years ago on Halloween, there was people throwing eggs and stuff. And then there were people going around shooting the workers.” She was referring to a recent pattern of people shooting sex workers with paintball guns. “It was really bad. And there are a lot of people dying and shit, too. From addictions and stuff like that. Depression too… you get very depressed. There are times when I just want to end it. But God put me here for a reason.” Being able to comfortably talk to someone is important for these women. “The group’s really helpful for venting,” Lindsay said, referring to SWAN. Beatrice helps her “get help, get counseling.” She sees the therapists who work with SWAN. All the women make use of the resources SWAN distributes, such as needles and condoms, and they all said that they carry a blade to protect themselves. Some also carry mace. Christine said, “I carry a knife because once you’re in a car with somebody and something really fucked happens, it’s just you and them.” She referenced self-defense classes that SWAN hosted before the pandemic. “I was asking questions like—and I wasn't trying to be funny—if my head is in somebody’s lap, I'm in the car with somebody, and somebody comes down like that”—she brought her elbow down hard—“how am I going to defend myself? Self defense is person-to-person, faceto-face.” Kimberly, who is 50 years old and has been a sex worker since she was 14, also said that it was necessary to be able to defend yourself. “If I do have to fight somebody, I'll fight them. I carry a blade on me.” Jasmine said that she trusts her SEPTEMBER 2021
instincts, and if she has a bad feeling about a date, then she won’t go. “When I'm scared about being [robbed], I'll try to go somewhere I know there’s a camera, like a street camera or security camera. Preferably somewhere really welllit or populated.” Still, many of the women have people they can depend on for support. Christine said that she knows there are people who are invested in her safety. “If there’s ever an emergency, I can call on people all the time… My people [at SWAN] and my people on the street, and I got family that support and love me.” Kimberly was wearing a SWAN shirt, bright purple with a small sketch of an actual swan on the front. She said her husband was a source of support, who she endearingly referred to as a “big baby.” He’s blind, so the two of them take care of each other. She told me that his protectiveness sometimes annoyed her. But she affectionately added, “That’s what I signed up for when I married him.” Christine also said that she and the other workers look out for each other. “All of us street people, the majority of us, it’s like we’re a big dysfunctional family,” she said. “Even though one day one person might hate the other person, they may be angry at the person, somebody may steal from somebody or do something stupid—for the most part, there’s a big group of people that wouldn’t let the other person get hurt. There’s a lot of loyalty.”
“This one’s always helping people,” Jaclyn said, and everyone laughed while Christine smiled. “They call me the mother,” Christine said. “‘She's our mother out here.’ And I do, I even scold them.” Dereen Shirnekhi is a junior in Davenport College and an Associate Editor of The New Journal.
ASIDE
THE FARMINGTON CANAL HERITAGE TRAIL BY ELI MENNERICK
In the 1830s, a canal ran from Northampton, Massachusetts to New Haven Harbor. Horses hauled boats through water four feet deep. The canal failed to profit, and soon it became a railroad. The railroad failed, too, and in the nineteen-nineties, it became an eighty-four-mile bike path called the Farmington Canal Heritage Trail. In summer and fall, when the trees are leafy, dappled shadows spill over the pavement. Biking into New Haven, you ride through Newhallville, then past Yale Health and Benjamin Franklin College. The path ends at a closed gate beneath Temple Street, about ten blocks from the canal’s original terminus at Long Wharf. For a decade, New Haven tried and failed to close that gap. Finally, in August, construction began.
I asked her what that looked like, and she explained. “Let’s say I get thrown out of a car and Kim comes across me, she’s walking down the street and I’m beat up. She’s going to pick me up. We’ve got a tight group of people.” 17
