4 am

I seen your two boys walking down the alley yesterday as I was shoveling snow. They walked with a older boy coming out of the second hand store wearing very large ski suits, two with a backpack, the other with a folding chair. The weather here in Canada can get bitter and of course they would need the suits to to keep warm and especially at night. You see the local youth shelter is all full up and the other one down the street does not have enough funds to house anyone at all much less feed these kids. I was to watch them as they walked the block and half from Value Village down the snow covered alley talking all the while amongst them. As they passed me the older boy remarked out there, “New clothes, new boots.”

They were walking toward the mall that seems to draw many people down my alley to do there shopping but today not for them. Finished up the shoveling to get my car out of the garage and drove to the library which is on the other side of the mall and who should I see sitting outside were the three boys. The two younger ones nervously standing there with no purpose and the other with a ipad in his lap and a cord hanging out of his backpack. You see the library has free wifi and where better to do what he was doing on the internet then there. I dropped the books off and got into my car and seen them start to leave and once again heard the older boy speak up, “I got money for your supper, c’mon let’s go.”

Dear Mother’s they look scared like they didn’t have a clue and all I kept thinking was what was it that made them be here in this space and time. Was it a fight for control of there manhood and pride of youth. The streets can be cruel and so harsh and I fear for them as you are probably doing right now. I woke up at 4 am with the thought again of them out there and with no clue as to what to do with the scene I was given before me. I had woke thinking about that folding chair the one boy had slung over his shoulder, an unusual item for the winter that just hit us. My theory is that he wouldn’t have to sleep on the ground.

As I sit here and write this I only hope for the best outcome for them, that this will be a small time that they are out there. This is not meant to be and I know as a mother I would be worrying  where my son was and if he was safe. If you asked me right now if they were okay in there world, I would say no.