The cold reality of homelessness in Ottawa

Alan, 52, is homeless and a self-described addict. He refuses to use an emergency shelter and sleeps rough, even in winter.

CBC met Alan on Rideau Street, where he panhandles, on a day in early December when it was –12 C, –20 with the windchill.

He cuddled a small dog as he sat cross-legged on the pavement, a blanket draped over his knees. In front of him was a scrap of cardboard, the words "Homeless — Anything would be helpful" scrawled on it.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Hi Alan, who's this?

That's my boy Rio. He's a long-haired chihuahua-dachsund mix.

How did you meet him?

Almost two years ago, some people had got evicted. They asked us to watch the dog for them for two days, but they never came back. We wound up keeping him.

He's been with you ever since?

Oh yeah, ever since then. I've never left him alone once.

Why don't you go to the shelter?

First of all, it's a bad place for me to be. I'm an addict. I struggle with addictions. It's just not a healthy place to be mentally or any which way.

And they don't accept dogs, and I wasn't about to give my dog away just to go and have a warm bed. I don't think I'd sleep well at night if I did something like that.

Can you describe your setup here? What kind of things you have?

Just cardboard to sit on to keep humidity and dampness and cold off of us, and winter blankets, sleeping bags. Got a little tarp in case it gets a little bit of rough weather out there, got the tarp to put over things.

So where do you sleep?

I have a tent, I have two different tents. I have a pop-up tent and another tent. I use them and then I let them dry out properly at my girlfriend's place. And I keep all the excess stuff and supplies and things like that over at her place, but we're not allowed to live together because of her housing agreement, I guess. I'm not allowed to be on the lease.

I'll spend some odd nights there, especially if it's really bad weather. I go more or less for [Rio], but if it were me I would spend more nights out.

How do you decide where you're going to set up your tent?

There's a lot of little wooded areas going toward east. So I get on the number 12, I go down that way. And there's a lot of bush out there so I go and set my tent up there.

They've got housing workers out there now, and because of my situation they're going to be helping me to find a place. I fell sick due to my addictions, and an open-heart surgery is needed now.

My health is right shot, I have a hard time breathing. Without an apartment, I can't get my surgery dates because afterwards I'll need a place to stay, after I go for the surgery.

I know this is quite personal, but would you mind telling me the story of why you started sleeping outside? What happened?

I was staying at a shelter and I couldn't handle it anymore, mentally. It was driving me crazy, just different attitudes all under one roof. Some people thinking that everybody owes them a life or something. And they're in there with this real bad attitude, like it's their home.

They go set up put their toothbrushes on the counter, their hairbrushes, and leave it there in the bathroom, and he's leaving his stuff up there like it was his own home, you know? Pretty soon he was going to install a toothbrush holder.

So I blew up, I got quite aggressive and I wound up getting out of there, out of the "hostiles." And I'd steal an hour or two of sleep on the street, in a mall, anywhere where you get a little bit of warmth for a couple of hours, you know? Get a couple of hours of sleep here and there like that.

Spent a lot of time sleep-deprived because of that, because you get disturbed a lot and don't get good quality sleep.

A number of people have dropped money while we were talking. How does that make you feel?

It's a nice thing, especially if you spent your life around a lot of people who are not so normal. Most of the people I hung around with are all criminals, are all addicts, or selling drugs, or stealing, whatever. Always taking, taking, taking.

And then to come out and see somebody actually give from their heart to you, it's amazing thing sometimes. It kind of restores a little bit of faith in humanity some days. It's a nice feeling.

Do people often stop and say hello or Merry Christmas?

Some will stop and say hello and ask what's going on. I'll say I'm homeless. I feel like I'm still accepted. They're not looking down on me, they're just looking at me as a person who's down on his luck, and he's going to get up again.

And it's OK to think like that, cause that's what it is.