In 1986, when I was 18 years old, I decided to move to Toronto. Since I was about 15, I had wanted to live there and be in the music industry. Not as a musician myself, but behind the scenes. Publicity, preferably.
My parents were, understandably, freaking out. I had told my mom and stepdad (Bob) that I was moving on Sunday. I think this was Friday at dinner. I called my dad to tell him, and he was livid. My mom was all, "she's 18 years old, we can't exactly chain her up". I had made a decision, and no one could stop me!
I had it set up that I'd live with a family as their "au pair". I knew a girl, Paula, from Calgary (met her backstage at a Glass Tiger/Honeymoon Suite concert, and many more. She was a groupie. I was NOT. Just... a fan who was a virgin!!) who was doing that, and I called her. A couple that were friends with the family she lived with needed someone for a couple months. We talked on the phone, and my fate was decided. They had two boys, three and six, and the mom was pregnant. She figured when she had her baby she'd stay home and be able to look after all the kids, so this was temporary. Being a rich, affluent, Jewish neighbourhood of Toronto, I wasn't worried about needing another family to live with after that, if I wasn't making the big bucks in the music industry yet. I'd been the favourite babysitter in the neighbourhoods I'd lived in since I was 10 years old! This would be a piece of cake.
So on Sunday, I hopped on a Greyhound bus headed for Toronto with about $100 in my pocket. It was a 59 hour ride. 59 hours. On a Greyhound bus. Luckily, I was from Winnipeg (about the halfway point) and had lots of family there, so I made a pit stop for a couple days. I don't even remember who I saw or stayed with, to be honest! Most likely my grandparents and as many aunts, uncles and cousins on both sides of the family that I could fit in.
I remember getting back on the bus in the early morning. We were told we'd be arriving in Toronto around 6:00 pm the following evening. Then I remember passing the "Welcome to Ontario!" sign at about 11:00 am. "6:00 TOMORROW?!" I thought. "We'll be in Toronto at 6:00 TONIGHT!" Ha! Ontario is a HUGE province. We arrived at 6:00 the following evening as planned. November 18, 1986.
Hilary, the mother of the family I was going to live with, met me at the bus depot. On the drive to her house, she explained the job to me: I start work officially at 4:00 pm each day. What I do before then is up to me (a paying job was needed for those hours). I look after the boys while she prepares supper. I eat with them. I clean up from supper, wash floors, do laundry, odd jobs. If her and her husband are staying home, I can do what I want until the boys go to bed. If they're going out, I babysit. I put the boys to bed every night, EVEN IF THEY ARE HOME. Read them stories, tuck them in, all that jazz that PARENTS DO. I think I had Sunday nights off? I can't remember.
We arrived at the door, where I met Paul (3) and Roger (6). Roger's first words were "oh, not ANOTHER babysitter!" Poor boys went through this a lot. I had a bad feeling. I was, to be honest, also the first white, Canadian young woman (who was so excited to be living in TORONTO!) that they'd had there; they were used to foreigners, older women, or exchange students. Not people like me. Which may have led to Hilary's less-than-human attitude towards me.
Anyway, I got free room and board for my (soon to become) slave duties. My room was a little hole downstairs, with no window or closet, and the family deep freezer was in there (meaning Hilary came in and out as she pleased). I had to get on the bed to open the drawers of the dresser. There was a small bathroom down there, with no tub or shower. One hand towel and one facecloth. I could "use the family shower when no one was home".
Which I did one day, and grabbed the oldest, rattiest, ripped up bath towel I could find in the linen closet to use. Later that evening, Hilary yelled at me for using it. "I GAVE YOU A TOWEL TO USE!" Yeah. A HAND towel.
I got a job from 7:00am to 3:00pm Monday to Thursday, at a news and tobacco store located in the lobby of an office tower. They sold other necessities of office life, such as panty hose, greeting cards and sandwiches in the fridge. I made $5.00/hour! That was pretty good back then.
One day I was coming home from work, and it was lightly snowing. Toronto was a lot more humid than Calgary, and it was during this adventure that I learned I have asthma. I was walking across the field near the subway station, a few blocks from home. I was breathing heavy and about to pass out. I knew I wouldn't make it home. Paula lived closer - I remember ringing her doorbell. She came to the door, and I passed out. The next thing I remember is waking up in the hospital, with an oxygen mask on. Paula and the family she worked for were there. NOT the family I worked for! Although they had at least been called. The doctor gave me a ventolin inhaler and a prescription for, I'm assuming, an antibiotic for pneumonia. I was kept overnight on the oxygen and released in the morning.
