Ericka was one of the women Parker and I met in the shelter. She was young, maybe 20 or 21. Such a sweet kid and adored Parker and I.

Look at this Facebook post. She’s talking about a Mother’s Day potluck, in a homeless shelter. Waking up to make breakfast for 80 people, in a homeless shelter.

We took buses to the light rail to go to a church in the city and then came back and hung out at a crappy little pond that was pretty damn gross but it killed time and gave us something to do. And bread was cheap. Broken wing (Gregory House) was a mean little cuss but he kept going and the other ducks knew to follow him because the humans felt sorry for him and always threw the food to him. Also, there were more geese than ducks, but it was still the duck pond to everyone in the shelter.

Look how normal it all seems in this post. It all became almost normal to us. Wake up, fold up your mats if you are on the floor in the hallways, put away your bins, do your chores.

Ericka died about a year or so later. My heart broke. She fought so hard to overcome her mental health shit, but she lost. Two out of the three people in this post are gone…..