Homeless to Helper: 'Dog Man' finds purpose repaying the kindness

Lubbock Avalanche-Journal - Sunday, October 10, 2010

Kellie Bramlet

 

Most people knew Jake Weingarten simply as “Dog Man.”

They saw the homeless man with shoulder-length graying hair and sleeves of tattoos wandering downtown Lubbock with six dogs, but they didn’t know much about him.

They didn’t know he served in the U.S. Army’s 82nd Airborne.

They didn’t know he lost both his parents at a young age.

They didn’t know he spent years working in construction, and suffered from a debilitating injury, eventually leading to a stroke and a heart attack.

Miranda Grubbs/A-J Photo

Jake Weingarten, center, helps Arlene Mater out to her car during Fiesta Domingo at Asbury United Methodist Church on Oct. 3. The once-homeless man now works as a carpenter for an outreach center at the church.

And Weingarten preferred it that way.

He kept to himself.

He trusted no one.

No one, except the dogs.

Weingarten arrived in Lubbock in 2003. He had just learned that his poor health would keep him from working in construction. His younger brother lived in the Lubbock area, so he left his home in the Northeast and headed southwest.

Weingarten qualified for disability insurance but hated the idea of it. He didn’t want to wait around for a monthly check from the government. He found seasonal work, but that soon ended.

By 2005, he was homeless.

Weingarten made a home for himself and the dogs in the woods at Mackenzie Park. He had to be careful, since the park closes at midnight. He fed himself by visiting Lubbock’s many soup kitchens. The dogs he fed by diving through Dumpsters.

Weingarten shied away from the library and other places where homeless people often congregate. For a while, he lived somewhat out of his car, until it was towed and he couldn’t afford the fine to retrieve it.

Weingarten was homeless for two years before he heard about HOPE Community of Shalom. Another homeless man told him about the food pantry and clothing closet.

He arrived at the outreach center off 19th Street one Sunday night. He met Mary Guetersloh, director of the food pantry and clothing closet.

She walked him through each of the shelter’s ministries: the Loaves and Fishes food pantry stocked by the South Plains Food Bank where he could do free grocery shopping, down the hallways past the rooms where the children’s after-school programs are held, and upstairs into the Begin Again Boutique, where clients can shop for donated clothing.

The amount of clothing they can take is based on how much clothing is available, Guetersloh explained.

The tour ended in the basement, where the ministry’s weekly supper, Fiesta Domingo, is held. He and about a hundred others were given a warm meal.

Without saying much to anyone, Weingarten finished his meal and left. But he was surprised by the unconditional generosity he was met with at Hope Shalom. He returned every Sunday.

Weingarten didn’t like taking handouts. It’s the same stubborn pride that kept him from applying for his disability insurance. So the next week he went to Guetersloh and volunteered to help.

“What you’ve done for me is not unnoticed in my heart,” he said, dressed in a big military coat and boonie hat.

Plenty of clients volunteer to help, Guetersloh said. Some are genuine, and some want first choice on the handouts. Regardless, she tries to find a small job for everyone, she said. But she could tell there was something different about Weingarten.

“I heard it in his voice,” she said. “He was really wanting to help.”

She gave him the task of helping out with the food pantry.

When she arrived the following Sunday, Weingarten was there waiting for her to unlock the doors.

*******

Nancy Clopton had always been more comfortable working with computers than people, and she certainly didn’t trust many of the people who came through the HOPE Community of Shalom, where she had recently started volunteering.

Hope Shalom was started at Asbury United Methodist Church, where Clopton attended weekly services.

In 2002, the church was struggling. The elderly congregation was losing members. They made a decision to hand over half their fellowship hall to start a Community of Shalom, a national Methodist charity. They called this one HOPE. It brought new life to the dying church.

Clopton liked the idea of helping the homeless, but when it came to many of them, their appearance, their speech, their smell could all be pretty off-putting. She wanted nothing to do with the man with the shoulder-length graying hair and sleeves of tattoos.

She was carrying heavy bags when he approached her and offered to help. An equally stubborn soul, Clopton refused. The two argued over it for a while. Clopton wondered if she would get along with this new volunteer.

Clopton kept contributing to HOPE Shalom and eventually became a board member and then the director.

One day, Clopton was working on extending one of the walls at HOPE Shalom. She was pretty handy with a toolbox. Her father taught her all he knew. But this was a little out of Clopton’s realm of work.

Weingarten stepped in and repaired the wall.

When he was done, Clopton and Guetersloh admired his work. Not only was the wall repaired, but not a single seam showed. It seemed their new volunteer had a knack for carpentry.

Little by little, the two women got to know Weingarten, chipping away at the layers of the hard shell he built around himself. They learned about his background in construction, his disability and how he came to be homeless.

They hired him as a carpenter, paying him all he would accept — a fraction of what professionals would charge.

“If it costs $100, I’ll charge them $25,” Weingarten explained.

Even after his disability insurance came through and he found a house for his six dogs and himself, Weingarten kept

HOPE Community of Shalom •2005 Ave. T. •762-0829. •Ministries include Shalom Readers, Tuesdays and Thursdays from 3 to 5 p.m. during the school year. •Loaves and Fishes food pantry stocked by the South Plains Food Bank, Sundays 4 to 5 p.m. •Begin Again Boutique, Sundays 4 to 5:30 p.m. •Fiesta Domingo meal, Sundays 5 p.m.

 coming back to Hope Shalom. But it wasn’t for donated food and clothes. Now, it was to help.

“They gave me a sense of self-worth,” he said.

The more time Weingarten spent at Hope Shalom, the more Clopton and Guetersloh learned about him: his time in the military, his family, his health. They took him to doctor appointments and helped furnish his new home, complete with pillows for the dogs.

Weingarten begrudgingly accepted their kindness.

He jokingly referred to Clopton and Guetersloh as his “two moms.”

And in exchange, Weingarten returns to Hope Shalom, week after week.

“Can you turn your back on that integrity and honor?” Weingarten said, reflecting on how greatly things have changed in the past five years. “You can’t.”