Some say many folks are just one paycheck away from homelessness.
However folks get there, the stories are often sad ones.
Justin Blitchok of the Oakland Press has a sad tale about Mickie “Red” Roquemore, 58, a gifted keyboardist who toured the world and worked with some of jazz’s greatest musicians and eventually became homeless. He was found dead New Year’s Day on the Pontiac porch where he often slept.
Blitchok writes:
A memorial service was held Friday for Roquemore by a wife and daughters who hadn’t seen him in nearly 20 years, after mental illness and addiction took his career and family and left him chronically homeless.
Roquemore’s widow, Jennifer, 58, separated from him in 1988, shortly after the birth of their second daughter.
When her doorbell rang on New Year’s Day, a Washtenaw County sheriff’s deputy was at the door.
“I knew right away. When they said, ‘Oakland County,’ I knew it was something to do with Mickie.”