I took a cab back to Hilary's house. It's probably better to call it that, than "home". I was met at the front door by Hilary with a shovel. "Shovel the driveway before you come in". I was too shocked to say anything. Like, you know, I just came from the hospital, I have pneumonia, I don't start until 4:00, SOMETHING. But no, I shoveled the driveway. Then, as I was about to come in, "build a snowman with Paul!" as he was pushed out the door. I didn't have mitts on or anything BUT THAT'S OKAY I'LL BUILD A SNOWMAN WITH YOUR SON EVEN THOUGH I SHOULD BE IN BED, THAT'S OKAY.
Once Paul and I were done playing, I made it into the house. "Would you mind watching the boys for a bit? I need to run to the pharmacy" asked Hilary. I said "oh, I have a prescription I need filled, if I give you the money would you mind doing that?" She looked at me like I'd asked for her unborn child and left without answering. As soon as she came back, I took a cab to and from the same pharmacy she just came from, to fill my prescription. So between cab fares and meds, my $100 was completely spent now.
I finally laid down, until my official starting time of 4:00. When I came upstairs, I was yelled at because there were dishes in the sink. "Those were from breakfast/lunch, I don't start until 4:00, and do the supper dishes..." "Well, you were HERE and you could have done them, not just walked past them..." That day? Was pretty damn typical of how I was treated every day there.
My day job at the store was going well. I got myself some money there, little theif that I was. Cigarettes were $2.99 a pack there (super expensive, if you can believe it!) and if anyone put down exactly $3.00, I gave them a penny and their smokes and pocketed the money. I also smoked back then, and never paid for my own cigarettes. I also took scratch & win lottery tickets by the stack (never winning more than $2.00). I WAS NEVER CAUGHT. The owner came in for the cash register tapes, but never did inventory. I guess!
I remember having a day off from both jobs and spending it downtown at Toronto Eaton Centre. It was the Christmas season, so it was very festive and crazy busy. I grabbed some food in the food court, and there was nowhere to sit unless you shared a table. So I sat with a nice lady, who told me all about the Christmas dinner she was planning with her grown kids. I told her I was living with a Jewish family, so there was nothing planned for that day. She told me what store she worked in, and that I was welcome to join her and her family for Christmas, and to pop by the store if I wanted her address. How sweet was that?! I had been told before moving there that Toronto was full of cold, mean people and that I'd be mugged the second I was alone. Not my experience AT ALL. In fact, that day in the mall a man dropped his wallet as he was putting it back in his pocket. I picked it up and chased him down the busy mall to give it back to him. He looked shocked and said "you're not from here, are you!" So maybe the nice people are actually from other places. Ha!
I think it was around the end of November when Paula and I decided we would be going to see Glass Tiger on New Year's Eve, wherever they were playing. Figuring, of course, that they'd be playing in Toronto. We somehow got jobs volunteering at their management office (not sure when we had time?) We stuffed envelopes and helped get their fan club off the ground. Kissing their pictures before we stuffed them in envelopes, of course. Their manager, Gary, broke the news to us that they were playing in Long Beach, California on New Year's Eve, opening for Journey. He told us that if we found our own way down there, we were definitely on the guest list.
Well. You didn't have to tell US twice. We had no money, so we did the next best thing - applied for department store credit cards. They gave those to anybody. So we filled out applications, honestly telling them we worked part-time for $5.00/hour, and submitted them to the "rush" office. Two hours later we had cardboard cards, until the plastic was received in the mail, and a $500 limit.
We raced to the in store travel agency and made our plans. This is the best we could get, for $500: leave 7:30 am December 27, take the train from Toronto to Chicago. 22 hour stop over in Chicago, then the train from Chicago to Los Angeles (all coach seating of course), arriving December 30. Bus out to Long Beach. Then leave January 1st and do the same thing all the way back, arriving January 4 in Toronto. We booked it. And so began my life of credit card debt.
I didn't tell the family I was living with right away. I figured I'd wait a bit. Or sneak out and just leave? I'm not sure where my head was at. But they had plans to attend a company Christmas Party a few days later (a Christmas Party! They were Jewish and there was no sign of Christmas in that house. But the father was, after all, a business man).
So I was going to babysit, and Paul threw a hissy fit before mom left. It wasn't like him. He was crying and upset and complaining his stomach hurt. So when they left, it was obvious to me that Paul wasn't feeling well. His belly was still hurting when he went to sleep. It was about an hour or so later that I heard him scream and cry out, so I ran up to see that he had thrown up in bed. I cleaned him up, put the sheets and pajamas in the washer, and when he went back down he was FINE.
