When Guelph author Marion Reidel first asked a group of people experiencing homelessness if she could document their story, she thought they would tell her to mind her own business.
Instead she said most were thankful someone cared and they opened up about their past and current struggles.
The Royal City Mission, in the heart of downtown Guelph, is a safe haven for people living on the streets. It provides meals and drop-in social services, and a sense of community. But in April of this year it ran out of funding and was forced to reduce its seven-day a week availability to just five half days.
Marion Reidel is one of the volunteers at the mission. She’s been so inspired by the community around it, that she wrote a book Stories from the Mission.
Reidel recently spoke with CBC K-W’s The Morning Edition host Craig Norris about the book.
The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Audio of the interview can be found at the bottom of this article.
Craig Norris: So talk a bit about how the mission inspired you to co-author the book with Jamie Hill?
Marion Reidel: When I volunteer at the mission, I’m working in the kitchen, I’m preparing meals, pouring coffee, that sort of thing, and you get to observe the clientele. When I started, they were open seven days a week, three meals a day. And now, they’ve cut the service back to five days a week, one meal a day. Which is really concerning because there’s a problem in downtown Guelph with people on the street who need shelter during the day and of food insecurity issues and need socialization and need supervision, quite frankly.
Craig Norris: Why was it important for you to write this book?
Marion Reidel: Well, I live in downtown Guelph in a tower of privilege on Macdonnell Street and these are my neighbours. I feel that it’s our responsibility as a community to make sure that the people at the mission are safe and I’m in a position to give. I’m reaching out to people to try and get them to understand what’s going on and see if they are also in a position to support this project.
Craig Norris: Tell us about your time volunteering at the mission.
Marion Reidel: I love being there! They’re very interesting people and there’s a lot of misconceptions. My neighbours are constantly asking me why do they choose to live in a tent and where are their families and why isn’t somebody else looking after them?
So as a writer, I thought what I can do is capture their stories. I expected them to say it’s none of your business, get out of my face. But instead, what I got was people saying, well, nobody’s ever asked me before.
And to sit with a man in his 40s who is weeping as he tells you of his childhood, when his parents were burning him with cigarettes and feeding him cat food as a punishment, and that they’d clean themselves up for parent interviews at school. So the school never picked up on it. And now he’s really broken and he’s living outside because his anxiety is so high.
Not everybody at the mission is a substance abuser and you know, and quite a few have not got families that they can fall back on.
Craig Norris: What are stories about some of the people at the mission that stick out for you?
Marion Reidel: Well, there are several. All the names in the book of the mission people are changed. The names in the stories about staff members are accurate. So there’s a story about Jennifer, who as a 15 year old wasn’t interested in school. She was physically developed beyond her age and wandered into an exotic dancing facility and got a job as an exotic dancer. They knew she was 15. She was let down. When she ended up getting pregnant, she went home and her dad punched her in the face and threw out of the house. You know, she goes on to get involved with bikers and a life of trauma. And she’s at the mission and is a wonderful, kind person who looks after younger people in the building.
There are some guys there who are on ODSP. Ontario Disability Support Program is for people who have had a workplace injury or a health issue where they can’t work. So I went to these guys and talked to them because they look like ‘Why don’t you have a job? What’s wrong with you?’ And they told me that they’re living on $700 a month. So they’re living in a room in someone’s basement.
They have shelter, but they don’t have access to a kitchen and they don’t have access to interaction with other human beings. And there are other people who are living in poverty. They do have a kitchen. They do have a space, but without the mission they wouldn’t talk to anybody all day. So they come and they do Zen doodle colouring and, you know, chat about the day. So there’s such a wide range of people there that need this service and it breaks my heart to see them sitting in St. George’s Square.
Craig Norris: You’re not technically selling the book, correct? You’re giving it away with a donation?
Marion Reidel: The Royal City Mission is registered charity and we’re not in the book sales business. So for a donation of $25 or more, the book is a gift and we’ll deliver it to your door. The book has two purposes. One is to build some empathy. I personally don’t find them dangerous, but I understand that it’s an impediment to the accessibility of downtown for average citizens and consumer business people. So this book helps explain who they are.
And we’re also hoping to generate money to get the mission open full time. And what we need is 1,000 people to donate $25 a month and the mission would be open full time.
Craig Norris: Where can people get a copy?
Marion Reidel: So the easiest thing to do is to go on the website, just type in Royal City Mission and there’s a donation button and you can donate one time and ask for the book where you can make the monthly donation of $25 and keep the place open full time.
Listen | Author chat with Marion Reidel: