Irene "Smokie" McGee

I Can't Believe She's Gone. Irene McGee otherwise known as "Smokie" Has Just Passed Away. Smokie was The Very First Tiny House Recipient and the Inspiration behind MYTHPLA (My Tiny House Project LA) and Starting Human. 
If you are one of the Many Many People Who's Lives She Touched, Please Help us Take Care of Her Funeral Costs by Making a Donation. Whatever you can do will be greatly Appreciated!

Rest In Peace Smokie. You Changed Lives and Inspired Millions. You are Loved and You are Missed.

Forever You Friend, 

~Elvis Summers (or as you would say, your guardian angel)

If You Would Like to Pay Your Respects to Smokie, Please Join us This Friday and Saturday. Friday there will be a Viewing of Smokie from 4Pm - 8Pm and The Funeral Service HAS BEEN CHANGED, There was a Double Booking and Unfortunately the Funeral must now be MONDAY at 2Pm. Both will be at the same Location:
Love  and Unity Community Church
4720 South Avalon Blvd
Los Angeles CA 90011

Smokie will be then Laid to Rest on Tuesday at Abby Memorial Park in Compton CA.

If You would Like to hear more of Her Story, PLEASE READ BELOW

a 63 year old black woman from South Los Angeles who was Homeless and had been living on the streets for over a decade. After her husband died, she lost thier house and began living on the streets. Smokie was a royal Pain in the ass. She really was sometimes, but Smokie didn't care about other people's approval, she wanted to do it her way or no way, and that was simply that. 

Smokie was a Homeless Black Woman living in the streets of South Los Angeles, and I am a White Guy From Seattle with a MoHawk. Our friendship was definitely an Unlikely and Unusual match, an Odd Pair of people to meet and become so close at the very least. 

Smokie was a Real Person. A person with a LOT of problems, a LOT of struggles, she had NO Filter when she spoke and on bad days she could be a real bitch....but she also had a huge heart, wanted to help everyone and She Was my friend. I miss her So Much. Smokie wanted to be an Exray Technitian when she was a little girl. I couldn't believe my ears when she told me that, i mean come on, who wants to be an exray technitian when they are growing up. 

When i first met her, she would come by my apartment asking for my cans and bottles to recycle and i told her i would save them up for her. After a few months of getting to know her, it hit me one day that everyone in this neighborhood knows her and likes her. Everyone talks to her, is kind to her and waves at her all the time, yet when the sun went down, nobody seemed to care that she was sleeping in the dirt next to one of the houses down the street. This really pissed me off that people were so damn busy in thier lives and didn't have even a minute to give a damn that this grandmother was sleeping in the dirt, so I decided to build her a tiny house.

I built her the tiny house right outside of my apartment in the street, put wheels on it and posted a video of the build and me giving her the house in hopes that a few people would donate some money so i could build a few more to help some more people get a safer and warmer nights rest. We had no idea that the video would go viral and launch us right into leading massive movement and enable us to help so many more who are in desperate need of help. 

Smokie Struggled with a bad addiction and had picked up many bad habbits over the years from having to live in a 24/7 survival mode in a vulture society, but when she got her tiny house and got a good solid nights rest, even the very next day, she felt so good and so alive that it lifted her Soul right off the dirty pavement and gave her the feeling of self worth and dignity, something she had forgotten what it even felt like, it gave her Wings and she told me she felt like she could do anything. Something so simple, yet so powerful. She immediatly wanted to get a job and get sober and move up to an apartment of her own. She Also wanted my car and tried really really hard to convince me that I should give it to her. I told her if she gets a license we'd talk about it.

Smokie had a lot of dreams and was still so full of life and for the first time in longer than she could remember, she felt like she had a chance to get her life back and on her own terms. She struggled hard, but got herself sober. Something she had wanted for a very long time. That is until the City of Los Angeles forced me to take her little tiny home away from her and put her back on the street. Everything pretty much spun downward from that point on. I remember the day it happened because she called me crying her eyes out saying she didnt want to go back to having to sleep on the ground and didn't want to be moved by a bunch of people that sold drugs because it was going to such her back in. She knew it would happen and was terrified of it. 

Smokie was crushed and fell into some bad depression. She did the best she could to stay busy, but living back in the gutter started to really take a hard toll on her body. After years of abuse and living in such horrible conditions, like most who are stuck living on the streets, not even able to wash thier hands or use a bathroom, her body was finaly starting quit on her. Smokie Still had a good few years left in her, despite the years of living rough, but this would have only been possible if she had been able to live in a clean and safe environment and not been forced to return to the street and live in filth without access to clean water, food and shelter. I sit here and cant help wonder if the City had stepped up and done thier elected jobs and had even some sort of moral compass and helped her intead of push her back down, if i'd be sitting here writing this now.

Despite everything that has happened and all we've gone through, i am so greatful and thankful to Smokie, because She Truly touch my Life and changed it forever. And She Did this to not only me, but to Millions of poeple all over the world. She inspired people, helped people, and brought HOPE to those who had none. Smokie was able to Re-connect with her family in the end and brought so many people together. A Poor Black Woman from the ghetto streets of Los Angeles. A Woman that society abandoned a long time ago and treated like dirt on a daily basis.

Smokie Was My Friend....no Smokie IS my Friend and I love her very much. She Inspired me, Changed my Life Forever and I Miss Her Sooo Much. I Can't Believe She's Gone! :-(

Your Donation will go Directly to her Mother Francis and Her Sisters to pay for the funeral costs and any amount of donations left (if any) will go to Honor Her Memory by Paying for The First Community Garden to be Built on the First Tiny House Community, Which will be Dedicated and Named, "Smokie Point". Smokie had wanted to build, work and manage these gardens herself as she had a love for gardening and had hoped to teach others to take care of the gardens as well as build more like it, But since she has left this world before we could see that dream through, the least I can do is create her dream for her so that others may get the chance to find purpose again and be lifted up. 

~R.I.P. Smokie