Got some "junk mail" yesterday from a place called Covenant House in Toronto I usually toss junk mail in the garbage without a glance, but this one caught my eye. And I will be sending them as big a donation as I can afford next week, because the following reminded me so much of that long cold hungry demeaning winter I spent on the streets as a teen:

"My name is Sister Patricia Cruise, and I run a place called Covenant House, and emergency crisis shelter for abused, abandoned and homeless kids...Every night we shelter desperate kids who've been living on the street. And they come from everywhere ...with only two options left to survive.

THey can steal.

Or they can sell themselves to the pimps and predators roaming the streets.

Imagine being 16 years old and left with that impossible choice ..."


Well, I don't have to imagine. I remember only too well. And I chose the first option above, in spite of being told regularly by certain older men who "wanted to help" that there was only one thing girls like me were good for, and that was ....

I became quite the accomplished thief there for a while -- an artist at stealing food from grocery stores, at ducking out of restaurants without paying. I even managed to steal a coat and a pair of warm winter boots once. And I never got caught, except by my own conscience.