David Prentice, The Midnight Mission

David Prentice is the Assistant Program Manager of The Midnight Mission, an nonprofit that offers a way to self-sufficiency for the homeless of Skid Row in downtown Los Angeles. In this interview he discusses how his own experience with addiction, prison, and surrender helped lead him to his life of service.

Grateful People: Could you explain the Midnight Mission?

David Prentice: The Midnight Mission is a non-profit homeless, healthy-living program. We have two different components. One deals with what we call guests of the community of Skid Row where we provide meals, clothing, referrals. There’s a whole list of things that we provide.

If you came in here and you had absolutely nothing, we could start you from scratch and help you build a road back to self-sufficiency. That’s the goal.

On the second floor is the Healthy Living program. A lot of people want to put it with the drug and alcohol treatment but that’s not necessarily the case because we deal with all type of issues. The men show up here. They may be homeless. Over a hundred different situations. It’s not always directly connected to drugs and alcohol. So we don’t pigeonhole anyone.

If you need help and you’re struggling with life issues, you’re welcome at the Midnight Mission. That’s what makes us unique. Plus we’re non-profit. We don’t take any money from the state or the federal government. We work solely on private donation.

How many people do you serve?

It’s really an extensive operation. We fed 1.2 million means to the homeless population of Skid Row last year. I think the projection is more than that this year. We provide medical care too – everything you could possibly want. A man can come in here with no education, no identification, no anything and a year later, he leaves self-sufficient, self-supporting through his own contribution.

We have an education department. So if they haven’t graduated high school, our goal is to advance them a grade and their knowledge. We have people who can go to college from here. At six months, you can either go to work or go to school, continuing education. It’s whatever you want it to be. 

In working with these men, what have you found out to be the things that they’re most grateful for coming here? Is it a roof over their heads? Is it just people who show interest or care for them?

First and foremost, I think when they come in, they’re grateful for just some relief. We lose sight of the simple things that people take for granted every day. But if you’ve been out on the streets of Skid Row, smoking crack, drinking every day, you haven’t eaten, your family disowns you, you have no place to go or no one to call, when somebody says, “Come on up. We have a bed for you,” there’s a lot of gratitude. 

A lot of times, I will come in in the morning and that’s where the gentlemen sit on that bench and there will be one or two individuals and they will just be crying.

Crying out of thanks? 

Crying out of thanks, crying out of just a general relief. They do an assessment downstairs basically to see who can come up. The guys will lie. They will say anything to just get up here and then once they get up here, the truth comes out.

What do they think they have to lie about?

They don’t know. But they lie. Can I get on a top bunk? Maybe medically they can’t but they will say they can. Are they able to work? Do you have any wants or warrants? All these different questions, they will just say whatever it takes to get up here and that’s okay with us. We know it. But they’re very grateful to even start eating regularly. I’ve had clients come in and sleep for two days, just because they haven’t had a place where they felt safe sleeping for so long. To go from sleeping with one eye open and listening for everything that’s going on, to finally getting a bed and being able to close your eyes knowing that you’re safe... it’s something that they’re immensely grateful for.

Then you get down to basic needs. A shower, soap, toothpaste, a toothbrush, a change of clothes. Again, we take it for granted. A guy who’s living out on that street right out front there. They can’t take it for granted.

How do you yourself cultivate gratitude for those basic necessities – those things that the people coming off Skid Row don’t have and which, as you note, most of us take for granted?

Well, for me, it’s easy because I’ve gone without it. My background: I come from alcoholism, drug addiction, county jails, mental institutions.

Would you share some of your story?

Sure. I drank alcoholically and used since I was roughly 13 years old. I had lapses of sobriety where I was able to piece a little bit of a life together. But then as soon as it got good, I would return to drinking and using drugs. There's a longer story, but what eventually happened was I found myself out of state as a fugitive from California. I was on parole, probation and fighting another case. I got to a place where I knew I was going to die.

Why did you think you were going to die?

The drugs, the alcohol. My father had killed himself drinking. One of the things that really sticks with me is he was dead for three days before the postman smelled him coming through the mail slot.

The postman called the police. I remember going to his funeral and there was nobody. None of his childhood friends. I was the only family. It was basically myself, my mother’s mother and five or six ladies from the church who go to every funeral. It was kind of that setup and I remember thinking what a sad way for such a great man at one time to die.

Later on in life when I got to that place where drugs and alcohol had taken me, I realized I was going to die just like that and that was really the switch.

When you had that realization, what did you do?

The first thing I did was I went down to a church that I had attended in this little town. The pastor was very honest with me and said, “Your problem, we’re not going to be able to fix. You need more than what we can help you with,” and he referred me to a 12-step group, which I had had a prior relationship with. This time it was different. I got to tell you I broke down in that trailer I was living in. I yelled out to God for help and I had a moment of clarity. I was able to get up off the floor and get dressed and get to that church.

What was that moment of clarity like? 

It was a spiritual experience. All these years, I have seen the signs of a divine power trying to come into my life and help me do something about it. Time and time again forgiven, given another chance, another chance. I think it was a willingness to reach out for that help. When I did, it was provided.

What happened after that?

I got sober. I was sober for a little while and I realized that in order to have any type of life, I was going to have to turn myself in. First I called to find out if the California authorities still wanted me.

Would you mind sharing what you were wanted for?

Aggravated assault. A series of events happened and I was given one last opportunity to flee justice. At the time, I owned a bar and one of the cops drank at the bar. He was like, “Look Dave, here’s what’s going on. Get out of here.” It was that defining moment where I said, “You know what? No. I’m not going to be able to have a life if I flee. I’m not going to be able to ever do anything. Let’s just do this.”

I came back to California and I was sentenced to four years in the Department of Corrections. So I went to prison. [Pointing to a picture on the wall] That’s the judge who sentenced me in that picture. Last year, he gave me an award for the work I do in his county and that was at a dinner. It’s kind of ironic that a man who I stood before to be judged, now I sit next to at dinner. So that’s how big of a transformation my life has taken since.

Four years is a long time to spend in prison. What was that experience like? Did your transformation continue?

Absolutely. So first off, going to prison for me, I don’t know if it was that much of a punishment. I didn’t really look at it like, “Darn it! I’m in prison.” When I looked at it, I said, “Okay, so I’ve got four years to do. What can I do in these four years to make sure the rest of my life doesn’t end up where I am today?”

A lot of great things happened. First, I went into prison with that mindset. Secondly, through a series of events, I became a clerk in the chapel at the prison. Through that, I met a retired correctional officer who took me under his wing and we started a group called Celebrate Recovery on the prison yard. I started doing some one-on-one counseling, but not really knowing I was counseling.

This gentleman got me enrolled in school and I ended up getting an associate’s degree while I was in prison in Biblical Studies.

The school was a college program?

Yeah, an accredited college bible school. While I was in that school, I was also the secretary of the 12-step fellowship group that they had on the prison yard. Combining those two really elevated my perception of incorporating the 12-step fellowship with my biblical teachings and how effective that became in counseling.

When I got released from prison, I just didn’t stop. I came out and immediately went to college to get my state certification to become an actual counselor in the secular world. Meanwhile, back when I was in prison, I had gotten a certification from a group called the Christian Association of Drug and Alcohol Counselors and that’s the certification I was working under on the prison yard. 

So, all these things were just placed before me. All I’ve really done is show up. When I stopped doing things my way and started living a life that maybe somebody would be proud of, everything just kind of fell into place. 

Who are some of the people you’re grateful for who helped you along the way?

In order, I would start with Mr. Mike Petoco. He was a retired prison guard who was also a member of my faith, came on to the prison and pointed me into the direction of this career. I’m sitting here because of him. The second person is Sydney Valenboyce. She’s kind of my adopted grandmother. 

Adopted grandmother? Did you know her before prison?

No. She was part of a prison ministry in her church in Bakersfield and we started corresponding through letters. I wasn’t getting any mail other than those letters. Through those letters, she edified me and encouraged me to continue on with school. School for me was different. I didn’t have a computer to sit down and type all my assignments. They all had to be handwritten. There were just mountains and mountains of paper going back and forth. She would encourage me to take a certain time every day and do my homework. She got my testimony and shared it with her church. It just grew into this really beautiful relationship.

When I got released, I was paroled to San Pedro. I went to college and on my graduation she came and that was the first time we met face to face.

What was that experience like?

That was a one-in-a-million shot. It was love. It was family. She was the only family member I had there for support. After writing back and forth for three years, and her encouraging me… I was the class valedictorian of my school. For her to see me for the very first time walk the stage and get that award and share that story with the audience -- women were crying -- it was just a really beautiful moment. One of the things I’m most grateful for is that I have actual people in my life that care about me like that.

David with his "adopted grandmother", Sydney Valenboyce

It’s interesting that you only got to experience that when you went to prison. It doesn’t sound like you had that before.

Right. No, I had no gratitude before. Part of the disease of alcoholism and drug addiction is it’s not that the people are bad people. It’s almost like there’s a demon. It’s almost like no matter what is offered to them, they can't stop. They love their children but they can’t leave this drug alone long enough to do anything about it. It’s a really horrific disease and that’s why I like working in this field because you get to effect some real change.

But yeah, gratitude just didn’t exist in my vocabulary before. I took whatever I could to continue using. That was just the truth of the matter.

A lot has clearly changed for you. How do you find ways to keep living gratitude in your profession here and out in the world?

Well, it’s hard not to be grateful and work here.

Why is that?

Every morning I leave my apartment and I drive the back streets through the business district of Bell, and then I come on to the streets of Skid Row. I turn the corner and I see how society changes from one block to the next.

There’s a shutoff point down by Central [Avenue] where that McDonald’s is where there’s not much homelessness down that end. It’s fancy apartments and coffee shops and wineries and those kinds of things. Then you go one block over and you start to see the tents. A lot of those guys that I see walking around on the street every morning have tried to come here, have tried to get their lives together and weren’t able to do it.

Why not?

There can be a multitude of reasons. There can be mental health issues. There can be a lack of willingness. There can be the lack of being able to follow simple direction. One of the things that the prison did the most for me was when I turned myself in, it was a physical surrender. It was like, “Okay, God, you take this. I’ve had the reins for 40 years and I’ve run it into the ground at every turn. My way does not work.” And God says, “Okay. Well, if you really want me to take care of this, the first thing I need you to do is go to prison. Are you willing to do that?” Now if you walked down this hallway and asked those guys, “Hey, are you willing to go spend a week in LA County Jail to have a great life beyond your wildest dreams afterward?” ninety percent of them would say, “No, I’m not going to jail! Heck, no.”

Right.

Because they can only see the immediacy. I think at that point in my life, I saw the end result. I saw how I was going to die and that was a big change in my thinking. Four years in prison, that’s nothing. I had been drinking and using for thirty years, so a four-year trade to have a life, I knew there was a better side. I had seen other people be successful in staying sober and getting a good life. I had seen that. So it was just a matter of surrender. That was the big thing.

Your wife, Bernadette, is here with you now. I was wondering if you would share how you guys met.

Okay, so it’s a great story. I was in school and I had to do an internship. I had been offered an internship with one of California’s most prestigious drug and alcohol centers. I came on a tour down here to Skid Row and I also ended up interviewing for the Midnight Mission. I knew then this is where I was going to be.

I went back to school and I told my professor I’m not taking the prestigious position. I’m going do my internship on Skid Row. They about had a fit. “You’re doing what? You can’t do that! This is a great opportunity.” Here’s how things worked. That prestigious facility that I had the opportunity at is now closed and here three years later I’m the Assistant Program Manager at the Midnight Mission.

How did you know what to choose? Was it just a gut feeling?

It was a God shot. See, I didn’t have just one too many glasses of wine and go to rehab. I’m a drunk. I hang out out here. So why would I get sober and then work for the money part of it and not the service part of it?

One of the big things that somebody told me a long time ago was that you cannot think your way into better behavior. You have to behave your way into better thinking.

That’s interesting.

Right. So I’ve had years of my thinking failing me. If I think I have a great idea rather than running with it – I have a man whose name is Burt Mealy. He’s my sponsor in my 12-step fellowship. That’s him in the black and white photo there and I call him.

Normally I say, “Hey, that’s a great idea. Let’s run with that.” Now I say, “That’s a great idea. Hey Burt, I think I have a great idea. What do you think of this?” and I run it through somebody. I get some good, positive feedback from him along with my wife.

What happened next?

I did the internship here at the Midnight Mission. The first day of my internship my current boss brought me to Bernadette’s office – she used to work here – and said, “David, this is Bernadette. Bernadette, this is David. He’s the new intern and you’re going to be training him.” And she’s been training me ever since, which is a great thing! [Laughs]

We started off as co-workers, became really good friends, best friends, went through counseling, relationship school for lack of a better term. We went to a relationship institute that’s specialized in how to put a relationship together and from that a relationship was born and it was healthy. We got married June 20th of 2014.

Recently!

Yeah, we just celebrated in June our first wedding anniversary.

Congratulations, both of you.

Yeah.

Do you have any advice for others about cultivating gratitude - particularly those of us who might take some of the basics for granted?

That’s a really tough question because I think I look at it from a perspective of somebody who is really injured. Because of that, gratitude is something I notice. What I see in a lot of the world is that people walk around and they don’t take a second to realize anything about gratitude. It’s just one thing on to the next on to the next. Whereas – I know my wife and I – we have conversations. We’ll be going down the road and the conversation will start with, “Wow, that’s a really cool hill,” or “You know, this day is just perfect. I’m so grateful to be here.”

I never did that before. So I guess if you really wanted to find out, come down here [to the Midnight Mission] and take a tour. Come to a place like this for a day. See what is really going on and see if you can understand how grateful you really are for what you do have.

We look at our problems and we think they’re so massive and they’re so big. Take a look around the rest of the world. I mean if we’re in America – you look out in the courtyard there and you see some real dysfunction and you can look at it and say how sad that is that these people are living this way.

But this is nothing. Go to South Africa. Go to a foreign country and go to India and look at the poverty there and compare it. These guys get three meals a day every day. They can take a shower. They have a public bathroom. They have some semblance of privacy. They can set up a tent on the street.

Even they have the means to be grateful because I’ve seen poverty on other levels that makes this look like nothing – they would swap spots in a second. So it’s all relative to where you are in life. I think with age it's easier too. You start looking back on your life and seeing what really is important. There was a time in my life I sold yachts. I made a lot of money and I was miserable. Today, I work in service. When I come to the door, I pray in the stairway every morning: God, please help me to be the most effective counselor I can be today.

I come on to the treatment floor. I do my job and I get to see and effect change. When the graduation comes, you watch a hundred guys who completed a year long program. Some of them standing at the podium thanking you for helping them put their family together, helping them get their job. That’s a spiritual painting and it’s priceless.

One of the things I’ve noticed from these interviews is that the most grateful people seem to be the ones who are living out some deep meaning.

Yeah, that’s part of it, too. I know back then for me everything was superficial. Your happiness was dependent upon what you owned and that’s so shallow in life. My wife and I don’t live a wealthy lifestyle now by any means. But we are totally grateful for where we live. We love our neighbors. Our neighbors love us. We have a dog and the dog is happy to see us when we come home. Those little things matter.

Actually, just the other day I started talking about our dog and my wife started crying. “I love that little dog so much!” [They both laugh.] To be grateful to have an animal like that and care so much is just something I would have never been able to comprehend ten years ago. This conversation would have been completely different.

To close, I was wondering if you both would share something that you’re grateful for this very day.

Ladies first.

Bernadette Prentice: Something I’m grateful for this very day. I would have to say my marriage. It’s like God’s will. When I first got sober, my sponsor would bring me here to the Midnight Mission to serve the homeless on Thanksgiving and that’s kind of how I got turned on to here, not knowing that I would meet my husband here many years later.

The kind of lifestyle that I had lived before was similar to my husband’s and so I'm thankful just to have somebody to share life with now. We were sharing this recently. This is the best time of our life because all we’ve ever known is jails and institutions and all of that. So to actually have somebody to share life with is something that I’m eternally grateful for.

What about you, David?

David Prentice: Mine is pretty easy, because it’s all-encompassing. Of course my marriage, my job, my mentors, the people that I have in my life. That goes without saying. But really what I’m most grateful for today is that there’s nothing in my life I want to change. There’s nothing where I go, “You know, it would just be a little better if this changed or that changed.”

I’m completely happy and content exactly where God has me, doing exactly what He has me doing and for that, I’m the most grateful. I get up every day and my shoulders are relaxed and I don’t freak out in traffic. I use the saying, “They can’t cut you off if you let them in.” The peace and serenity of being just okay, being me today, as it should be is what I’m most grateful for. I don’t want to go change anything.

Thank you both so much for taking the time to speak with me today.

Absolutely!