Some nights, he slept at Heart's Place, a shelter run by St. John's United Methodist Church. Other nights, he sat in shopping center hallways or hunched on a bench in the Wyman Park dell. He noticed dog walkers clutching their bags as they hurried past. For days no one spoke to him.
He couldn't pay to continue the methadone. With the shelter closed for the summer, he suffered through withdrawal outdoors. Thunderstorms left him shaken and damp for days.
By this spring, he was desperate and confided in a couple with whom he had struck up a friendship at St. John's and its shelter.
Callegary and Wagner traveled from their home in Reisterstown to the city church, drawn by its progressive atmosphere and emphasis on social justice. When they volunteered at the shelter, they chatted with Elliott over meals.
Callegary sat near him at church, and they sang together, loud and off-key. When he needed a haircut, she brought scissors to the shelter and trimmed his gray curls.
In late spring, they approached him with an unusual offer: Would he like to sleep in their barn and help out with their goats?
They didn't make the offer blindly. A background check revealed no criminal record. They brought him to their house to make sure that they could trust him around their grandchildren. It was the first time he had been in a home since he lost his own.
Elliott did some checking himself, surveying the barn and the goats. He took to them immediately, the fur that was surprisingly soft, their curious snouts and need for affection.
After the visit, he went back to his bench in the park to think. He was a city boy, he knew nothing about goats. The only time he had even seen goats had been at a petting zoo. But he knew he needed support to deal with methadone withdrawal and to put his life back together. And the couple had always been kind to him.
A few days later he called them: Could they pick him up and take him home?
Callegary and Wagner's property is nearly hidden from the road, tucked between the Reisterstown Post Office and an apartment complex. They have lived there for 29 years, raising three daughters and now two grandchildren in the home. Several trucks and pieces of heavy equipment sit in the yard, vestiges from Wagner's dirt-moving business. Baby swings and toys remain from the day care that Callegary used to run.
