LIFE ON THE BRINK
www.newtondailynews.com | Wednesday | Nov. 22, 2017 | 5C
Taylor Continued from Page 4D One family Taylor assisted was battling health issues and medical bills and in the interim their food assistance was canceled because the paperwork could not be filed on time. Taylor said volunteers rallied to help find the couple employment and an apartment for their two children. Taylor received a message via social media last week with news the family has now purchased a house. During a recent interview at her home, Taylor began to tear up — a rare victory in work with a lot of hills and valleys. The emotional investment Taylor shows in every one of her Friends in Hope assignments comes naturally. “I cry every time. I don’t really know how not to,” Taylor said. “They’re coming to you with their life in major turmoil, and they’re saying ‘help me.’ So you either have to care or you don’t.” Janice Jenkins is Taylor’s employee and friend. She’s worked at Taylor Maid Cleaning for nearly seven years and often goes along for the ride when Taylor gets a call to serve, many times adding her own gift of extra blankets and clothing. Jenkins said it’s her friend’s natural ability to relate to people in need that makes Taylor so effective. “They look forward to seeing her. She has the personality it takes to really make them feel liked. It just happens. The judgmental level isn’t there. She’s really interested in what they are doing,” Jenkins said. Everyone around Taylor sees her strength, but every person has a breaking point. In April, Taylor was assisting several different
Submitted Photo Robyn Taylor poses for a photo with her friend Jason Purtilo. Taylor and Purtilo are the most unlikely of friends, but when Taylor saw Purtilo living on the streets this summer she knew she had to reach out to help him.
families in poverty. Her caseload had become too emotionally taxing, and Taylor made the conscious decision to take a step back from Friends in Hope to focus on herself and her grandkids. But that reprieve was temporarily put on hold when Taylor made an immediate connection with a homeless man named Jason. Her work with Jason began in similar fashion to her first interaction with the homeless — Terlouw finding Jason laying on a Newton sidewalk asking for help. He was crying, moaning and had no shoes. Taylor said he was clearly suffering from mental illness, so with her experience, she knew her questions needed to be direct. “I really don’t hold back. I don’t mince words. I said, ‘What’s the deal? What are you on? What are you coming off of?’” Taylor said. Working with another Friends in Hope volunteer, they got Jason a week’s stay
at the Mid-Iowa Motel — a place their group has found to be safe and respectful to the homeless. After his stay, Jason decided to go back on the streets, and it was a while before Taylor heard from him. She’d see Jason around town occasionally, buy him Burger King drive-thru and chit chat. People around Newton began to connect Jason with Taylor, and she’d get calls from convenience store owners and other advocates with updates on his condition and activity. “Eventually, he started contacting me. He’d get picked up (by police). He’d be walking around town talking to himself and the voices were getting bad. I’d get calls in the night, ‘Can we drop him off?’ I’d say yeah, bring him over.’” Providing Jason shelter was a step deeper into advocacy for Taylor. She had not housed the homeless in her own home. She got in contact with Jason’s mother and they became close.
Taylor discovered Jason had a family who wanted nothing more than for him to be well and safe. But Nov. 8, Jason had another setback. A warrant was out for his arrest, and he went to the Jasper County Jail. “Nobody’s bringing him strawberry milk in jail, I can tell you that. But they are very kind to him and know of the issues that he has,” Taylor said. “The jailers were so good at getting him the help he needed and on the medication we’ve been trying to get him on for a long time.” It may be Taylor’s intent to step back from her work, but even she concedes she can’t fully walk away from those in need. She recently crossed paths with Newton couple Jim and Meredith Tracy. In April they helped establish a blessing box through St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church and more recently have established another homelessness advocacy group, Neighbors
Helping Neighbors. She volunteered at the groups recent free laundry night for the homeless. Taylor’s dream is to see an emergency shelter in Newton with a transitional center and to see Friends in Hope combine resources with Neighbors Helping Neighbors. A year ago, on her left hand, Taylor inked a tattoo which simply reads “hope.” She says it’s a reminder of the one thing needed to keep positive while exposing oneself to the strife of others. “If you have nothing else,” she said, “maybe you have hope.” If you’re interested in getting involved with Friends in Hope, contact Linda Curtis-Stolper at linda.curtisstolper@gmail. com or at 641-840-2417. You can also find Friends in Hope on Facebook. Contact Mike Mendenhall at mmendenhall @newtondailynews.com
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