State-Journal.com - Homeless couple pulled from roadside to wedding chapel

Photo By Hilly SchifferTeresa Doyle, center, reads a marriage license to Brenda Gregory and her future husband, Richard Noyes, at the Franklin County Clerk’s Office Tuesday. The couple has been together for more than 20 years but never married because of financial trouble.

Photo By Hilly SchifferBrenda Gregory hugs her future husband, Richard Noyes, as they wait for a marriage license at the Franklin County Clerk’s Office Tuesday. They will marry Saturday at New Life Baptist Church in Waddy.

Photo By Hilly SchifferBrenda Gregory, homeless since August, sits in her new apartment at Southern Apartments. Recently, she and her future husband, Richard Noyes, moved into the apartment with the help of Teresa Doyle.

Photo By Hilly SchifferTeresa Doyle reads a letter from a creditor to Richard Noyes, who was recently homeless, at his new apartment where he and Brenda Gregory live at Southern Apartments. Doyle found the couple without food and shelter in Shelbyville and decided to help find them a home, and is helping plan their wedding.

Richard Noyes, a Vietnam veteran, sat in his wheelchair near one of the nation’s busiest interstates on a cold November day. Beside him were four oxygen tanks, and he held a small cardboard sign that read “Homeless veteran.”

Brenda Gregory was near him on a small collapsible stool with two suitcases and his oxygen condenser between them.

The world seemed as frigid as the weather when Richard, 67, and Brenda, 49, found themselves on Interstate 64 with nowhere to go. The only thing they had was each other.

It was a day the couple never imagined would come in 20 plus years together. They were homeless in an area Brenda picked because she saw a coupon in an advertisement that made Shelbyville seem like a nice place.

Once there, they learned if they could get to Louisville, perhaps they could get matters straightened out at the Social Security office that would restore the small monthly payment they lived on.

One person did stop – just as in the Biblical story of the Good Samaritan.

“I couldn’t not stop,” said Teresa Doyle, a senior care worker of Frankfort-based Home Instead.

“I was on my way to Shelbyville to call on clients, and as I exited, I saw Brenda and Richard sitting by the highway, and it broke my heart.”

Teresa took the exit and circled around to the couple.

“What can I do to help you?” asked the petite blond from her car window.

“This is what is amazing to me,” Teresa said. “They could have asked me for anything, and all Brenda said was they could use a bottle of water to share between them, and she asked me if I could stay with Richard so she could go up the exit to find a restroom.”

Shortly, Billy Tingle, an employee of Claudia Sanders restaurant, stopped. He went immediately to the Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurant to get the couple food and water. Soon after, his boss offered to pay for a hotel room to get them out of the cold air.

Teresa said with their immediate needs met, she started making calls to agencies she works with.

“What if I didn’t do the work I do and know what I know,” Teresa questioned, adding, “What if my company owner, David Owen, was not the compassionate man he is?”

Teresa contacted Operation Care, and it provided funds to pay for additional nights in the motel.

Richard had his DD214, a form that verifies his Army service. Teresa called Patrick McKiernan, the Homeless Veteran Outreach coordinator with the Kentucky Department of Veteran’s Affairs in Louisville.

“All of these angels just came quickly,” Teresa said.

But suddenly, Brenda became ill, and Teresa rushed her to Mercy Clinic, where it was discovered her blood sugar level was dangerously elevated because she’d been unable to purchase insulin.

“Since it is not a hospital, the clinic could only keep her the rest of the day working to bring her blood sugar down to an acceptable level,” Teresa explained.

“Then Richard was hospitalized for a week. He had grown weak and his lung function had dropped to unacceptable levels.”

Teresa said she kept thinking this could have been her own life. For the past 10 months her husband has been laid off as general manager of Carolina Containers, but she said they had tightened their purse strings and are making it – now.

“Did I question my judgment in all this? Sure I did. But my mother-in-law is on oxygen and I know how she suffers. Plus, I have a really soft spot in my heart when it comes to babies and seniors. I told them I have no money to give you because of my own personal circumstances. But I think I can help you.”

A journey to homelessness

Richard was a gunner door operator on a Huey helicopter. He volunteered for another trip to Saigon when the evacuation began in 1975.

He still mourns the men left behind in Vietnam and pointed to a black POW-MIA flag he cherishes, a gift from Brenda. “That flag says it all – bring them back or send us back.”

The couple met in Nashville when Richard was doing maintenance for Grayline Tours in March 1988. The 45-year-old Richard, who had never been married, grew up in foster homes in Missouri.

He said a social worker told him that he’d been taken from his abusive and alcoholic parents. He still has scars from the cigarette burns.

Brenda, who grew up in Cincinnati in a family of 10 children, was visiting her brother. She had three children, was divorced and had been in an abusive relationship.

“When I met Richard, it was love at first sight,” Brenda said smiling.

Over the years they crisscrossed the nation. Richard worked mainly in construction and Brenda, who only completed the sixth grade, as a housekeeper.

“We never had enough extra money to get married,” Brenda said. “We soon had two more children to raise.”

Their son and a daughter from Brenda’s first marriage are now working their way through college in Washington. Their daughter is finishing high school and lives in Cincinnati with her half sister.

“One of our girls was just rebellious and ran away when she was around 19. We don’t know where she is, but she would be 26 now.”

The quiet Richard said at one time he worked a couple of years at the North Platt Telegraph in Nebraska running the strapper, the machine that bundles papers.

