ORLANDO, Fla. – For Michael Hudson, a shower makes him feel human again.

“It really does,” he said.

So when he got a call from a friend that there was a mobile shower trailer outside the Downtown Orlando Library branch on Wednesday, Hudson said he ran down.

“I used to shower three, four times a week. But now it’s once every week or two,” Hudson said.

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The importance of a shower cannot be understated when you are homeless. For one thing, Hudson says, it helps when trying to get a job.

“When you go in there and you haven’t had a shower in a week, that kinda holds you back,” he said.

For another, as Biannca Gerena with The WASH Foundation says, a shower gives people a chance to relax and be alone.

“A shower is more than a shower,” Gerena said. “If you realize when you don’t get a shower, you just don’t feel comfortable. It’s not a good feeling, you know? Just to start a good day, you will want to start fresh with a shower and clean,” she said.

The WASH Foundation, which is part of the nonprofit Clean the World, offers its free shower service to anyone who needs it at locations throughout Orange County.

The Downtown Orlando Library is the latest site for The WASH Foundation, which will park its trailer behind the building on Wall Street on the first and third Wednesday of every month going forward.

The mobile shower service is funded with private donations and help from the Orange County government. Hilton Hotels also partners on the project. The WASH Foundation says the service costs about $1,200 a service day to run, but it’s cheaper than anything the government could do on its own.

The trailer has four private bathrooms, with one that is ADA-accessible. Each room includes a toilet, sink, and shower stall with hot and cold running water. Guests get a hygiene bag that they can take with them and a towel to use during the shower. The showers run about 15 minutes and are wiped down after every use.

In the first hour or so Wednesday, seven people had already taken a shower.

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Frank Crosby was also one of those people.

“I had to go check in a book and check back out a book again for another three weeks. Then I had to go pick up money for my rent, which is due tomorrow,” Crosby said. “And then when I noticed this, I said, ‘well, I’m in the neighborhood, so what the heck?’ I thought I’d take advantage. It was hot outside.”

Crosby may have a place to live, but not a place to shower whenever he wants. He has a small place on the property of a home in Bithlo, and he has to ask to shower at the main house ahead of time.

If it wasn’t for his social security benefits, he wouldn’t even have that.

“The only other place I could go to take something like this is go to Kissimmee and pay 50 bucks for a motel room. That’s laundry, room, and transportation just for one day,” Crosby said.

Hudson says he’s been homeless since May. He lives on the streets with a group of men because he doesn’t care for the shelters in town.

“I don’t feel safe there, so I’d rather be on the streets with my friends where there’s safety in numbers,” he said.

Florida’s ban on public camping has made that harder.

“We go maybe three or four days before the cops find us and then go somewhere else. We have to find places to hide. I don’t know how many sleepless nights I had because I couldn’t find any place to sleep,” Hudson said.

The Orange County Library System, which runs the downtown branch, doesn’t provide any funding, just space for the truck.

However, the shower service is in line with the growing number of social services the Orange County Library System provides, such as social workers who help connect people to government services or career services like resume help and programs to improve job skills, all free with a library card.

“We try to provide services, any kind of services we can think of that are new, might be a thing that helps people,” said Leigh Andrus with the library system. “It’s a wide variety of resources based on helping to educate people and just helping them improve their lives.”

Hudson says a library social worker helped him get SNAP benefits, and he utilizes the WiFi to communicate with his friends and find a job.

“The hardest part is getting jobs, when somebody finds out you’re homeless and they don’t want to hire you. I was in retail management for years. I can still do it. I’m intelligent, got a college degree, I know what I’m doing,” he said.

Gerena says this is true of many of the homeless people she’s met since she began working for Clean the World.

“You always get people with ‘oh just be careful with them, you don’t know what can happen,‘” Gerena said. “But once you get to know them, honestly know them, who they are, and why they’re in this situation, you just connect with them.”

“Just don’t judge,” she added.

A calendar for the mobile shower services is available on The WASH Foundation website. Just click on “Orange County, FL” to get updated locations by month.

Gerena also says the group is accepting clothing donations, especially donations of new underwear. You can bring them to the group’s shower service locations. You can also donate or sign up to volunteer on the website.