 | | | Boys' Haven Equine Program facilities
(Photos courtesy of Boyshaven.org) | |
Help from Boys' Haven
Boys’ Haven, developed in the 1940s by Father James Maloney — who had previously been an orphanage chaplain in the Louisville area — shelters, heals, and teaches struggling young
people to become productive, healthy members of our community. Today, under the leadership
of Executive Director Vernon Rickert, Boys’ Haven operates a residential treatment program for abused and at-risk children, community counseling programs for families, and independent living services for homeless young adults. For more information, and to help other young people like Peter, visit boyshaven.org, call 502-458-1171 ext. 109, or write to 2301 Goldsmith Lane, Louisville, KY 40218-1018. |
Peter, 13, could feel his heart pounding as he waited for his mother to open the door.
It was strange, knocking on the door of his own home as if he were a stranger. But he was a stranger, in a way. Since his mother had been arrested on drug charges when he was 7, Peter and his brothers and sisters had been separated and shuttled through foster care. By then, Peter was already used to having to scrape by: He had cared for his baby sister, earned money by bringing people’s groceries to their cars, and stolen food to feed his family. Unlike other kids, Peter hadn’t spent much time thinking about what he wanted to be when he grew up. He had just wanted to stay alive.
Now, six years later, he would be living with his mother again — if she could manage to stay clean. He remembered when their very house, a subsidized unit in one of the roughest neighborhoods in the West End of Louisville, Kentucky, had been the local crackhouse. Police sirens, gunshots, and the shuffling about of addicted squatters in his attic were sounds familiar to his child’s ears.
At the sound of a chain unlatching, Peter recalled himself to the present. The door opened just enough for him to see half his mother’s face, her dark eyes blinking back at him.
“Hi,” he said.
His mother nodded, openingthe door. Peter quickly sized up the place. It looked clean enough. The electricity was on, as a dingy lamp next to the sofa testified. There were no drug paraphernalia lying around. It was a start.
One afternoon about a month later, Peter walked into the house and tossed his backpack onto the kitchen table. The house was quiet. It was a dull gray day, and the living room was lit by little else than the insistent flashing of the TV in one corner. The only sound was the superficial, seductive voice of a television model selling shampoo.
“Give yourself a break at the end of a hard day,” the woman coaxed, tossing an impossibly silky mane in slow motion toward the camera. “Revel in the soothing sensations of…”
“Hey, Ma,” Peter began, and then froze. Lying on the kitchen table was a man’s black leather jacket — definitely not his — along with an empty plastic bag and several hundred-dollar bills. Peter looked up to see his mother’s closed bedroom door and realized she wasn’t alone. Disgust, disappointment, shame, anger, and despair mixed and rose up like fire in his chest.
“Life is hard,” the female announcer said. “So why not indulge yourself a little?”
Peter stalked over to the TV and punched up the volume. The woman’s voice rose to a silken roar.
“Why wait another minute?” she cooed deafeningly after him as he banged the front door on his way out. “It’s all here waiting for you!”
Ten years later, 23-year-old Peter stood outside yet another door, waiting to see if it would be open to him. Words from a decade earlier rang in his head. “It’s Boys’ Haven or boot camp,” his social worker had told him, referring to a residential treatment program for abused and at-risk kids. Back then, when he was 13 and again on his own — drinking, stealing, doing drugs — it had been so easy to knock on the door of Boys’ Haven and walk inside. It was anything but easy today.
* Based on the story of a young man whose name has been changed for privacy. Research for this story was conducted with the assistance of Jim Grote, Director of Development for Boys’ Haven.
