My expectations for Sleep Out were modest. I figured the evening was going to be filled with a few small annoyances, punctuated with a well-earned nap the next day. God clearly has a sense of humour.
Upon arrival Mildred told me there was a “guest room for the reporter,” but I insisted that wasn’t necessary. What sort of journalist would I be if I didn’t actually participate?
The evening started with Mass and Eucharistic Adoration, followed by Night Prayer and a sharing group where we discussed what we thought the night would be like.
I joked to my group that without my toddler kicking me in the back I would likely sleep better on the ground than in my bed at home. Foolish man.
After the circle I grabbed a sheet of cardboard – a luxury, I was assured, that not all homeless people have – and shlepped my belongings out to a dry section of concrete under the overhang outside St. Mary’s gym. Some of the other volunteers were already snoring when I got there.
“Great. It can’t be that bad,” I thought, looking at them as I unrolled my sleeping bag before shimmying under my blanket.
The first thing you notice in a Sleep Out is the ground. It is there, and it does not like you.
It might start in the knee or elbow, but slowly the aches spread all over as the concrete squeezes your body with its own weight. A shirt crease starts to feel like a bundle of sticks rolling around underneath your body, and no matter how hard you try you can’t get comfortable.
Then come the noises. The silence is punctuated by howling trucks and the banshee wail of the not-too-distant SkyTrain. Devoid of rhythm or rhyme, the noises only sound when your eyes start to droop and it starts to feel like the world has conspired to torture with sleep deprivation.
Finally comes the cold. It grasps at you from the ground and pries its way into every small gap between the blankets. Every move you make to cover up just exposes a different part of the body.
One moment it feels warm, and then comes the realization that each breath is just a bit cooler than the last. Slowly you understand that there is nothing you can do to stop it and the cold is going to slowly creep into your bones until you can’t focus on anything else.
You can’t make it go away.
After four hours and 23 minutes lying on the ground, I hadn’t had a wink of sleep. I had family obligations the next day and I knew I wouldn’t be able to perform any of them if I stayed until wakeup call.
So I got to do something that no homeless person gets to do. I got to leave. I packed up, apologized that I had to go, and I got in the car. As I turned my key in the ignition it started to hail.
I had always assumed the worst part of being homeless was the poverty, hunger, and lack of address, but since the Sleep Out I have added lack of sleep to the list.
Placing aside for a moment the drug use, mental health complications, and fear of violence that often accompany homelessness, I can’t even begin to imagine what it must be like to live weeks, months, or even years without a good night’s sleep.
I can barely sit down at my desk to write with only six hours of sleep. It must take a herculean effort for a person who only sleeps on the ground to do anything to better themselves.
While I was lying there, I remember being surprised about how little the cardboard did to make me comfortable. The next day my chest was sore from trying to lie on my stomach. It was painful to take a full breath of air, and my bones ached.
Thinking about it, I wondered if sleeping on soft, wet dirt instead of hard, dry concrete would have been preferable.
If nothing else, the experience of Sleep Out has made me thankful that I don’t need to make these sorts of choices. Further inspiration will come with time.
