the Lou Gehrig's of the spirit and the warmth of addicts — "getting any kind of nurturing or…"

The street bottom as the only place warmth is left: the seminarian brother's faith rots into "a kind of degenerative Lou Gehrig's Disease of the spirit" out among the ungrateful homeless-addicted flocks, and Loach, holding out his hand for a touch nobody will give, ends up "getting any kind of nurturing or empathic treatment only from homeless and addicted stem-artists," drinking from their brown-bagged bottles, nearly disappearing into the silt for good. Only the intoxicated will touch the untouchable.