Letter To Paul In Bellingham

I am writing and posting this open letter to you here, hoping that someday you will take the time to read it:

This morning I woke up and struggled up from the mat on the shelter floor. I washed my face, brushed my teeth, dressed in yesterday's clothes and pinned-back my hair.

Then I smiled at Debra and winked at Robert.

Got my mind ready for another day...my last full one in Bellingham.

When the lights popped-on, I walked past sleepy guys who were still on their mats to my locker.

A guy had his jacket on the floor in front of the locker. I asked him if he would please move it over so that I could put my stuff away.

He glared and snarled: "No! Wait for me to wake up, you effin bitch!"

I told him that it would only take a minute for me to open the locker and put my stuff away.

He continued to snarl obscenities at me.

Then a guy who apparently works at the shelter in some capacity, started yelling at ME. ME!!

I stood there, with one hand on my cane and my other arm full, and couldn't believe what was happening.

There we were, in the place where we take the time to worship God every day. In the place where a large cross covers part of the back wall. And banners proclaiming "LOVE" and "HOPE" adorn each side of that symbol of Christianity.

And I watched grown men behave like dogs.

For all of the Bibles stacked on the shelf, I rarely see examples of Jesus in that shelter. Not in that room...not anywhere.

I've seen people push, curse, steal, threaten and lie.

And nobody ever mentions a word about showing respect for women. Or the importance of scruples, ethics, integrity or what it really takes to be a man. Or a decent adult. Or a humble child of God.

Those guys forgot God altogether this morning.

I didn't.

I stood up for myself and told the second guy that I will never accept cuss words from anyone.

Would God?

Would you?

I will sit and eat a meal there tonight and attend chapel. Just like I've done every night.

And after the sermon or video, I will watch everyone forget what they just saw and heard.

Goodbye to you, Paul. Goodbye Bellingham.

I'm going to board a bus tomorrow and say hello to God again.

I have a feeling that He'll be leaving with me.

After this morning's encounter, I don't blame Him.

Basking In The Cool In Bellingham

Now I am in Bellingham, Washington and enjoying the nice seventy-five degree days. The temperature hovers between sixty-five and seventy-five degrees during the day. It's much cooler than that at night.

While the rest of Nation swelters in the late-August swamp, I am happy to turn my face into cool, Pacific Ocean breezes.

I've stayed at the shelter for the last two weeks. It's been alright.

I sleep on a mat on the floor [but they do give me a pillow, case, sheet and blanket to use] and eat my meals downstairs in the kitchen.

Tomorrow will be my last day there.

On Friday, I am planning on taking a bus out of the area.

Destination: Ontario, Oregon.

And then?

Off to the land where the hills will turn into a fiery arrangement of red, orange and yellow.

East.

And thanks to some gracious folks here in Bellingham, I will be able to see those hills.

Before I leave here, I will go over to Wal-Mart and pick-up my new glasses.

See?

Ruthie's Summer IX

The organic farmer's wife is from Russia. And in between nursing a baby and amusing a five-year-old [both boys] she made a killer soup!

She also baked organic cookies, put-up homemade raspberry jam and taught me some of her native language.

The cabin was a total mess when I arrived, but over time the curtains got washed, the windows were wiped, the cupboards were scrubbed out and it was put back in decent shape.

And when I wasn't cleaning up the cabin, I ate fresh raspberries off bushes near the main house and drank cold water from a spring.

Without the plastic bottle.

At night, I watched huge moths circle the porch light outside the cabin. They were graceful and amazing to behold!

The five-year-old boy became my best buddy and after he caught a lizard, he carried that thing with him everywhere!

One day I left the mountain and when the organic farmer's wife dropped me off at the motel in Hood River, I told her something that I'm sure she remembered later on that day.

I told her: "Be grateful for everything that you have...for it could be gone one day in the blink of an eye."

A few hours later the bridge in Minneapolis, Minnesota collapsed.

Ruthie's Summer VIII

I took a bus to Pendleton, Oregon and then hitchhiked from there to The Dalles.

When I got there, the man who managed the soup kitchen told me: "Go find a tree in the woods and sleep under it."

I left The Dalles and got picked-up by an organic farmer. He brought me back to his farm in Trout Lake, Washington.

Mt. Adams is practically in their back yard!

Their house was built in the early 1900's, with gingerbread trim, wide windows and a wrap-around porch.

I didn't stay there.

Nope.

Five minutes after I climbed out of the car, I stepped into the little cabin in the woods.

Ruthie's Summer VII

Yeah, I was jumped from behind by several teenage thugs in the middle of the night. I spent three days in the hospital and then boarded a bus back to Ontario, Oregon.

It was a long journey with everyone pretending not to stare at my beat-up face.

