Ian Lee Stewart grateful for new place to call home
Published:Saturday | June 18, 2022 | 12:08 AM
Ian Lee Stewart is overjoyed to have a new place to call home. Hardly able to contain his happiness, he said the house will make a big difference as his former dwelling was leaking and falling apart.
Stewart received a two-bedroom unit equipped with indoor sanitary facilities, a water-harvesting system and solar panel from BOOM Energy Drink in partnership with Food For The Poor (FFTP).
BOOM has now sponsored 20 homes for needy Jamaicans, having sponsored 10 homes in 2022 and 10 in 2021.
He shared that his old home was on shaky foundation, the left side of the one-bedroom concrete dwelling having collapsed and causing discomfort, particularly during the rainy season.
HARD TIMES
Stewart, a hard-working father to a two-year-old son Khalil Stewart, had fallen on hard times during the pandemic. In between his juggling and trying to make ends meet with the mother of his child, Damonia Dockery, he could not afford the repairs needed and reached out to FFTP for assistance.
Speaking of his family, Stewart shared that being a father has changed his entire outlook on life. After five years of high school, he graduated without sitting a single subject as his parents never had the money. It was his dream to eventually sit some subjects but working and living expenses have seen that dream being put on the back burner. Now a father, Stewart is determined that fate will not be his son’s. He is resolute that he will have all that he needs and more than he ever had.
“In life when you get a youth everything motivates you, so you have to try focus to get a better job, get a better life. Certain things you used to do, you have to stop. You don’t want him to grow up and be like you, continuing the struggle on and off. You have to put him in the right place,” he said.
Stewart said his dream for Khalil is for him to go to college and achieve more than he ever did. Among the changes fatherhood has brought into his life, he said is that he comes home earlier, just so he can spend time with his son.
He also had high praises for the mother of his son as he said a lot of women would not stick around in the rough times, but she motivates him and even helps him to achieve.
“Some lady would a get up and say she can’t live in this situation, she sticks around,” he shared.
As for Dockery, she praises Stewart’s fatherly skills as well as his determination to accomplish whatever he sets his mind to.
When he earns she says he gives her everything but she tells him to “take something for yourself and give me the rest,” she admitted.
Most of all, she said she appreciates the fact that he sticks around and tries to secure work close by as she recalls how she missed her own father when he went away.
Stewart, who received the house in time for Father’s Day, said he didn’t even know that Sunday would be that day.
“Words cannot explain, I never considered Father’s Day, I was focusing on my son and babymother’s birthday,” he confessed.
For his parting shot, Stewart said he is encouraging those who are charged with the awesome responsibility of being a father to get a skill, work hard and come home to their family.