Better Believe Steve

It was nearing nine o' clock, so off to the ESPN Zone we went. Our guide Steve arrived to the corner a few minutes after nine, carrying with him a large duffel bag. He sat us down right there on the sidewalk next to the ESPN Zone and told us this is where he used to come to watch all of the sports games through the windows. I guess once a sports fan, always a sports fan. After sharing our day's experiences, he told us where we would be sleeping that night. Coincidentally, we would be settling down right on the corner where Adam and I had panhandled earlier―underneath the awnings of the CVS at 13th and Pennsylvania. Evidently, this was the area in which Steve had been homeless. It was comforting to learn that Steve knew every single little nook and cranny around these blocks, as well as all the other homeless people that hang around here.

Steve then told us to run across the street and grab our cardboard to sleep on from the dumpster in the parking garage. As the four us began to take off towards the crosswalk at the end of the block, unsure of exactly where we were supposed to go, he playfully shouted, “Where in the world are you guys going? You're homeless! Just cross the street wherever you want, for God's sake!”

We found the cardboard boxes right where Steve said they would be, and I grabbed the biggest one I could find. From there we set off to our sleeping spot a few blocks away (crossing the street wherever we pleased). As we approached the two long awnings, it was apparent that we were sharing the space with two “neighbors.” Steve said he knew the person underneath the first awning, and probably knew the second person as well, but couldn't be sure underneath all of the blankets. We laid down our cardboard over the concrete and configured our sleeping bags with the girls closest to the wall and Adam and Steve on the outside.

We slept beneath the awning on the right.

After everything was set up, Steve called us over to some steps a few meters away. Gathering around Steve, he pointed out all of the federal buildings around us. We couldn't have been in a safer place―right across the street was the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, to its right was the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, to its left was the Drug Enforcement Agency within the Department of Justice building, and two blocks down was the J. Edgar Hoover Federal Bureau of Investigation Building. Basically, not only were there about twenty cameras on the top of every single building, but we had the entire nation's law enforcement within a two block radius.

Our guide, Steve Thomas

Steve began to talk. Instantly, the mood became serious―even the street seemed to keep its noisy chaos at bay, kneeling at the feet of a story needing to be told. Born and raised in the D.C. area, Steve grew up in the hood with his sister and single mother. His mom didn't believe in welfare, so while she constantly worked two to three jobs, he was left to fend for himself the majority of the time. Also, as I've mentioned, Steve is a king-sized dude―but also the biggest softie around. As a kid, he was made fun of frequently for his size. Like any person, he really just wanted to be accepted and liked by the other kids―so from an early age, he began doing whatever it took to get approval by his peers. When he was 13 years old, the older boys on the block invited him to smoke pot with them. Being the insecure bear that he was, he was just happy to be included. By age 15, he was dealing drugs and dropping acid. Somehow, he managed to graduate high school―but his mother had not once uttered the word college, so it was just assumed that he would grab his diploma and then grab a job. Luckily, after graduation, he found a job that paid over $17.00 per hour (in the 1970s, mind you) as a construction worker building the subway system in the city. The gig lasted a few years, but soon enough the subway was completed and it was time to find a new job. Steve found work at the Post Office and for the first time ever, he was surrounded by all adults.

One night, his co-workers invited him to a party. While he was there, a guy pressured him to try cocaine. At first, Steve declined--he was proud that he had managed to steer clear of the “hard” stuff his whole life. But the guy kept hounding him to give it a try, taunting him. It was Steve’s desire to be liked and his need for approval that carried him to that fateful moment when he caved in and tried it. “It took me 30 seconds to try it and 30 years to get off.”

After a random drug test at the Post Office, Steve lost his job. He decided to join the Air Force as a technician. Steve was a hard-worker, talented, and well-liked by the whole crew. So much so that he was being considered for placement at NASA. But as soon as things began to look up, another drug test barred the way to success. The General serving above Steve was so impressed by him, he made sure the terms of Steve’s discharge would never appear on paper.

Steve got a few more jobs here and there, but it was always the random drug test that nailed him. Finally, he began working as a truck driver. Although Steve traveled everywhere, he could not leave his drug addiction behind. “I had drug dealers in 25 states. Within 10 minutes of getting into a city I could find drugs.” And soon enough, once again Steve’s addiction left him out of a job.

He returned to Washington, D.C. but did not have much to return to. His family had left him and he was out of a home. “As I walked along Pennsylvania Avenue, I saw people on every bench, and it hit me, ‘They're homeless, and I am too.’” Steve turned to us and pointed to a bench across the street--it was the exact bench that became his home.

Why didn’t Steve stay in a shelter? Actually, he did try to stay in a shelter at one point, but the conditions were too unbearable that he “would have died on the street rather than go into one of those shelters.” He told the story of when he tried to use the restroom but there was no toilet paper. So he went to ask the attendant if he could have some toilet paper. The attendant ripped off exactly three squares and gave it to him. That was it. Between that and the smell of dozens of unshowered adults in extremely close quarters, Steve, like many others, actually preferred the streets.

It took over a week for Steve to build up the courage to shake a cup for spare change. He wasn’t proud of the position he was in and he didn’t want anyone to know he was homeless. But he needed the money. So he stood on the street corner with his cup. The very first person who walked past him yelled in his face, “Get a damn job.” In that instant, Steve became a broken man. He never tried to shake a cup ever again.

One night, Steve’s spirits hit an all time low. He stole his friend’s gun from a few benches down and brought it back to his bench. Laying down, Steve put the gun to his head. But somehow he could not bring himself to pull the trigger. He lay there, cursing God for robbing him of the courage he needed to go through with it. As it so happened, a doctor from the local shelter happened to be doing some rounds that night. The doctor drove around in a van and checked in on different homeless people to make sure they were okay. After the Unity Healthcare van pulled up to his bench, Dr. Thomas Garland walked over to Steve, knelt down, and asked him if he was okay. Immediately, Steve broke down and told the doctor everything that had happened. When he was finished, Dr. Garland asked, “Will you allow me to help you?”

It was at that moment when Steve’s life began to turn around. The doctor checked his blood pressure and found it to be dangerously high--Steve should have been dead. He gave Steve a few pills and told him to come back to the shelter to start a recovery program the next morning. Since that night two and half years ago, Steve has been completely clean and sober. A year ago, Steve started his own non-profit organization, S.T.E.V.E -- Striving To End Vagrancy Everywhere. Now known throughout the city as “Better Believe Steve,” he is the second leading homelessness advocate in the city and the number one speaker for the Speaker’s Bureau of the National Coalition for the Homeless.

“I dug my hole and laid down in it, pleading with God to just throw the dirt on top. And He did. But instead of burying me--He planted me.”