Many thanks: Utah's homeless enjoy holiday meals

Tom Standish didn't have family to spend Thanksgiving with; his siblings declared him "lost" to his manic depression months ago. Memories of good times had faded as days of fruitless job-searching and nights tossing and turning in a homeless shelter piled up. But, even though the 40-year-old's holiday spirits seemed dim Thursday, Standish managed a smile over a turkey dinner served up by the Salt Lake City Mission.

"I am so very grateful today," he said. "This wonderful meal, these wonderful people help remind me to have faith through all of these trials."

This Thanksgiving, hundreds of volunteers busied themselves mashing potatoes, carving turkey and slicing pie at the Christian Life Center, 1041 N. Redwood Road. Nearly 3,000 people, bused in from various homeless shelters across Salt Lake County, enjoyed the fruits of the volunteer labor.

"It's one of those years when people need a lot of help," said Brad Jaques, development assistant for the Salt Lake City Mission. "The economy's down and there are a lot more families on the street."

Jaques feels a kinship for the men, women and children who gathered at the Christian Life Center Thursday, some enjoying their meals at a table, others, perhaps out of habit, crouched warily on the floor. Weary and depressed after several suicide attempts, he "used to be one of them," he said.

"I didn't want to come to things like this," he said. "I grew up in a wealthy family. I thought I was better than charity Thanksgiving."

Jaques soon found, however, that most homeless people, like himself, were deeper than their ragged clothing and tattered spirits.

"These people are stuck," he said. "I was stuck. This program helped me to change. Now I want to share that with others."

Thursday's Thanksgiving feast may not have changed Ron Trusler's life, but for the few hours he spent eating pumpkin pie and listening to the mission's band pump out Christian rock, he wasn't thinking about his troubles.

"I didn't expect to have a nice Thanksgiving this year," said Trusler, 47. Since January, when his career at an Indiana Fed Ex store ended abruptly with a layoff, Trusler's only been able to find a few odd jobs here and there. He's been staying in a shelter in Salt Lake City.

Despite his bleak reality, however, turkey and cranberry sauce seemed to take Trusler back to better times, when he had things "put together."