Bingo

August 20, 2014


A group of people who are not homeless have entertained many of the homeless, female guests of the Pine Street Inn with Bingo for the past couple of hours.

Either that group of people who are not homeless has never read anything that I have written about the abuse that is inflicted on me at the Pine Street Inn, or that group doesn't care.  The Bingo prizes are black gift bags that have "HXD" written on them, and there are a lot of them.  They are also cloth bags, not plastic; many of the female guests will be carrying those bags around, or using them to keep things in while at the Pine Street Inn, for months if not longer.

It is a constant struggle for me to deal with the sexual harassment that is inflicted on me by many of the guests and staff of this shelter.  No encouragement of that abuse is needed for it to happen; the conglomerate has ingrained the behavior into a lot of people.  I always have to be careful about how I deal with the conversations that I have with staff to try to get the harassment stopped, and when one person stops, another starts.  I have to be careful, because of the denial that surrounds the issue, that my asking for help doesn't get turned into me being treated as if I am imagining that I am being sexually harassed, and as if I am trying to cause trouble or expect special treatment.

I am barred from almost every shelter in the Boston area because of this issue.  The Bingo people couldn't have chosen something else for prizes?  They had to make my life more difficult, and the overall situation at this shelter worse?

Copyright L. Kochman, August 20, 2014 @ 8:31 p.m.