I am sitting in a dark room behind two monitors which are attached to a tiny personal computer which barely works. Beyond the bright white LED screens which display names on names are several bodies to which a few of these names belong. One is asleep with his head in his hands and another sits across from him, eyes glazed as he slowly nurses a cooling cup of tea. The final person is rummaging through a bin, made available for all, searching for a hat which might protect her from the hail we can all hear just outside. There are no suitable hats for this weather in the bin. I’ve checked. The hats are mostly cheap polyester beanies which will become quickly water logged and functionally useless after a day or two. She is looking for something good enough. 

There is a whiteboard on the wall to my left which displays where my staff are working for the night. We are overstaffed, in my estimation, with myself and four others and an additional two security guards. I could do with two less and if it were up to me I wouldn’t have any security but I am grateful for the help. 

Over my left shoulder is a door which leads outside. Somewhere out there is a small group of survivors who stand huddled in a circle together, sharing cigarettes and stories. Over my right shoulder is a door which leads to the main room. 

The main room contains the rest. Somewhere between 55 and 60 folks on any given night who have nowhere else to go. I try to walk the room frequently and catch anyone who may be understandably struggling to find the peace of mind required for rest. I can’t do much but I can do something. Can grab you some tea. Can make you some oatmeal. No coffee, sorry. Not until 6. Yeah, staff have a pot. Yeah, I can sneak you a little. Cream? Sugar?  It’s good to see you. 

I like being able to do what I can. I like being honest about what I can do. And what I can’t. There’s a liberation that comes from that honesty. I think. As I walk the milieu and realize that we each who are here are facing a common threat which is so large it forces us to retreat to each other. To do what we can. Each time I scan the room of bodies splayed upon cots there is a sense of wartime evoked. Trenchfoot. Frostbite. Tremors. Paranoia. Open wounds. PTSD. I feel at times like a grossly unqualified medic running a grossly unqualified MASH unit. But we make it work. 

It can be scary I guess. But not uniquely. What you will experience here is not beyond you. It’s a nice reminder of your humanity if you’ll allow it to be one. A grounding which I do not believe is available in any other kind of place. It is an environment in which pretense is stripped to reveal basic truth, a place which exposes ego and demands it yield to the nature of things. You can not do enough here. And yet you will try. 

It is a place where the barrier between things which we have convinced ourselves are opposites grows thin. The gathering of such mass amounts of raw humanity influences everything in this way beyond the metaphorical. In the same way rage becomes gentle, cigarettes become medicinal. It is with this gentle rage you will hand a cigarette to a victim of class war. You will curse the world together as the sun rises and laugh.