Kevin George Ellis, a member of Abbotsford’s homeless community, died last Tuesday night. His release from the pain of these soulless streets will be mourned in the homeless community and those who care to serve the needs of these citizens. Kevin was human and had the flaws that come with that state of being. It was his misfortune that one of his flaws was addiction, a scourge that devoured his life. Kevin had serious respiratory problems that were only complicated by his addiction. Worse misery lay in his having the wrong addiction. If you ever doubted the driving power of addiction consider that Kevin knew his addiction would, together with his respiratory illness, cause him an early, painful death. Even in the face of this death sentence Kevin was a helpless prisoner of his addiction. Sadly, Kevin is not unique. I lost a cousin decades ago because he could not stay sober (from beer) long enough for life saving medical treatment.

While the broad majority of his fellow citizens will not notice his passing from the City’s indifferent streets and those malignant of spirit will demonstrate this warping with the utterance “Good, one less homeless bum, the rest need to die – the faster the better”, the humane will deplore the circumstances of his passing. It was wrenching to see the suffering inflicted on Kevin by the system and to a lesser degree society. I do not know if system and attitude changes would or could have granted him a longer life. I do know our current systems and attitudes condemned him to death and made his life at the end extremely miserable and painful, denying him any comfort. Others with a desperate need for caring will die in pain and loneliness, killed by the callousness of our society.

Kevin is not the first person I have seen die or dying from the complications of a respiratory illness and an ongoing addiction. He is the first who I have seen with an illegal drug addiction. Until now the addiction I have associated with respiratory problems has been nicotine, with cigarettes the method these addicts use to get their drug fix. While this group of addicts may not have received a great deal of sympathy, they did receive care, consideration and un-begrudged medical treatment. Having labeled Kevin as a homeless druggie and bum the system and society judged him as unworthy of solicitude and denied him simple mercy.

When you look at the world around you and find it an unfriendly, dark and frightening place, remember it is this way because of choices we make and have made as a society. We have made human life the cheapest commodity on the planet and created a class of disposable human beings. The society and behaviour we so deplore is merely the reaping of the whirlwind we as a society have chosen to sow. If we want a better world we need to build it on a solid foundation of love for our fellow man, especially the least among us and those in desperate need.

Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It’s the transition that’s troublesome.