10 February 2008

Winzell

Last night, just before going to bed, Kara and I watched the local news. That's part of our normal routine. Channel 4 (NBC). 11 p.m. Pretty much every night.

Unless Anderson Cooper has something interesting going on.

One of the leading stories focused attention on the plight of homeless men and women throughout Detroit on this unusually cold Saturday night (it got down to 0 degrees; with the wind chill, negative twenty degrees).

The reporter, rather excited for such a gloomy piece, interviewed a man. His name is Winzell Jarrell. The reporter (nor the TV screen) did not indicate this. But I knew who it was. I've known Winzell for almost a year now. I can't believe he's still alive. Honestly.

Winzell, and hundreds of other homeless citizens , defy the odds. I don't know how they do it. I really don't. I'd jump off a bridge.

Needless to say, I was messed up after seeing my friend on television. I woke up six or seven times last night from a deep sleep. Partly because it was just one of those nights. Partly because Winzell doesn't have a home.

3 comments:

Bradford L. Stevens said...

Somebody sent me the following statistic and it made me think of you.

"There were 39 combat related killings in Iraq in January.
In the fair city of Detroit there were 35 murders in the month of January.

That's just one American city,
about as deadly as the entire war-torn country of Iraq."

Lest you think I am taking a swipe at Detroit, we just recently had a person here in St. Louis County who walked into the Kirkwood City Hall and gunned down 2 policemen and 3 city officials. He shot the mayor twice in the head. The mayor is still in the hospital in critical condition. My point is we all live in a dark and fallen world where the man of lawlessness crouches at the door desiring our humanity. It does not matter if one lives in Baghdad, Detroit or St. Louis. The battle is the same everywhere in the world.

Anonymous said...

Cass park this coming Sunday? I'll be there.

Anonymous said...

Bradford,

The statements you quoted make a good point that we problems in this country that need to be addressed, and maybe we need to adjust some priorities.

However, comparing the number of (U.S.) combat deaths in Iraq to the number of murders in Detroit is only valid if one only considers American lives as having value. For Iraqi civilians, 39 deaths is more in line with the daily total rather than the monthly one.