After 13 months homeless, a R.I. writer finds ‘sanctuary' thanks to 3,300 strangers

Boston Globe

11-07-2025

Lily — who'd once been starving and mangy, tied to a fence in Texas — seemed to believe him, he said.
'And when we got here — she's loving it," Fealey said on a recent morning as Lily rested on a couch in a townhouse in southern Rhode Island where they now live with Fealey's girlfriend, Lane McDonald.
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Fealey now has a place to call home thanks to
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In the 9,000-word piece, Fealey, 57, a University of Rhode Island graduate and former journalist, described how police rapped on his car window late at night, how security guards ordered him to leave store parking lots, how he feared for his life when a stranger came up behind him in a vacant lot at 3 a.m.
The article grabbed the attention of a Narragansett family, who took it upon themselves to track down Fealey, find him shelter, and set up a GoFundMe page. 'My kids love Rhode Island, and they said, 'Oh, my God, Mom, this could be any of us,'' Janice Mathews
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As of Thursday night,
'We are happy that he has a roof over his head and that his life is better,' Mathews said this week.
Fealey said, 'It just shows you how many good-hearted people there are out there. It's very heartening and just positive because in these times — with the things that are going on and we're living in a totalitarian democracy — that there's people out there who give a s--t."
The Esquire article came out at a time when when 653,104 people were experiencing homelessness across the United States, according to the
The number of homeless people in Rhode Island had risen to 2,442 people ― according to a
Fealey said the response to his article reflects a widespread concern about the housing crisis.
'Everyone's being affected by it, except a certain higher realm,' he said. 'People know that they're not living as well as they once did, or as they expected. And there's whole generations that are not going to get houses, the way things are going.'
Fealey and McDonald moved into the townhouse, which they began renting in May.
On a recent morning, a bouquet of sunflowers burst from a vase, and container of sea glass rested on the kitchen table. McDonald said Fealey wakes up early and writes, she paints and works from home, and Lily enjoys walking on nearby trails and beaches.
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McDonald, who'd been struggling to afford rent in Narragansett and living with her parents, said that if a fortune teller had looked into a crystal ball a year ago — showing them living 'in this beautiful place,' no longer worried about whether Fealey is safe — she wouldn't have believed it.
'It's still unbelievable,' she said. 'It's a dream. It's coming out of a nightmare, and it's a dream.'
Lane McDonald, left, and Patrick Fealey take Lily for a walk near their home.
David L Ryan/ Globe Staff
Fealey said he finally feels at peace.
'When I was homeless, I was on high alert all the time,' he said. 'I now feel safe and more at ease, calmer. I think most people feel good when they come home from whatever they are doing. Home is, or should be, a sanctuary. I have that now and am so grateful.'
But Fealey is concerned about his health.
After contracting Lyme disease, he underwent tests and was told he was close to kidney failure. He attributed that to psychiatric medications he has been taking for years and the stress of being homeless.
Fealey has said he was stricken at age 29 with what he describes as 'a violent and disabling onset of manic depression.' For the next 26 years, he got by on a mix of eight medications, traveling the country while banging out literary fiction on a 1939 Smith Corona Clipper typewriter.
Fealey said he relied on Medicaid for those psychiatric medications. 'That was my lifeline,' he said. 'I have medications I need, or I will basically kill myself. They are keeping me alive.'
Now, Fealey said he is worried that millions will lose Medicaid since
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" That's gonna be more really sick people in the street," Fealey said. 'What's happening in America?'
Patrick Fealey is now living in a townhouse in Rhode Island.
David L Ryan/ Globe Staff
When he was living in his car, Fealey wrote the Esquire article while using the back of his Paul Reed Smith acoustic guitar as a desk. Now, he has a desk in a sun-filled room.
Fealey said he has written a nonfiction book about his experience of being homeless, and over the years he has written 14 novels. He said talked to one agent but it wasn't the right fit. So he is now looking for an agent. He said he needs to sell his books so he doesn't end up homeless again.
Meanwhile, a play is being written about Fealey's experience.
O'Brien, who lives in Los Angeles, said the
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'Like so many, I was deeply moved by Patrick's essay in Esquire,' O'Brien said. He said he felt 'lots of points of connection' with Fealey's story, and having the essay about his brother in the same issue 'seemed like serendipity or kismet.'
O'Brien said he 'kind of staggered' by the quality of Fealey's writing. 'His essay makes personal and human a subject that is too often ignored,' he said, 'and I've always felt compelled to write plays about taboo subjects — problems a culture would rather deny or vilify than reckon with."
With housing costs skyrocketing and more people becoming homeless, the situation seems unsustainable, O'Brien said. 'It will be a political play — not at the expense of telling a human story — but it will impart a lot of reality and instigate a desire to change things," he said.
O'Brien said there's talk of how empathy
is in short supply these days. But, he said, 'His story kind of forced us, or me at least, to feel empathy rather than being overwhelmed or having my eyes glaze over with statistics. That could be me or someone I know and love.'
Edward Fitzpatrick can be reached at