A Not-So-Simple Life

In a cramped Washington rowhouse, six women share one shower and a quest to serve God
By Darragh Johnson
Sunday, January 25, 2009

Now for the peekaboo pumps: Do they stay? Or go?

The missionary spins a shoe in her hand, admiring its red sole, slinky heel and winking peep of open toe. She's worn the pair just once, when she dressed as Tina Turner for Halloween. They were so uncomfortable. And totally impractical: In her ministry work in Southeast Washington, when she's climbing the stairwells of public housing projects and praying with families in their living rooms, she opts for T-shirts and jeans.

But the shoes are so glam and unlike anything else she owns. She can't bear to throw them out; yet she cannot keep them -- there's no room. So Laura Cartagena leaves them on her bedroom floor and turns to the other possessions strewn across her bunk bed -- the Japanese paper lanterns, the Twister board game, the sleeping bag -- nearly all of which she will store at her parents' house in Maryland. the rest