The women’s shelter I used to work at had an annual donor’s dinner. But it wasn’t at a restaurant or anything, it was in the shelter. In the dining room. The residents would have to leave due to privacy concerns and because seeing poor people isn’t any fun while you’re trying to enjoy dinner, right? It ruins the mood. They would be given some money to Ho-Lee-Chow or something, like $10 each, maybe less, but most of the women declined because Ho-Lee-Chow is gross. The shelter wasn’t in a fantastic neighbourhood or anything and it was night and dark and they had small kids and there was nothing to do and most had no money aside from a tiny OW cheque, if that. I don’t know what they did. Meanwhile a private chef would come in to cook for the donors. It was uncomfortable. It was actually a little bit horrible. It seemed like such a pretty big inconsistency to care enough to donate so much that you’re invited to the dinner but have so little respect for the women that you take over the place they live for a night. Same thing with people who wanted tours, like going to the zoo.

I expected that the women’s experiences would be the hardest part of working in the shelter. Everyone told me that. But it wasn’t true at all. It was everything else about it. The best thing was that all the women would gather together to watch Dog the Bounty Hunter. There were a lot of conflicts among the residents, as you can imagine. It’s a really stressful place, you have people with a lot going on trying to share space, frustrated by the inadequacies of social services, with shelter management, workers, custody, with unemployment, not having childcare, not having anything to do, with waiting, with everything. It’s a commune no one wants to be in. But everyone there was a little bit in love with Dog the Bounty Hunter.