Room 301. The Oasis Inn. Of all the fucking places

I’m lying on a bed right now, and I’m actually crying.

After everything that’s happened over the past six months—the shelters, the hospitalizations, the wheelchair dispute, losing my shelter bed, fighting for accommodation, and trying to figure out where the hell I’m supposed to go—I’ve somehow ended up back at the Oasis Inn.

Room 301.

The very same room where so much of Personal Dispatches began.

I wrote some of my earliest stories here before ending up at Richter Street. I had no idea what the next six months would bring, or just how much I’d end up writing about.

And now, after everything that happened at Kelowna General Hospital today, I’m back.

I had to shuffle money between bank accounts, fight with a card that wouldn’t work, and pay for this room myself. I’ve got one night paid for and a little money left.

But holy fuck.

I have a bed. A door I can close. My own bathroom. An actual bathtub.

I can lie down whenever I want. Nobody is telling me where I can put my wheelchair or whether I’m allowed to rest.

It’s not fancy. It’s not permanent housing. And I have absolutely no idea what happens tomorrow.

But tonight, I’m safe.

I can’t quite explain what it feels like to go from being in such an overwhelming crisis to suddenly finding myself somewhere familiar, somewhere that played such a big part in the beginning of this whole journey.

I just published A Bed Is Not a Destination yesterday.

And here I am, back in the room where so much of it started.

I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.

Apparently, I’m doing the latter.

Room 301. Where it all began again.

What a strange, strange fucking day.