Hilary called to see how he was, and I told her what happened. I also told her the bedding was being washed and all was quiet now. But she panicked and said "we'll be right home!" And soon they were. Hilary ran upstairs to check on Paul and told me to wait in the living room.
She came back down, and proceeded to blame me for sticking my finger down Paul's throat and making him throw up. "He does not do things like that". I told her he was sick, was complaining about his sore belly, but she insisted I had done something to him. "And, by the way, we heard from (the family Paula worked for) and they told us you're going away for a week on December 27. When exactly were you planning to tell us?" Oops. "This is not working out. We want you to leave. We are going away tomorrow night for a few days so we need you gone by 6:00 tomorrow evening".
Okay. So. I have NO money. I had to work the next day from 7:00 am to 3:00 pm, giving me exactly three hours to pack my things and find a place to go. Paula had a luxury room where she lived, (bed, sofa, TV, phone, stereo, full bath, etc) but I couldn't stay with her considering it wasn't her house. I was a little freaked out.
I went to work the next morning. There was a woman who worked in one of the offices as a coffee lady, and came by every morning to buy her milk. I always filled her in on the horror story that was my life, living in Hilary's House. This particular morning, she took one look at me and knew something MAJOR was wrong. "You're white as a ghost! What happened?!" I told her how I had to leave that night, but had nowhere to go and no money. She said "oh honey, if I didn't live in a two bedroom apartment with my two sons I'd ask you to stay with me, but there's no room. Here - call Covenant House. They are a shelter. They will take you in".
So, I looked them up in the phone book and gave them a call. I explained my situation. They gave me the address where to go that night, as long as it was before midnight, and they'd take me in. Just like that. Of course, I had no idea what I was in for, being a shelter virgin and all, but I was happy I had a place to go. After work, I went to Hilary's house to get my things (I'm not even sure what I had brought there - a couple boxes I think) and went to Paula's house where we hung out in her glorious room for awhile. I took to the shelter what I knew I'd need - clothes, curling iron, hair dryer, hair products - I had great hair - a few essentials, and left the rest there.
I took a cab to the address Covenant House gave me over the phone, and was interviewed by an intake officer. I just had to show I.D. that I was between 16-21 (the age range for that place) and was told the "rules" of the house: within 24 hours you meet with a counsellor to work out your plan while living there (job, school, your own place), 9:00 curfew EVERY NIGHT unless you have proof you're working, wake up time is 7:30 and you're out the door by 9:00 to find a job or whatever, supper is at 5:00 and if you're working or will be late you must inform the kitchen staff and they'll keep it warm for you, bedtime 10:00, no physical touching whatsoever, no swearing, no raising of voices, no drugs or alcohol and if you appear to have been using you will be tested/kicked out, pay cheques are signed over to staff and you receive $20\week from them to spend on cigarettes or whatever, the rest is saved for you. Once you have $300 saved, you have a week to find a room to rent and you move on (with lots of help from them if you've completed the program successfully). Meals and subway tokens for job search/work/school provided. Actually, all necessities are provided, which is why you only get $20/week. I had my cigarette source and now a new way to make friends, my mind worked fast haha
After our talk and my agreement to the rules, I was driven over to the main house. I laughed my ass off when I saw where I was - a building not less than a week before I was standing in front of, thinking it was a nice character apartment building in a great location downtown, and stating I would live there someday. Someday.
I was brought inside and since it was later, after 11:00, the floor was covered in gym mats and young women sleeping. I was told they only had 40 actual rooms and beds, (20 on the boys and girls floors, respectively) so the overflow of girls slept on mats at the main house, and boys at the intake house. As rooms opened up, we'd get one. I was taken to a dining table and given a sandwich and apple juice while they found me a mat and an empty space on the floor. I changed in the bathroom, and amongst all the stares and whispers I made my way to my mat in the main living room, over by the Christmas tree. Oh yeah - my first Christmas away from home would be spent at a shelter! I didn't know at the time, that it would be one of the best ever.
So I settled in to sleep, nervous about what was in store for me in this new situation but grateful it existed and that I was told about it. Knowing what I know now, there are plenty of scarier shelters I could have been at! This was no free ride, you needed a plan and you needed to follow it. But I'll get to that.
So that covers about my first... two weeks in Toronto. Yup, It's a gooder. The adventure continues next time!
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