Demonte teaches us all to live generously. While living in a tent in the woods of Chapel Hill, he showed up bright and early every Saturday morning to the CEF Opportunity Class, making coffee for everyone and helping with classroom set-up. With a gift for photography he quickly became the resident photographer at CEF, capturing fun daily moments in the office, where he spends time every day of the week. He routinely snaps photos and then runs right across the street to print the pictures and give copies to everyone.

Demonte came to Chapel Hill after his home in Maryland burned down. “I didn’t have anywhere else to go… When I came here all I really had was the clothes that I was wearing.”

Running through a list of all the ways he has worked with CEF, Demonte shares, “When I came down here, everything I needed help for, if they couldn’t help me, they referred me to somebody that could. They just basically helped me put my whole life back together.”

His list of goals he accomplished with CEF includes: Getting his social security card and birth certificate after losing all his documents in the fire; connecting to doctors and mental health; getting help with managing his benefits; and finding housing.

On top of all that, Demonte points to the lessons he has learned from CEF’s Opportunity Classes. “I learned how to budget. I had never made a budget before coming to CEF; now I plan… I had never done that before. Demonte graduated months ago at this point, but he still continues to go to class every week to keep learning and also share with others there what he has learned, “Just to give back, plus I like helping people.

“CEF, it’s just been a lifesaver for so many people. It helped me out a tremendous amount. I just love the people here. I have a lot of friendships here… It is great to have people who you can call your friends, sit down and talk to when something is on your mind. I advise anybody that needs help with finding a house or a job or writing a resume to come check it out.”

Demonte was in a car accident in 1995 and suffered brain damage. As a result, Demonte is permanently disabled and not able to work formally, but he certainly still works hard. He got ordained as a minister and has served churches as their music director, volunteering locally with Love Chapel Hill church. Music is a long-time passion for Demonte from his time in the church as a kid, where he and several other youth started the “Seven Jewels Youth Choir.”

Out of the woods and now in an apartment, Demonte says he is “more restful now, because when I was out in the tent I would always wake up and it was hard to sleep.” Being in an apartment has also allowed him to get a long-awaited knee surgery that was not medically possible when his circumstances were different, as his doctors could not in good practice discharge him from the hospital to rehabilitate in a tent.

So what’s next for Demonte? “Basically all the goals that I had set for myself, I reached them all. The only goal I haven’t reached is the goal for my Safe Savings Account and my goal to get a laptop, but I’m working on that right now. Everything else I set as a goal is pretty much done, mostly from the help of CEF.”

by Anne Yeung

“Family” is the word that comes to mind when I think of Ricky Reams— it means the world to him. When Ricky and I met two years ago at Housing for New Hope’s Phoenix House transitional housing program, the first goal we tackled was saving for housing. Ricky saved with remarkable fervor, stunning me by reaching his goal of $500 in just four months. But what I will never forget is that the only time he ever deposited less than planned into his Safe Savings Account, it was in the name of family: he wanted to give his grandchildren gifts for the holidays.

Family was also essential to Ricky’s ability to work. Two months after he successfully moved into his own place, we reconnected to work on job searches. After revamping his resume, drafting a cover letter, and practicing tricky interview questions, Ricky was able to find work – he just had trouble keeping it. He confided that ever since moving away from his hometown of New Haven, Connecticut, he had been struggling to hold a job: “I get depressed because my family always in Connecticut and I couldn’t go check on ‘em and see ‘em like I want to. So I just get isolated and shut the world down.” Knowing that being separated from his family made it difficult for him to maintain employment, my co-advocate Stephanie Colorado and I set about making sure he knew he could have “family” in Durham, too. Every Thursday morning, we met Ricky at Whole Foods to play cards, talk about life, share stories, and just spend time together.

Today, Ricky will have been employed as a Donations Ambassador at Habitat ReStore of Durham and Orange Counties for almost half a year and will proudly tell you, “Everything been going so good at that job! I love to go to work … I come in there smiling and happy every day.” He will also gush about the newest addition to his family, a childhood friend who he only recently found the courage to approach, “We gonna get married – I’m talking ‘bout we gonna jump the mop, we ain’t gonna jump the broom! Right now, we feel like we 40 years married. She’s a beautiful woman and I love her to death.”

Hanging out with Ricky was my small part in helping to make sure depression wouldn’t keep him from doing what he loves – but, selfishly, it was also my way of basking in his good nature. He’s the kind of person who, when I vented about people who I thought were being nasty, reminded me, “You know what you do to people who make you feel that way? You pray for them.” If you ask him his secret, he will shrug, “I’m like the same person every day, try to uplift people, ask them how their child doing, how’s your day – that’s just me.” It is infectious. Each time we met – whether it was to open an affordable credit union account, sign-up for e-statements to reduce fees, budget for his new housing expenses, file back taxes to avoid garnishment, stow the cash he had from selling his van into his Safe Savings account, or connect to Legal Aid for help dealing with an exploitative landlord – he uplifted me with his spirit. He became somebody I could call if stressed or angry. He became somebody who, when I share with him that I’m scared to head to medical school but am trying to be brave, he tells me “I’m proud of you, Anne” and I choke up. Ricky is family.