I haven't seriously spoken or written about my time on the "outside" in a while. The "Outside' being Homeless. I lost my house about a decade ago, and was outside for a little over a year. Staying with friends at first then at the radio station I worked at. However ultimately on the actual street.
There I am above six months in. Blank dead eyes, and all.
I found that even among the homeless there was a pecking order. At the bottom those with no options. These slowly fell to pieces mentally, and physically. I was in what could be called the upper middle class of that demographic. In that I was still employed had insurance friends,...options.
I kept a photo/written journal though my family didn't know then.
I told only two close friends from my broadcast life. In fact I came out as homeless on one of my radio programs. Only in America. Anyway I didn't at first know how to be a houseless person. I tried the subway for 'one' night.
Eventually I figured out what most employed homeless do. The Railroad. The commuter lines. One buys a weekly ticket, and there you are. A place to sleep, and pass the time. In the beginning I used Amtrak.
The Grand Central to Washington D.C. round trip. It takes a day, and keeps you off the streets,...but eventually was just too much hassle, and too expensive.
So the L.I.R.R. Midtown to the tip of Long Island,...Montauk.
If one behaved, and appeared like a regular commuter fine. However I noted some who were at it for a while we're losing it. One does go mad out there. They stopped caring for their appearance or began bothering other passengers.
Ticket or not they were ejected at the next stop.
Of course the conductors knew who we were,...they saw us everyday. However if we were cool so were they...live, and let live within the rules. So after my radio engineering shift to Grand Central, and sleep. I'd get to Montauk in time for lunch, and time at the library. Then back sleep, and get to town in time for my next shift.
That was it except for a few months in the parks streets or sleeping in the store room at the radio station.
On the streets I remember being always wet, and cold. Always moving. You can't stop. A great danger if you do. If you try to sleep really deep sleep you'll be found by cops or crazies. Even worse by those wanting to "help" you. They were paid by the head. For everyone they "helped" toss into the system they got a bounty. Nice huh?
My ankles, and feet became swollen because I was on the move for so long....you don't dare lay down. One finds a niche, and crouches. You cat-nap for ten fifteen minutes at a time. This is why we all seem so bleary eyed to you. Tranced as if in a sleep walk.
This because we are.
One's hearing also becomes acute. This because you are surrounded by constant danger. My brother said it was the same for him in the war,...the Vietnam war. He also said I was finally a veteran since I like him had spent a year in constant danger.
All this for just over a year. However I lived. I survived.
Yes it's left it's mark.
Like being in a war it never leaves you. You have vivid flash backs,...I still do. I'm writing again because they're back. Just as war came back to my brother. So the streets have once more come back to me. They will they always will to my last day return, and return.
When my sister found out, and helped me find a new home, and I began to heal. I sought help. Although I found there were many agencies, and programs for those near being homeless or already so. However none,...as in NONE for those that were recovering from it.
Finally I saw the truth of it.
So 'few' return from that state there's no incentive or funds to help us. Homelessness is a plague with a 98% fatality rate. The surviving 2% are on their own.
So 'few' return from that state there's no incentive or funds to help us. Homelessness is a plague with a 98% fatality rate. The surviving 2% are on their own.
So here I am treating my wounds by posting this.
Enjoy the eclipse.
Mind has gone on for near 10 years.
Mind has gone on for near 10 years.
4 comments:
Several years ago while I was in that curious condition of being between jobs I befriended a man, who as his fortunes varied was homeless, and then homed, and then homeless again. I found a job, which I still have, and kept my modest room at a boarding house. So we had that in common.
For several years I would meet up with him at the local library and give him a ride in my car to his apartment or when he was homeless to where he was camping out. Unfortunately he had a criminal record. His past made it very difficult for him to get hired. The fact that when I knew him he was not the man who had committed the crimes of his youth does not count for much. Hiring someone with a record is a risk that too many are unwilling to take.
I have spoke with some of the folks who had known him. There are those who looked upon his homelessness as something he chose. There is I suppose something to that. He had family that he could have reached out to. But it is a thing which many men find difficult to do. It is complicated. Particularly because his family was hundreds of miles from our neck of the woods.
One man who volunteers at a local soup kitchen said to me "perhaps it was his calling to lead the life he did." The temptation when you hear someone say a thing like that is to say "horse hockey," or words of the sort. It may have been so. Amongst the many homeless of the area, I don't want say he was unique, but he was a man of intelligence, good humor, and a kind of stoicism. And there were many who would befriend him. He knew so many people that from time to time if we were having a conversation and someone would pass by he would interject a quick bio of the person.
At the end of the day he lived with the consequences of his past. Not everyone with a criminal record has the misfortune of being rejected by potential employers seemingly at every turn.
So back in 2015 the following was published.
"MORRISTOWN — Police have identified a man whose lifeless body was found on a bench in front of the post office Saturday morning.
For the past decade Marvin McDonald, 54, had lived at various addresses in Morristown, including 51 Washington St., but was probably homeless at the time of his death, Lt. Stuart Greer said in a statement. While the cause had not yet been determined Monday, McDonald's death is not believed to be suspicious.
McDonald's identity was not made public until his family had been notified, Greer also said."
I was surprised by how much his death hurt. Though I should not have been.
Remember the UN Declaration of Human Rights? It is a little more detailed then our Declaration of Independence. Here are some excerpts.
Article 1.
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Article 5.
No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
Article 25.
(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
(2) Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. All children, whether born in or out of wedlock, shall enjoy the same social protection.
Aren't those some beautiful ideas?
Unless I missed something, in recent years, we have not always lived up to these principles, here in the land of E pluribus unum.
It is so awful that this happened to you Sidney. The subject fills me with dread. I know it could happen to me, and I wouldn't be able to cope.
Housing is a right guaranteed by the Italian constitution. It ought to be treated as such everywhere, as in the UN Declaration that Patrick has cited. I think homelessness is a crime against humanity.
I never saw a homeless person in my life until Reagantime. I think that the public process of becoming inured to the existence of homelessness on a large scale was part and parcel of Americans, and to a lesser extent other people, becoming callous and indifferent to the suffering of others - that it accompanied our debasement as a nation, making it a fitting place for the most despotic economic system the world has ever seen: capitalism. We're right back to the gilded age and the Malthusian economics of the English Poor Laws.
Have I ever mentioned that capitalism is dogshit on a stick? It can never be said often enough.
Z
Yes though there were always Hobos. The Regan era was when regular folks fell into the life. It's been near 40 years that people have lived on the streets of America. Four times longer than the great Depression,...think of that for a moment..."Four Times Longer".
They're invisible to all now they've been around so long. In fact when I post of talk about this readers come out of the closet, and say they too were Homeless for at least a time. I think like family violence this is far more common than we want to believe.
Though we're blind to it,...many of us. History is not.
There will be another civilization on the other side of all this. The world 'will' go on without us. Their judgment will not be kind. Our real end began with the Second Hundred Years War+ roughly 1900~2030. An era that ultimately will topple the West, and lead to a new Dark Age.
They will see our rot for what it was.
I can read their judgment now.
A short excerpt "From Renaissance to Darkness" The Rise, and Fall of Post-Medieval Western Civilization 1500~2060. Lhasa University Press, 2348 C.E.
"...from the middle of the 20th century there was a time of unparalleled wealth in the West. In particular within the former United States of America. Still there were beggars everywhere. Education was only for the very wealthy the same with health care. In the later early 21st century they dispensed with the charade. Western culture openly disenfranchised the majority of it's populations in favor of a tiny insulated wealthy class. This led to the inevitable results described in chapter six of this volume."
Post a Comment