He was sitting under a tree on a bench to stay out of the sun on that hot summer day. His dirty white shirt had some holes in it and his shoes looked vey dirty and worn. This homeless man looked very tired and sad, behind his long hair and beard I could see a man without a hope, without a purpose. That whole afternoon that I was at the public Park in Boston I took glimpses at that strange man transitioning from sitting to lying on that bench. Right next to him there was a shopping cart, a worn out backpack was hanging on the side. The cart was full of different things; couples of dirty looking blankets were folded, some plastic bags, some cans and some cardboard paper. .
He stands up and grabs the cardboard paper, he lays the paper on the bench then he grabs one of the blankets and makes it into a pillow. He pulls the shopping cart closer to him, looks around and lies down with his cap over his face. For the next hour while this strange man was taking his nap, I took a look around and began to notice that he was not the only one there. There were a lot more homeless people sharing the same characteristics and one thing in common, none of them looked happy. The reasons for this problem in their lives was unknown, the path that lead into homelessness is different for which one of them and the solution for this problem is not only to have a place to live, but to have a life with purpose and meaning, therefore to have a place to call home.
Homelessness is a very complex issue to which there are no simple solutions. Katie Johnston, [1] points out that the data from The United States Conference of Mayors 2014 Status Report on Hunger & Homelessness showed that Boston has one of the highest rates of homelessness in the country. A quarter of the homeless people have jobs, but they still can't afford to have a place to live. "The gap between incomes and housing costs is extreme here," said Jim Greene, director of the Emergency Shelter Commission for the Boston Public Health Commission.