that we felt “velcroed at the hearts.” The ranch also became our geographical anchor, a place that, wherever else we might move, we knew we would always call home.
As it turned out, we did move. In 1998, tired of the Park Cities, the Dallas rat race, and what Deborah would later describe as “twelve years of exile in the ‘far east,’” we returned to Fort Worth. We moved into a French mansard-roofed rental home on a golf course and began building our new home on a secluded lot near a nature preserve on the Trinity River. Then we began to plan what we thought would be the last half of our lives.
We hadn’t been in Fort Worth for more than a few days when Deborah spied an item in the Star-Telegram about homelessness in the city. The piece mentioned a place called the Union Gospel Mission. At the time, an insistent voice in Deborah’s heart told her it was a place she might fit. Not long afterward, a letter arrived from Debbie Brown, an old friend, inviting us to join “Friends of the Union Gospel Mission,” a circle of philanthropic donors. Deborah immediately told me that not only did she want to join, she also intended to inquire about volunteering at the mission itself.
“I was hoping you’d go with me,” she said, smiling and tilting her head in a way so irresistible I sometimes thought she should register it for a patent.
The mission, on East Lancaster Street, was tucked deep in a nasty part of town. While it was true that the murder rate in Texas had been falling, I was sure that anyone still doing any murdering probably lived right around there.
I smiled back. “Sure I’ll go.”
But secretly, I hoped that once she actually rubbed shoulders with the kind of scuzzy derelicts that had robbed my gallery, Deborah would find it too scary, too real , to volunteer on East Lancaster. Then we could revert to doing our part by dropping off some old clothes or furniture—or, if she really found it tough to tear herself away, more money.
I should’ve known better, for other than yellow jackets and black-diamond ski slopes, Deborah feared only one thing.
17
Now , believe it or not, there used to be what you might call a “code of honor,” or unity, in the hobo jungle. Down there, if one fella got hisself a can of Vienna Sausages and there was five other fellas around, then he gon’ give each one of em a sausage. The same goes for his six-pack and his half-pint and his dope. ’Cause who knows whether somebody else might have somethin he wants a piece of the very next day?
One of the fellas in my circle had him a car he was livin in, a gold Ford Galaxy 500. Me and him got to be purty tight, so one time when he was runnin from the law and he had to get outta town for a spell, he asked me to watch out for his car. It sure wadn’t no new car, but I liked it and it run purty good. I didn’t drive it around much ’cause I never had drove nothin but a tractor. But he’d been stayin in it, so I figured I would, too.
That’s when I got me an idea: There was enough room in there for more than just one fella to sleep. So I started rentin out two sleepin’ spots in the backseat—$3 a night. Fellas said it beat sleepin on the sidewalk. I had me a regular Galaxy Hilton there for a while till the police showed up and hauled it off, said my little hotel had unpaid tickets and no insurance.
Regular folks that live in neighborhoods and go to work every day don’t know nothin about no life like that. If you took a normal fella and dropped him off in the hobo jungle or under the bridge, he wouldn’t know what to do. You got to be taught to live homeless. You ain’t gon’ put on no suit and no tie and think you gon’ be pullin off the hamburger drop.
So I had me some partners for a while. But after a few winters went by, I began to pull away from the folks I’d been runnin with. Kinda slipped off into silence. I don’t know why. Some kinda “mental adjustment,” maybe. Or maybe I was just goin a little
As it turned out, we did move. In 1998, tired of the Park Cities, the Dallas rat race, and what Deborah would later describe as “twelve years of exile in the ‘far east,’” we returned to Fort Worth. We moved into a French mansard-roofed rental home on a golf course and began building our new home on a secluded lot near a nature preserve on the Trinity River. Then we began to plan what we thought would be the last half of our lives.
We hadn’t been in Fort Worth for more than a few days when Deborah spied an item in the Star-Telegram about homelessness in the city. The piece mentioned a place called the Union Gospel Mission. At the time, an insistent voice in Deborah’s heart told her it was a place she might fit. Not long afterward, a letter arrived from Debbie Brown, an old friend, inviting us to join “Friends of the Union Gospel Mission,” a circle of philanthropic donors. Deborah immediately told me that not only did she want to join, she also intended to inquire about volunteering at the mission itself.
“I was hoping you’d go with me,” she said, smiling and tilting her head in a way so irresistible I sometimes thought she should register it for a patent.
The mission, on East Lancaster Street, was tucked deep in a nasty part of town. While it was true that the murder rate in Texas had been falling, I was sure that anyone still doing any murdering probably lived right around there.
I smiled back. “Sure I’ll go.”
But secretly, I hoped that once she actually rubbed shoulders with the kind of scuzzy derelicts that had robbed my gallery, Deborah would find it too scary, too real , to volunteer on East Lancaster. Then we could revert to doing our part by dropping off some old clothes or furniture—or, if she really found it tough to tear herself away, more money.
I should’ve known better, for other than yellow jackets and black-diamond ski slopes, Deborah feared only one thing.
17
Now , believe it or not, there used to be what you might call a “code of honor,” or unity, in the hobo jungle. Down there, if one fella got hisself a can of Vienna Sausages and there was five other fellas around, then he gon’ give each one of em a sausage. The same goes for his six-pack and his half-pint and his dope. ’Cause who knows whether somebody else might have somethin he wants a piece of the very next day?
One of the fellas in my circle had him a car he was livin in, a gold Ford Galaxy 500. Me and him got to be purty tight, so one time when he was runnin from the law and he had to get outta town for a spell, he asked me to watch out for his car. It sure wadn’t no new car, but I liked it and it run purty good. I didn’t drive it around much ’cause I never had drove nothin but a tractor. But he’d been stayin in it, so I figured I would, too.
That’s when I got me an idea: There was enough room in there for more than just one fella to sleep. So I started rentin out two sleepin’ spots in the backseat—$3 a night. Fellas said it beat sleepin on the sidewalk. I had me a regular Galaxy Hilton there for a while till the police showed up and hauled it off, said my little hotel had unpaid tickets and no insurance.
Regular folks that live in neighborhoods and go to work every day don’t know nothin about no life like that. If you took a normal fella and dropped him off in the hobo jungle or under the bridge, he wouldn’t know what to do. You got to be taught to live homeless. You ain’t gon’ put on no suit and no tie and think you gon’ be pullin off the hamburger drop.
So I had me some partners for a while. But after a few winters went by, I began to pull away from the folks I’d been runnin with. Kinda slipped off into silence. I don’t know why. Some kinda “mental adjustment,” maybe. Or maybe I was just goin a little
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