Imagine it is Bermuda's coldest night in history and you are tucked away with heaters, heated blankets, comforters and sealed windows.

You sleep, knowing that when you wake tomorrow that you have a job, friends, family and many people to turn to for support.

Your past does not haunt you and if you were to lose your job, there would not be much of a problem getting another job.

"Rick'' used to feel as secure as you might be feeling -- until he found himself homeless last year.

He lived in a shelter for several months but he has been unable to pay for a bed for more than a month.

He spends these winter nights -- including the one in January when the temperature dropped to 44.9 degrees -- huddled in an alleyway under a blanket and whatever cardboard and paper that he could stuff in his clothes.

"I always had somewhere to turn, to family, friends, or a girlfriend whenever I had to move,'' he said. "Now I have nothing. Nothing. I don't even have a toothbrush or my own soap.

"I have to buy food more than shelter. I'm too hungry to do anything else.

"I think about food all day. I yearn for food.'' In his thirties, Rick is a recovering addict who found a prison term in the last half of the 1990's to have killed his desire for drugs.

He will not use again, he said, because "I have been that road. Why? It never got me anywhere. If anything it got me here, in this position.'' He added: "You know, the hardest thing is waking up and not knowing what is going to happen.

"I thought I had an opportunity to be productive again. I'm learning otherwise.

"You survive the best way you know how when you are out here. You put something hot in your belly and you hunker down and hope nobody tries to rob or kill you.

"I wouldn't wish homelessness on anyone. I have met people who have been doing this for years. All I'm asking for is a chance to escape it. One chance.

Everyone keeps telling me to come back, but they won't give me a job.'' Rick explains he is willing to work in landscaping, painting, plumbing, and as a general construction worker.

Without work he cannot pay for a bed at the Salvation Army Emergency Shelter.

Even though he is homeless, "Rick'' is still fastidious. Before being interviewed, about his abject poverty, he combed his hair.

"Of course I still do these things,'' he said. "I have to maintain my pride and dignity.'' He speaks of his condition in the most hushed tones, shocked at the transformation in his life.

"I didn't even know that Barr's Bay Park -- right next to a Police Station and a multi-million dollar company -- is a haven for homosexuals at night,'' he said. "I thought it might make a safe place to get some sleep and be early at the construction site next door.

"But I was approached by someone as I slept under a bush. He offered me money for sex. I'm not that way. I still can't even believe the stuff going on there.'' And he has to run a gauntlet of drug dealers, both major and minor who know his condition and offer relief.

"On the way here I told a guy that I wanted money for food,'' Rick said. "He said I could take ten bags of weed and deliver them for him, just like that, and I would have several weeks' money for the shelter. It's hard, man.'' He concluded: "The last few weeks have been the worst of my life. I could never have imagined what has happened. But I cannot risk being incarcerated again. It doesn't make any sense.'' One has to wonder if he was talking about selling drugs or being homeless.