for all of my friends. I feel determined to honour each one with dignity and respect, so much so that I, along with Joanna, have taken responsibility for people with no next of kin. I don’t want to be hardened to all of this. I recognize too that in order to stay healthy I must create space to process, grieve and rest.

Besides a lot of sleeping last week, I took time to pray, watch funny television and drink cup after cup of tea with honey. I endeavoured to sit in gratitude for a bed and quiet home to recover in. It wasn’t all picturesque: I ugly cried and wrestled with God too. As I began to come out the other side, I was able to give thanks for how God continues to walk with me in these valleys. These deaths, simply put, suck. There is also something deeply beautiful about being there with people at the end of their lives AND with those left behind.

As we plan this next funeral, we are thinking about the small repertoire of songs that our friend played regularly in the corner of the drop-in. One of them was Green Day’s “Time of Your Life”. It has been stuck in my head for days and seems a good, though maybe tragically ironic way to end this post. 

Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road
Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go
So make the best of this test, and don’t ask why
It’s not a question, but a lesson learned in time

It’s something unpredictable, but in the end is right,
I hope you had the time of your life.

So take the photographs, and still frames in your mind
Hang it on a shelf in good health and good time
Tattoos and memories and dead skin on trial
For what it’s worth it was worth all the while

It’s something unpredictable, but in the end is right,
I hope you had the time of your life.
 

If you have never been to The Dale, coming to a Monday Drop-In is a great way to be introduced to our community. It is here that you can see what it means for our people to be invited into ‘full participation’. As messy as it gets, the Drop-In is also a pretty well oiled machine.

Many of our community members, aka volunteers show up around 9:30 am. A huge urn of coffee is put on to perk, tables are set and food prep begins. I arrive at 1o with any additional groceries we need in hand, clean laundry (mostly tea towels and aprons) and occasionally tokens that will be distributed throughout the day. Souad, our Volunteer Kitchen Coordinator guides the action by asking her “sweeties” and “munchkins” to chop the vegetables and get things in the pots. As she so often says, The Dale kitchen is not her’s, but ours. And she’s right.

Joanna and I are in and out of the kitchen, some days more than others, but usually to disinfect a sink, help with some dishes and deliver items from the storage room. We are thrilled to have such an amazing crew cooking really good food for what can be up to 120 people. Trusting our team means that we are free to connect with people in the drop-in. There is usually a nice hum in the room, accented by people jamming on musical instruments in the corner. Yesterday Mr Bojangles was practically on repeat.

There are times when things can get difficult. Take yesterday, when a couple of people had open alcohol in the space. We endeavour for The Dale to be both safe AND respectful and so immediately needed to ask our friends to stop drinking or take it outside. They did. Sometimes people come in crisis, simply needing to be heard and loved. Oftentimes we get to hear very, very painful stories. We also come having our own off days. I can attest to the fact that I have arrived at the Drop-in very much needing to be listened to and hugged.

Just before 1 pm I welcome people and explain how things work: we bring platters of food to every table and ask that each person ensure its fair distribution, at the end of the meal we are all invited to take our dirty dishes to some big bins of soapy water by the kitchen. We give a round of applause to the many people who have helped on that day, explaining this is a meal for the community, by the community. Then Joanna gives a run-down of our weekly schedule, Souad describes the meal and I lead a short prayer.

Yesterday we had a beautiful green salad with fresh garlic and lemon juice, meat patties, ham, a sort of ratatouille, fruit salad and banana cake. People routinely comment on how restorative eating healthy food is. I am convinced that something special happens when people sit around a table sharing food.

Clean-up requires rinsing dishes before running them through a Disinfector and often involves blaring “Stand by Me” and dancing in the kitchen (I highly recommend it). Because we use a space that is not our own, we have to leave it as we found it. All of our kitchen supplies need to be put back in our little storage area in another room. We work to be done by 3 pm.

If you are ever close to 250 Dunn Avenue on a Monday, please drop by. We will encourage you to join a table and enjoy a meal because we want to experience the gift of your presence. I’ll probably tell you about how Mondays are one of my favourite days. Together we can sit back and get a glimpse of The Dale at work.