Joy is All We Have: Wisdom from Those Who Experience Homelessness

by Ann Rotermund

A man signs into a counseling center with the name “God.” While the staff struggles to know who God is, the man soon decides he’s not God after all. “Probably a good decision,” the counselor says, asking what brought him to this realization. “Yes,” he says. “I have decided I am not God because the job is too hard.” This is just one of the stories in Joy Is All We Have , an inspirational memoir by Ann Rotermund, a retired counselor who worked with homeless men and women for twenty-nine years at the Saint Patrick Center in Saint Louis, Missouri, where her experiences with this group became a personal catalyst of change. Rotermund shares these lessons here, showing how the people she helped overcame adversity and sickness in their search for better health. At times, they failed or disappeared from the center, not to be seen again. But at other times, Rotermund experienced transformative moments, like getting someone who really didn’t have the right words to find another way to communicate. Stories are universal, and if we milk the meaning from Rotermund’s stories, maybe we can all increase our compassion and awareness.

86 pages, Paperback

First published November 9, 2014

Reviews

[Elise · Rating 5 out of 5]

Written with so much humility, courage, and love, Ann Rotermund's Joy is All We Have is filled to bursting with wisdom gathered from her time working with homeless men and women in the city of St. Louis. These stories were strange, funny, sad, and uplifting. In short, I experienced the full spectrum of emotions while reading this one. What struck me most, though, about this book is that it showed what it truly means to be pro-life in a world where people are more often hostile than helpful to one another, a world where people are used up then thrown away. The love Ann shows to each of her clients who passes in and out of the St. Patrick's Center was inspiring, because that is exactly what they needed--love, respect, and a sense that they matter and are cherished by someone.

"There is an old saying that all the ills of the world come from our inability to quiet ourselves" (42).

"We are messy creatures even from our birth, but it is the messiness that makes us unique and fascinating in our own right" (66).

In the words of one of Ann's clients, "When you are homeless and poor, joy is all you've got" (67).