“But the paper began to downsize, and I had to go,” said Richard, explaining how most of his jobs through the years even in construction were short term because of their nature.

Richard’s health began to fail, and he developed COPD and ultimately was placed on disability because of the disease to his lungs.

His hands weathered from years of work show deep bruising where the steroids he is now on pool blood beneath his thin skin.

Harder times began in August, when the $694 a month disability income Richard was receiving did not show up on the debit card given to them by the Social Security Administration. They eventually lost their apartment, and for several weeks Richard sat begging on the streets.

“It was so sad to see him there and people passing him by like he didn’t exist,” Brenda said wiping tears from her eyes.

The couple decided to try and get to Cincinnati to stay with Brenda’s sister.

“She took us in for two weeks, but she has problems of her own and we needed to go.”

From there, they caught a ride into Florence where again Richard begged on the streets.

“A policeman in Fort Wright took us to St. Vincent DePaul in Erlanger, but they were unable to help. But the Ministries of Erlanger did help us.”

“We kept thinking Richard’s Social Security would show up on the debit card, but it did not,” Brenda said. “I called the 800 number on the card, but they said we had to get it straightened out through Kentucky, because we were now in Kentucky.”

“The police continued to harass us as if they had never seen homeless people before. They did not want us homeless there.”

“So, a church took up some money, about $240, and gave us a gas card so we could purchase items we might need at gas stations, and a lady drove us to Shelbyville – the location I selected because of a coupon I saw in book.

“We stayed at the motel until our money ran out. The morning that Teresa found us we had decided to see if we could get to Louisville.”

A journey to a home

Former Hospice minister Bill Brumley stepped in to help and was a true godsend, according to Teresa, who said he never treated them like they were homeless.

“I call him my little angel from heaven,” Teresa said. “He has stayed with me throughout all this.”

Pastor Bill, along with churches, the VA, Operation Care and Community Action all paid for their five-week stay at the Green Valley Motel in Shelbyville.

“I can’t say enough kind words about Linda Bebe at Community Action. Without her, I am not sure where Richard and Brenda would be right now.”

Teresa said roadblocks toward a permanent place kept popping up, especially with the rules of the Frankfort Housing Authority.

“I didn’t know each housing authority could set its own rules, but I learned quickly.”

Frankfort’s rules include a three-year history of residence, a background check paid for by the client and a deposit on the housing.

“Where are people supposed to get money to pay for a background check and make a deposit on a place, when they are homeless?”

According to Teresa, the roadblocks almost forced her to believe that she’d run out of options.

“I told Richard and Brenda I may have done all I could do for them. But she said those sweet people looked at me and said ‘please don’t give up on us.’”

Teresa said it is her faith that kept her fighting.

Patrick with the state veteran’s services was able to come up with the first month’s rent and Community Action paid the deposit. Home Instead paid for the background check.

On the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Pastor Bill, Wayne Buckman, with Southeast Christian Church of Louisville, Teresa and a crew of others moved Richard and Brenda into a third-floor apartment at the former Southern Hotel.

“They woke up Thanksgiving morning in their own home,” Teresa said. “I had so many prayers of Thanksgiving.”

Sitting in their apartment Tuesday, Teresa asked Richard to show The State Journal the sign he carried on the highway.

“Can’t do it,” he said. “The night we moved in here I threw it in the trash. I’m not a homeless veteran anymore.”

Going to the Chapel

But Teresa’s work is not over. Richard and Brenda had one more request – would she help them get married?

According to David, who owns the local Home Instead with his wife, Nicki, she is now a wedding coordinator, and Teresa is the planner.

“You would think their children are getting married,” David said.

Tuesday, Teresa took the couple to the Franklin County Clerk’s office, where Guy Zeigler, who had learned of the event, paid for their marriage license.

“You are finally going to make an honest woman out me,” Brenda said as she filled out the papers. “I am going to be Mrs. Noyes.”

Deputy Clerk Debbie Caudle congratulated the couple as she helped Richard complete his papers.

“How much do we owe you?” Richard asked.

“Mr. Zeigler, the county clerk, has taken care of it,” Debbie told the couple.

Brenda wept.

Richard whispered, “Thank you.”

There were other kindnesses from the Frankfort community later in the day.

Gina Morales of On Broadway Salon will be giving Brenda a new hairstyle Friday, and Eddie Burke of Burke’s Barbering will take care of Richard.

“I’ll give him whatever he wants,” Burke said. “I am happy to help.”

Morales echoed Burke’s enthusiasm. “This will be fun.”

Goodwill provided a voucher for a dress for Brenda.

Teresa was busy searching for inexpensive rings late Tuesday.

“I still need some shoes for Brenda, and the clothes for Richard. He wants to wear a cowboy hat.”

Come Saturday at 2 p.m., their journey of desperation will end. Brenda Gregory will wed Richard Noyes at the New Life Baptist Church in Waddy.

Pastor Bill, who has been with them through the journey, will officiate. Teresa’s, 6-year-old daughter, who has become a friend of Brenda’s, has agreed to be the flower girl.

The bride will walk down the aisle to the music of her favorite recording artist Dolly Parton singing “I will always love you.”

As for Teresa, she has prepared the remarks she will make, detailing a journey that has not only changed the lives of Richard and Brenda, but hers as well.

“I know what is important now. I know how little most things really matter,” she said. “When your medical needs are met, when you have food and shelter, love and devotion, nothing else is important.”