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Ode: A homeless man moves to Sioux City to start over

Jeremiah Grimm
Ally Karsyn

Fire, roaches, bad roommates—he's had them all.

It was a perfect day, an almost clear blue sky. Long Island Sound lay stretched out before me. Sand squished under my shoes while the waves crashed against shore. It was that gentle rhythm I used to fall asleep to. The water was too cold for tourists to come pouring into this little coastal Connecticut town. So, it was just me and the seagulls and the smell of the sea, strong and salty.

Behind me, the large empty parking lot where my father let me drive the Camaro for the first time in the deep snow of winter. He simply told me to turn the wheel all the way, hit the gas and spin on the ice. He wanted me to learn how to control the car before I learned anything else.

Down the beach, I saw the small grove of trees, just thick enough to hide a group of preteens playing truth or dare, resulting in my first kiss. I stood there on the beach in Westbrook, and I felt nothing.

I got in my car and drove a couple minutes to my old house—a little, red-brick summer cottage, where we lived year-round. It was still there. I had not stepped foot here in over 17 years.

Knee-high sculptures of sailors on lighthouses dotted the driveway. Decorative fish netting and life preservers had been added to the fence that surrounded the large front yard. It reminded me of a seafood restaurant, but it wasn’t tacky. It was all put in place with love and care. I knocked on the door, but no one answered. Again, I looked around and saw memories, but none of them touched me.

My house was here, but my home, was gone.

Early in my life, my family moved quite a bit. When I was around 6 years old, we moved into the first home where I could remember good times. A split-level house in a quiet suburban neighborhood. Think of kids on bikes, mothers yelling at them to come home for dinner, and older kids having to drag their younger siblings around with them because “mom said so.” This was where I had my first and only pet, a beautiful—I dunno—mutt, named Daisy.

And it’s where I was sitting on my parent’s bed and playing Nintendo one night when a police officer barged in. I wasn’t allowed to leave the room. My parents left in handcuffs. Me and my older brother and sister stayed at an aunt’s house for a few days. I remember asking, “What happened to our home? Why can’t we go home?” No answer was given. My mother was released, and we went back home with her. For the next two years, I would only see my father on weekends at the prison.

Back then, I didn’t understand the poverty we were in. My mother worked as a waitress and struggled to pay the mortgage. Through everything, she was simply wonderful and did whatever she had to do to make sure we were clean, fed and happy. She was “Mom” to everyone who visited our home.

After my father was released from prison, he became the devoted husband and father I hope to be. But his absence put a financial strain on the family. We lost the house. It sold just days before foreclosure. And my dog, Daisy, had to be given away.

We moved into a small, cramped apartment on the other side of the county, in a dirty little city. I suppose the upshot was that it was still in the same school district. Honestly, I don’t remember much from that time until moved again. I was starting eighth grade when we moved to Westbrook—a tiny town on the coastline, a rich town, a tourist town. We had 200 kids in the entire high school—new computers every year, a senator’s daughter went to school here. You get the idea. Drive 15 minutes on I-95 in any direction and you would pass five towns just like it.

My home was a 2-minute walk to the beach. It was nestled down a private road lined with trees. The quiet roar of the ocean was always in the background. Our relatives loved it too, of course.

I did well here, and I was happy. Until my mother got lung cancer. She died two years later. I was a junior in high school.

After she died, my dad was barely around, bound by his grief. My older brother and I would see him maybe once a week.

Less than a year later, two months before I was going to be the first in my family to graduate, and go on to college, I got a phone call. My father didn’t want to pay for the house anymore. He was moving in with his girlfriend, and he told me, “I need you out in ten days, so find some friend to live with or something.” Then he hung up.

I looked around and felt everything just… fading away. I was just standing in a house. Again, that question rattled in the back of my head, “What happened to our home?”

My uncle let me move in with him, which, as fate would have it, was extremely close to the community college I was to attend. That didn’t last long. My uncle worked for the IRS. He made me account for every dollar I spent. If I had two glasses of Tropicana orange juice in one day, I got a lecture about money. Everything in his life was done by the book. He had to go to the bathroom at the same time every day or his world might come crashing down.

Any time I’d go out, it would be Where are you going? What are you doing? Who are you meeting? What are their phone numbers? Are their parents home? What do their parents do? What church do they go to? Oh, and I had to be back before dark unless I was working.

While I was out, he’d search through my room on a regular basis. He kicked me out of the house when he found a joint in my jacket in the closet. Shortly after that, I couldn’t afford college anymore. I dropped out.

For the next seven years, there was a lot of moving around—a lot of addresses throughout some towns and cities dotting the Connecticut coastline. Just a string of crappy apartments, couch crashing, bad roommates, constant moving and some homelessness as well. I’d lost all of my things over those years more than once.

With no real possessions to speak of, I moved out here in May 2008. A friend of mine, also struggling with homelessness, was returning home to Iowa. He invited to put me up for some time.

Hoping for a fresh start, we moved into one of those tiny loft apartments on Fourth Street. I got a job at Chili’s the day after I arrived. About a month later, I moved into the Bolstein Apartments. Remember those? Across from Jackson Manor? That building was red-tagged and reduced to rubble a couple years ago.

I quickly got out of there and moved into a nice, Glen Oaks apartment. For the first time in years, I actually had good roommates and a safe, roach-free place to live. But that went up in flames. Literally. If anyone remembers that fire seven years ago—yeah, I lost everything, again.

I moved into an apartment at Ninth and Nebraska. Yeah, that brick row building that’s boarded up now. Yeah, I lived there and lost everything after two burglaries. Not feeling safe, I moved in with a friend.

This kicked off another short cycle of temporary living situations. Until I found myself living in North Sioux about five years ago, things going really well, a good place to live, good job, until…

I met Meghan. She’s lived in Sioux City her whole life, and when we met, she was still living in her childhood home, her family together and happy. Moving in together was a major adjustment for her, just “moving” was weird for her. She had never done it, and while I can definitely relate to leaving a home full of memories, her home is still there, always beckoning to return for a visit.

Last year, standing on the beach in Westbrook, I wanted to go home.

Home, that place where you instantly feel warm, comfortable… safe. That magical place where your trophies line bookshelves and handprint turkeys decorate the fridge. That special place where you know you belong. I have no idea what that feels like anymore. I really don’t.

Thankfully, after being with Meghan and her loving family over the last few years, I think I’m starting to remember.

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Odeis a storytelling series where community members tell true stories on stage to promote positive impact through empathy. It’s produced by Siouxland Public Media.

Our next show is Friday, December 1 at ISU Design West in downtown Sioux City. We’ll have live music by Jessica Zepeda, starting at 7 p.m., followed by stories about “Holiday Joy & Mayhem.”Tickets are $10 in advance; $15 day of show.

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