Thursday, May 06, 1999
Nun helps disabled mesh lives
BY KAREN SAMPLES
The Cincinnati Enquirer
NEWPORT — Nobody is perfect in this house. Paul leaves his laundry in the washer. Missy sometimes tells on Beth, who spends hours on the phone. Richard — the brilliant one — has trouble making change.
Nobody is perfect in the world beyond Hancock Manor, either. What makes this place unique is the way it all works out. Five mentally disabled adults and one nun, each with their own skills and imperfections, have turned this house into a home.
Sister Ruth Kolkmeier keeps the place running for The Point, the nonprofit agency that opened Hancock Manor in September.
It's one of the area's only boarding homes for disabled people who can live semi-independently. Northern Kentucky desperately needs more places like it. And next Monday, officials and parents will meet to discuss the housing crisis.
At Hancock Manor, Sister Ruth cooks, shops and ferries the residents to and fro. She's amazed at how well their personalities have meshed.
Some of the residents had never lived away from their parents before. Soon enough, they fell into a comfortable rhythm.
All five work during the day at groceries, laundries and the like. They clean their own rooms. They take care of one another.
Once a week, Sister Ruth drives Richard to Comic Book World. He loves his comics, not to mention his old encyclopedias, embalming texts, Jack- the-Ripper books and science-fiction movies.
Richard is 51 and slightly autistic. All his relatives are dead. Once, before Hancock Manor, he ended up at a crisis center in Cincinnati, where another patient beat him up. He ran away, was taken in by a family in Boone County and eventually moved into Hancock Manor.
Richard has a way with words. At stoplights, he'll say, “The green light beckons.”
He uses terms like “indubitably,” and “regurgitate.” Once, when he and Sister Ruth were driving down Monmouth Street, Richard blew a kiss toward an adult nightclub. “Never fear, Richard is here, with candy for you to endear,” he said.
Sister Ruth gets a kick out of Richard.
Beth, 23, is the active one. She swims, fishes, plays softball and soccer. This weekend she's going to a prom with her boyfriend.
Paul, 27, is paralyzed on one side from a car accident when he was 7. Every day, he gets up around 5:30 a.m., exercises and goes to work at his father's construction company.
His hands are shaky, and sometimes he spills his coffee. Sister Ruth cheerfully calls this “baptizing the carpet,” and everyone has picked up on the phrase.
Dave, 33, is the newest arrival. He used to live at another facility, but it wasn't right for him, he says. “They kept babying me over there, like, "Do this, do that,' and I just stayed by myself and tried not to talk to anybody.”
At Hancock Manor, he and Paul became fast friends. Recently, Sister Ruth dropped them off at a Reds game — the first Dave had ever attended.
Missy, 22, is everyone's surrogate mom. She reminds Sister Ruth where the car is parked. She remembers all sorts of important phone numbers. When Dave started riding a bus home from work, she would watch from the window to make sure he arrived safely.
The five of them occasionally miss their families. But they also enjoy having their own friends and being free.
Paul sums it up simply.
“I like coming home every day and talking to people,” he says.
Meeting
Legislators, parents and agency officials will meet on Monday to work on a housing campaign for the developmentally disabled. All are invited to attend. The meeting will be 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. at the Point Pavilion, 620 Scott St., Covington. A $5 lunch will be available. Call 491-9191 for more information.
Karen Samples is The Enquirer's Kentucky columnist. Her column appears on Sundays and Thursdays in The Kentucky Enquirer. She can be reached at 578-5584, or by e-mail at ksamples@enquirer.com
Karen Samples is The Enquirer's Kentucky columnist. Her column appears on Sundays and Thursdays in The Kentucky Enquirer. She can be reached at 578-5584 or email
her at ksamples@enquirer.com
SAMPLES ARCHIVE
