Christmas Day 1991 : Not at Home for Holidays : Homelessness: Season is particularly trying for those without a roof of their own, and more so with children involved.

COSTA MESA —  There’s no denying it: This has been a different sort of holiday season for Ed, Mary and their two teen-age children. Christmas is hardly the same without a home to call your own.

Consider the tree. No towering noble fir, this one. Mindful of fire restrictions at the Costa Mesa homeless shelter where they have taken refuge, the family has settled for a 2-foot sprig of pine festooned with cut-out paper decorations and a makeshift string of popcorn.

But somehow, they have preserved a healthy outlook.

“You don’t have to have a bunch of fancy bulbs and sparkling lights,” Mary said. “That’s not the meaning of Christmas.”

Ed and Mary, who didn’t want their last name used, are hardly unusual these days. They are among upward of 12,000 homeless people in Orange County--a quarter of them children--struggling with recession and struggling for survival as they try to scrape together the rudiments of a holiday celebration.

For those out on the streets, it may seem like any other day--cold, edged with hunger. The more fortunate ones who have managed to find a spot in a shelter will have an easier time of it. Donations of food, clothing and toys will mean a decent enough Christmas for most.

But it still won’t be the same, especially for the swelling number of county residents who are suddenly and unexpectedly homeless. With the persistent recession still gripping the nation, an increasing percentage of homeless people are those put on the streets by the whims of the economy and personal misfortune: a job suddenly lost, a debilitating injury.

“More and more people are falling off the edge,” said Barbara W. Johnson, executive director at Fullerton Interfaith Emergency Service, a nonprofit social service agency. “Any kind of catastrophe puts them over. Unemployment, illness, divorce. Maybe they’re in a shared-housing arrangement, and the other person moves out. Suddenly they’re left to pay the whole rent and can’t. It takes as little as that.”

These are Christmas cards from the edge.

Take the case of Joseph and Sandra. Until recently, both had good jobs. Then within the span of a few months, she had to go on disability because of a high-risk pregnancy, and he was laid off by the electronics appliance store where he worked as a salesman.

Bills piled up. Their El Toro apartment complex was sold out from under them, and they moved into a motel. Pride kept them from turning to relatives. Besides, what could most of them do to help?

“After a while, reality sets in--we were homeless,” said Joseph, 35.

Together with their 11-year-old daughter, they entered the Orange Coast Interfaith Shelter in Costa Mesa a few weeks ago.

The shelter has provided a safe haven. Joseph is busy taking classes to learn computer bookkeeping. He’ll finish in February just in time for the baby. Their 60-day stay at the shelter will allow the family a respite to put together money for first and last months’ rent on an apartment.

In the meantime, they’ve managed to put together the semblance of a Christmas for their daughter. But for a while, it didn’t look like that would happen.

“The Christmas tree was a big issue,” said Sandra, 30. “Traditionally, we’ve gotten one the day after Thanksgiving. But we couldn’t this year.”

After the family arrived at the shelter, the managers gave them an artificial tree. “It’s artificial, but it’s a Christmas tree. My daughter loved it,” Sandra recalled.

Presents also mysteriously appeared under the tree, thanks to an Irvine woman who bought the little girl $300 worth of gifts through the Adopt-A-Family program. A holiday meal will be cooked, turkey will be put on the table. A bit of the Christmas glow will return.

“We never expected or wanted to be in this situation,” Joseph said. “But it can happen to anyone. It can happen at any time.”

It happened to Barbara Allen a few weeks ago.

Since she divorced her husband in 1987, Allen has managed to scrape by with her 16-year-old daughter, Teri. They have lived in a variety of situations--apartments, government housing, a trailer, motel rooms, a tent at a local camping ground.

But the spiral hit bottom recently. Allen found herself on the street with Teri, who was 9 months’ pregnant. They spent one night at a fast-food restaurant. They got so desperate they called 911. Ultimately, the Allens found themselves at New Vista, a homeless shelter in Fullerton.

The family shares a cramped bedroom at the shelter, but there is a decorated Christmas tree in the front parlor with gifts beneath it, donated by good Samaritans. Half a dozen are for Teri’s newborn son, Joey.

“The shelter tries to make it as good as they can,” Allen said. “But this year is the worst. It’s never been this bad for us. I’ve never had to be in this situation before. It bothers me I’m not able to buy my kids some presents.”

Charlene (Charlie) Hawkins, 20, can certainly relate to that. But the divorced mother of three feels some relief in the simple fact that her children--ages 11 months, 3 and 2--are so young they don’t grasp the magnitude of the situation. Hawkins herded the clan into the Orange Coast Interfaith Shelter recently while she continues to look for work.

“It’s been hard for me, but the kids don’t really understand,” said Hawkins, who hopes to get a job as a secretary to pay her way through nursing school. “As long as they have those bright paper packages under the tree, they’re happy.”

Hawkins shares a flat at the Orange Coast shelter--and the tiny decorated Christmas tree--with Ed and Mary.

Ed, 44, and Mary, 47, fell on hard times after they left their jobs in Texas and moved out to California to help her sister, an Orange County resident whose husband died this year.

After a time, they moved to Porterville with $2,000 in savings, eager for the small-town life again. But the family quickly discovered there was no work to be had. After holing up in a hotel for a month, they found their money had evaporated.

They fared little better in the job hunt when they returned to Orange County. With nowhere else to turn, they entered Orange Coast Interfaith Shelter.

In the weeks since, their luck changed. Ed, whose voice still carries the drawl of his native Georgia, got a job as a security guard at an aerospace plant. Mary found work as a private nurse tending an elderly woman. They’ve been hunting for an apartment to move into after the new year.

Life is looking up.

But this remains as grim a Christmas as they can remember, particularly for the children.

“Our kids are teen-agers. They don’t know what cheap is, and they never lacked for anything in the past,” said Mary, a calm and bespectacled woman. “If you’re going to think about Christmas shopping, you better get that out of your mind.

“The kids are old enough to realize the situation we’re in. It brings them down to earth. It makes things back to reality for all of us. There’s no more pie in the sky.”