All she wants for Christmas is a place to call home. Or, make that, she needs a place to call home ASAP.

In this Yuletide season when many are preoccupied with planning what to buy for gifts and how to cook the ham, 79-year-old Dorcas Richards has bigger concerns. The elderly woman needs a place to stay as she was given notice in October requesting that she leave the Passagefort home she has called home for years.

"Is seven years I lived there you know, Sir," she said. "The agent that rented me the place said that the owner was returning to Jamaica from the States and needed the house."

her concern

With a look on her aged face that perfectly summed up her concern, Richards told THE STAR: "I got the notice from October, but the problem is it's hard to find somewhere to rent. I never knew it was this difficult."

She joked that she had been asking everybody to assist her in finding a place to rent, "even duppy".

Richards said that rent for the one-bedroom, one-bathroom and kitchen section of the house that she occupies is $10,000. Her vending in New Kingston is her main source of income. Despite how slow things have got due to the current economic climate, she prides herself that she has always come up with the rent.

As it relates to food and groceries, some kind folks at MegaMart in Portmore make sure she is well taken care of.

"The supervisors there are very kind. I hardly have to buy anything at shops because every time they get pay, they come together and buy groceries for me," Richards said.

desperate for a place

One of the supervisors at the store confirmed this saying that some two years ago, Richards had gone to the store to purchase some supplies but was short on funds. Since then, the store representative continued, the supervisor 'adopted' the humble-spirited lady.

"So I don't have to worry about food," Richards continued. "But I'm fretting now because is November now and I still don't find anywhere to stay."

Richards said that while she is desperate for a place to rent, she would not mind getting another Portmore-based residence. "I like it here. I can't take the places where the gunshots are being fired."

Any kind-hearted person willing and capable of assisting Richards may call 533-6422.