Tag Archives: weather

Anthony & Me 2015 and News Report Featuring Anthony

Happy New Year! Time seems to go by so fast. I realized it had been an embarrassingly  long time since I have updated the blog – not because Anthony & Me are not still meeting and working on things, but I just have been busy with other projects.

It is hypothermic here today, starting out at a painful 8 degrees this morning. I gave Anthony a call to make sure he was ok. “I ain’t going out in all that today,” he assured me. That’s probably wise. He ventured out yesterday though which wasn’t much better.

2015 is starting off pretty good for Anthony – check out this beautiful news story that was done about him and his journey to get housing. It ran today on the ABC Family Channel. Thanks to reporter John Jessup and videographer Denis Pacuraru of CBN News who did a terrific job with the story!

Looking back, 2014 was a decent year – a great year for Anthony. He celebrated one year of housing which is tremendous. I on the other hand have made some progress on my book, but not near where I had hoped.

As we look forward, Anthony and I are sitting down next Tuesday to talk about what we want to accomplish for 2015. I will post our goals after we meet – but I am pretty sure one of Anthony’s new goals is to try to visit his sister in Seattle this year! Not sure how we’ll do that financially at this point, but we’ll find a way. Oh, and he told me today that he has quit smoking?!!? Wow….that is HUGE! He hasn’t had a cigarette he said since Jan 2nd. “I’ve been chewing lots of nicotine gum – it helps.” I hope he can keep that up.

 

 

 

 

 

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Rain delay

The sun did not shine. It was too wet to play. So we sat in the house. All that cold, cold, wet day.
― Dr. Seuss, The Cat in the Hat

For me the pitter patter sound of falling rain soothes the soul. I often stay inside by the fireplace where I find my eyes wandering toward the windowsill. The only difference today was that when I looked out at the marbles of rain bouncing on the street surface below I knew that Anthony was not snuggled up in a home next to a fireplace drinking freshly brewed coffee.

Washington, D.C.

Connecticut & Q, Washington, DC. Photo: Sergey Vladimirov

It was a little after 7am. I was up writing but having trouble focusing. I was supposed to meet him at 11:30am for our bi-weekly meeting. Last week he flaked on it – well maybe that is too harsh. I found him in an exhausted state after being up most the night monitoring a group of college kids that he was supervising as they went through a 48 “urban plunge” where they experience life on the streets. It’s understandable he didn’t feel much like meeting. Hell, he didn’t want to eat. I know he’s not feeling well when he passes up a free meal!

It was shortly after 11am when I got the call. Anthony cancelled again. “Maybe next week,” he said sounding sluggish and melancholy  “It’s nasty out there this morning and I’m just going to stay here at the Au Bon Pain and wait it out and maybe try to get some sleep.” I offered to meet him there at the french bakery, but he insisted that today was not a good day.

I let it go. We talked for a minute about a few other items, he checked on my writing progress. “Well, I tried to do some this morning but that didn’t work out. I’ve got some time set aside later this afternoon,” I told him still hopeful that I would get some productive time in on the book after lunch.

This is the first time since we have been working together that he has cancelled twice in a row. I offered to change my schedule and meet with him on Thursday but he preferred to wait until next week.

Something doesn’t seem right.

Sadly I didn’t get any work done on my book. I got a lot of other crap done…but no writing.

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Rain: Good for Reed, Bad for Anthony

Photo: John Tlumacki

Photo: John Tlumacki

Yesterday was a good day for me. Despite a sluggish start, I managed to get three pages written. Although I feel I’m allowed to give myself some credit when I have good days like today, I’m also a realist and recognize that perhaps the nonstop drizzle that coated us yesterday might have contributed to my discipline. Nobody wants to sit at your computer and write when it’s beautiful and sunny outside!

There is something about the rain and the cold that seems to just fuel your pen. Perhaps that is why Ireland has produced so many damn good writers – or then again maybe it’s just the Jameson. Who knows…but it gets me in my writing mode – the Jameson that is.

Now for the depressing part. As I sit here in front of my fireplace with a blanket over my legs and a warm cup of English Breakfast tea soothing my throat I’m jolted by the thought of Anthony. Not only is he probably cold and wet, he’s certainly not selling many papers in this drizzle. It’s actually worse than a full on shower. At least then you have an umbrella and you can go on your merry way. No, yesterday was that miserable cold spitting that is just enough to allow you to run out without an umbrella but not enough to get your head out from dry sanctuary of your coat collar so that you can see more than just the sidewalk in front of you. If Anthony was out there – we’d probably have walked right by him.

 

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