Overwhelmed by Hope

"I don't like dirty people. And I don't like people who love their drugs more than their kids."

These were the words of one of my colleagues, a good friend in fact, who I have great respect for. We do the same job yet we see the world from opposite ends of the kaleidoscope. Apparently I quite like dirty people. I've been doing an elective in addiction medicine in the Downtown Eastside and I love it. I love it so much that the question as to whether I really needed to deliver babies the rest of my life flittered across mind. Don't worry, it was only transient, I will definitely be returning to the happiness ward. However, I have worked with some passionate, maybe nearly crazy, but undoubtedly inspiring individuals who have dedicated their lives to working with a deeply vulnerable population.

Poverty, addictions, homelessness, prostitution. Words you think of when you imagine what is apparently the poorest postal code in Canada. Strange. Because its where I feel most welcomed. People talk to you on the street... granted, not always soberly or eloquently. They yell greetings at each other. They sell nick-knacks on the sidewalk: a speaker system, a pound of Starbucks coffee, 4 litres of fruit juice, an instant pawn-shop appears and disappears in minutes. They know each other by name.

I don't want to idealize things, they have more than their fair share of heart-wrenching experiences, abuse, and crippling addictions but I wonder where there's more love. In the Eastside or in lovely, sterile, rich Point Grey, closer to my residence (ouch).

They have a photo contest each year run by the Pivot Legal Society and have a book just recently published with photos called Hope in the Shadows. My heart breaks to hear my patient's stories, but somehow they reflect to me the essence of what it means to be human. In their pictures you find love and community.