My friends, Jeanette and Renee, cared for me in Ontario. I stayed at a safe-house there for a week and then Renee put me in a motel.

I stayed in Ontario for six weeks and mended.

During that time, I returned to my bank, got a post office box and helped Renee with one of her many projects: "Summer Lunch In The Park."

Kids from all over a poor neighborhood came to the park for a nice lunch and an hour of art and craft.

We had a great time!

Then as July progressed, it became VERY HOT!

In the middle of the afternoon, all I heard outside my motel door was the whirrr of air conditioners.

I eventually took over the tab at the motel. And Jeanette, the woman who had been the backbone of the safe house, was "dismissed" by the new director.

The director, that I met, is a cold person who's as abrasive as sandpaper!

I couldn't do anything about that situation but I decided that I was strong enough to change my location again.

Ruthie's Summer VI

I returned to Ontario and stayed for awhile, got bored and decided to go up to Bellingham, Washington.

I went up to that city and met someone who decided to drive down the next night to Tacoma, Washington. I joined her.

I ended-up in Tacoma overnight and the next day I left late in the afternoon for the Oregon border.

I go where I go, Campers.

But what I didn't know when I left Tacoma was that I was headed for a serious assault.

I left Tacoma on the fourteenth day of June and early the following morning, I was a victim of violence in Portland, Oregon.

The details of the attack are posted here.

My next update will explain what happened to me after I was released from the hospital.

Ruthie's Summer V

I returned to Oregon, where I trudged up the breakdown lane of eastbound I-84, feeling half-dead.

JC, bald-headed, with tattoos on his big arms and earrings in his ears, stopped to pick me up. I looked past his two young sons and saw a smile that I knew came from God.

JC drove me back to his home in Camas, Washington. I stayed at his house with his wife and sons for a week...and left well.

One night while I was there, in their huge, fancy home, a group of neighbors gathered in the back yard next door.

JC told me that the neighbors are all snobs.

I asked him what he planned to do about that fact.

He put in a "GodSmack" CD and turned the volume on the player all the way up.

The neighbors glared at the house and scattered.

We laughed.

Then I walked outside on the deck above JC and Holly's Koi Pond and sang a loud rendition of Janis Joplin's song "Mercedes Benz."

The neighbors gathered in front of their kitchen window and stared.

When I finished singing, I slowly bowed and walked back inside the house, sliding the glass door in place with a slam.

Ruthie's Summer IV

A woman who works as a caseworker at the second shelter in Lawrence, Kansas ended up driving me forward to Atchison, Kansas.

We met with a nun from a convent there who put me up in a motel over the weekend, brought me meals from the cafe next door and shared her wisdom.

Two days later, she drove me out to the edge of town and I hitchhiked over the border to St. Joseph, Missouri.

I stayed at a VERY MODERN Salvation Army facility overnight and then moved on the next day to Iowa.

And that's where the rides slowed down and almost stopped.

During my time in Iowa, I got a chest cold of all things! In the middle of June! I sat on a guard rail, coughing up yellow and green and got very tired.

That's when I decided to turn around.

Ruthie's Summer III

I walked down to another shelter that proved to be bit better than the one that I'd left.

It has a cable TV, lots of food, a goldfish tank and I got a mat on the floor.

The people there were very nice and I finally got myself a decent sleep.

The next morning, I met a guy who calls himself "Cheeriostix." He is a young man who hops freight trains to various destinations.

He doesn't like to hitchhike.

But he does like the hitch hiker's website, Digihitch.com, which is featured on my link list.

He was already familiar with me and my blog when he met me at the shelter there. He reads my posts in the forum at Digihitch.

Ruthie's Summer II

I first tried to get a bed at the Salvation Army shelter in Lawrence, Kansas. But after watching people fight with the staff and each other...I left.

I found another shelter in the city.

[More on that in a minute]

But the next day, I returned to the Salvation Army and asked to use the shower there.

That shower was NASTY, Campers!

There were things floating in the corners that defy biological description!

Ruthie's Summer

I am going to begin my update my taking you back to the beginning of June.

I already posted about my wonderful drive with Matt.

He eventually dropped me off at a shelter [more like an old house] in Salina, Kansas.

That is quite a place! A shell of a once-beautiful home that is now beat to hell.

And the worst part about it was the fact that the people who worked there wouldn't allow me to sleep downstairs.

Soo...I struggled up a steep staircase, big backpack, cane and all.

The next day I walked quite a ways down to the local Salvation Army office where they packed me up a bag of food, gave me a jug of ice water, put me in a van and drove me down to the on ramp heading east.

I stood there chomping on chicken until an off-duty cop drove me to Lawrence, Kansas.