Lee: `It's easy to die ... it's harder to live'
Here, eventually you'll have a good job. You know, get up, take a shower. Go to work ... all those kinda things.
Lee was 22 when Fast met him in 2008, a young Cree man from Alberta who spent his tumultuous childhood in foster care, a system he compared to jail.
When he first got to Vancouver, he told Fast the city's bright lights reminded him of Las Vegas, even though he'd never been there.
“This is the best, uh, place on Earth, I think. Just like the licence plates say. It's just awesome out here,” Lee said, excitedly describing his imagined life in Vancouver.
“Here, eventually you'll have a good job. You know, get up, take a shower. Go to work. Then take a lunch break — all those kinda things, right?... I would love to just have my own house, right? And have a dog, right? One or two kids — you know what I'm saying? And to be able to do things for your kids — just to be able to go camping on the weekend, or go skiing.
“I'm gonna have all that, eventually,” said Lee, who at the time was rotating through shelters and homelessness on Vancouver streets, while using crack or meth.
When the world descended on Vancouver for the 2010 Olympics, Lee lived in a notorious SRO that was so rundown he often slept outside to avoid the bedbugs and violence. And yet, he said he was proud to live in the host city: “I'm excited for hockey, snowboarding, downhill skiing, even bobsled!”
Two years later, despite his meth use landing him in the police “drunk tank,” he still maintained his optimism, participating in government programs to try to stabilize his life.
“I have to get my resumé ready, get my (government) ID, get my Indian status card. And I'm trying to get a new place to stay. Last night, my (SRO) door got kicked in for no good reason, just people being crazy,” he said.
When Fast saw him in 2013, Lee was sleeping in a park behind St. Paul's Hospital and, for the first time, said that while he still loved the city, he hated his life in it.
“Trying to eat, trying to keep myself from not going to jail or anything. I wish I had a job or I went to school,” he said.
“Somebody told me that it's easy to die but it's harder, it's harder to live. I think it's a saying, people say that. And it's true. So, I'm going to keep trying — keep going. I have to. I have a lot of living to do.”
Lee died in 2014.