Today I’m heading down to help with Project Homeless Connect Minneapolis. Twitter Hashtags #PHC #homeless

Here is Shawn. I’ve written about him on my blog before. I met Shawn in 2007 when he was one of the students in my A+ certification course at the Minneapolis Urban League.

Shawn has been through a lot. He became homeless in 2006 after losing his job. He tried to get emergency assistance but navigating “the system” was difficult. Shawn is a veteran and has sight and hearing difficulties.

I finally got to see Shawn on Saturday. It’s been more than a year since we last met. I started doing Project Homeless Connect because of Shawn. We were going to meet up 1 year ago and I was going to guide him through all the services. It turned out that Shawn had violated his parole and was put in jail. I still attended but wondered if he was ok. Months later, I got an email from him explaining the problem.

He’s done so much to follow the rules, make his appointments and do what is needed to get back on his feet.

Most people are two paychecks away from being homeless

I had heard about the InvisiblePeople.tv website and finally went to go take a look. Telling stories about real people is a good thing to do to make others “real” vs just another newspaper blurb. Shawn emailed me last week and I said, “Let’s meet!”. I thought this would be a great thing to do, sharing Shawn’s story. He agreed and I pulled out my pocket camera to record.

Shawn went in for surgery in October after collapsing. It turns out he had a large, cancerous growth in his stomach. He got that removed and he says he’s feeling much better with a ton of energy! Seems this growth was draining him.

He’s such a great guy with a good heart. Currently he is staying at a shelter, Harbor Lights. I hope to get him into St. Stephens which is a safer and cleaner facility. They have a lottery system to get a bed. The other option is Shawn could check with the VA and see if he could get into a training program there which would also offer him housing.

I’m just glad he’s not bouncing around or trying to live outside.

What Shawn Taught Me

I like to think of myself as open minded. Shawn taught me that homeless people can keep their word. When I met Shawn, he didn’t have a computer. As the class progressed, people were expected to do work outside of the class. Shawn couldn’t do this because the computers at the library were pretty much locked down. He lamented over it. Other students began to see what they could do to help. I realized I had a good contact for used laptops and was able to secure a T30 for $200. Shawn and I agreed that he would pay me in 2 weeks for it.

Now this was a leap of faith. We all know the stereotypical story of giving money to homeless people, “They’re just going to drink it up or use it for drugs.” Shawn kept his word and paid for the laptop. I realized that I had been harboring a stereotype and to this day thank Shawn for opening my eyes.

Shawn is seriously good with electronics.  He also loves designing websites although I am back working on him to move away from hand coding HTML and to start using a CMS (Content Management System) like Wordpress.  You can check out Shawn’s website http://stokesanimallibrary.com where he has indexed hundreds of animals, insects and links about nature.

Being homeless is situational; it doesn’t define you as a person

If you haven’t already attended a training for Project Homeless Connect, you can still help by donating. This effort is run entirely by volunteers and receives no funding from the government.

This started in San Francisco and these events are held all over the US