Alf (Poverty and Homelessness, in the First World)

Alf

         

     Some family members and I were recently having a heart to heart about poverty in the United States, and it brought back a wave of memories for me, from a time when my oldest son and I were homeless in the Bay Area.  Most of this I have never spoken of to anyone before, out of shame, and out of the desire to forget it ever happened.  It was an extremely stressful time in my life that I had chosen to bury away in the far recesses of my brain.  There is a part of this story that is one of the deepest aches my heart carries, and to put it in words will make me relive that moment.  But instead of reburying it all again, I have decided it will be healing for me, and perhaps informative for others, if I tell this story, here in my blog. 
     The first time I was homeless was on the island of Kauai.  I was 19, and living there with my oldest son's father and another good friend.  While the situation was stressful and uncomfortable, and made worse when all of our belongings were stolen, there was a band of homeless veterans and assorted other folks on the North Shore who welcomed us to their campfires, and gave us a sense of community during that time.  There were prawns in streams to catch, tropical fruit everywhere to pick, and the temps were always mild, so living was not unbearable.  We sat around fires and talked of life, and survival, and made some decent memories in the midst of stress.  Our only real fear was being arrested for sleeping on the beach or in the parks.  Eventually, we got jobs and rented shacks, where we spent our days walking 5+ miles morning and night, to and from work.  Our nights were spent crashed on the wood floors of our shacks, waking up to do it all again the next day.  We worked hard, yet we found the easier pace of Island Time to be refreshing.
     Once back on the mainland, we rejoined the frenetic pace of the contiguous states.  My oldest son's father and I ended up living in an area along the California Delta.  I worked 16-hour days as assistant store manager for a fast food chain, and my partner worked in retail.  We lived in a pet-friendly apartment complex near our jobs, and had a kitten named Scallywag, a gift from my partner's mother.  In time, I found out I was pregnant with my oldest son, and near the end of my pregnancy, we rescued a puppy, and named him Alf.  Life felt survivable.
     Soon after my oldest son was born, we had to move, because we found out we had to have a two-bedroom home.  We could only afford the two-bedrooms in a rougher part of town.  Thankfully, the place we found allowed us to keep our pets. I now worked graveyard as a waitress at Denny's, so I could be home with my son during the day while my partner worked.  We were still treading water, but a downward spiral had begun that at that time I could not see, and had no way of knowing how to stop.
     When my oldest son turned two, the relationship between his father and I fell into disrepair, and eventually dissolved.  My biggest issue became finding childcare for my son while I worked.  Rent was 550.00 a month, and my checks, every two weeks, were about 130.00 each, not even half my rent when put together.  Tips varied, but the average was 20.00 a night, 5 nights a week.  I had no car.  After paying for rent and power, I barely had enough left to feed my child and critters.
     Living alone in that neighborhood was unsafe, but Alf took care of us.  His mother had been a Staffordshire Terrier, his father, a shepherd/lab mix.  Alf was a goofy-looking sweetheart, brindle in color, shaped like a shepherd, with one ear that never stood up, giving him a charming face.  He was always gentle with my son, who was his best buddy, but Alf could be ferocious if he saw or heard anything he felt might be threatening us or our home.  I felt quite safe with him around, and the security he brought was well worth the cheap dog food I bought for him.  As for the love he gave, that could not be quantified.
     Around this time, my sister went into the Peace Corps, and before she left for Honduras, she gave me her car, an older Mercury Lynx.  It was such a blessing to not have to walk miles to and from work anymore.
     During my night shifts, a paramedic started coming into Denny's after his shift ended, and he begin to interact with me a bit.  His mother and sister sometimes came in with him, and they all seemed very nice.  I started dating this man, and his mother and sister started watching my son for me once or twice a week.  I thought things were looking up.  This man took me and my son to see the trains in Martinez, to amusement parks, and to duck ponds and lakes for walks.  He talked of marrying me, and putting us on his medical insurance.  He painted beautiful word pictures of the life we would have together.  (A couple of years later, I discovered this man was never a paramedic, had never finished the 9th grade, and was already married to another woman, with whom he had a daughter.  I have no clue whose uniform and badge he wore during that first year I knew him.)  It would take me another two decades to fully understand my defective ability to read people, so 23-year-old me took this older man at his word, and let him into my life. 
    Some months down the road, things got rockier.  My car started leaking oil, more and more all the time.  I could not afford to get it checked.  About this time, I started getting violently ill, especially toward the end of my graveyard shifts.  At Planned Parenthood, I found out I was pregnant and was suffering from hyperemesis gravidarum, an extreme form of morning sickness.  My job eventually fired me for missing too much work because I was sick.  I went to sign up for food stamps, but was told by the worker that because I had been fired, I must wait 90 days before applying for any type of assistance.  My partner told me he would take care of everything, but soon afterward, I lost my apartment, and my son and dog and cat and I started sleeping in our car.  It was only supposed to be for a few nights, until my partner got the funds together for a place for all of us.  We parked my car in a visitor's parking place at the complex where my partner was still living with his mother and sister.  On the second night there, my partner's mother came out and told me I was too skinny to be pregnant, I must be lying to try and trap her son, and if I did not leave, she would call the police, and my child would be taken from me by CPS because we were sleeping in a car.      
     About now, many may wonder why I did not reach out to my family for help.  At that time in my life, I believed that my existence was a continuation of what I grew up with, a constant game I could never catch on to or win, where every decision I made was wrong, every word I spoke would be seen as a lie, every thing I loved was undeserved and would be taken away, my joy was evil, my needs were bad, and society, just like my father, would pounce on me at every turn I made, to make me pay for the very act of existing.  To me, that was the way things were. I did not even know it was what I believed.  It was just facts, like the sun rising everyday, or the sky being blue.  My life was a result of my badness, I was getting exactly what I deserved, and I must live with my mistakes, and never reach out to anyone for help.  Just like the sweet, clueless, gullible, eager-to-please child I had once been, I continued to think that someday, when I finally figured out how everyone else was playing the game, then things would start to work for me.  Until then, I believed I was on my own, and I deserved no help until I figured out how to play the game right.  A society that had no way of understanding how I had been raised, and family members who had no idea what my father had wrought, confirmed all of these beliefs with "tough love" words that reinforced my skewed view.  When I had made two different visits to my family in the Tr-Cities while my oldest son was a baby and later a toddler, my father made it clear that he and my mother would not watch my son for even one minute, so I could irresponsibly go off and visit friends.  Upon hearing that, I simply took my son with me to visit friends, careful not to make myself or my son a burden on anyone in my family.  Many times in my teens my father had said words like "No one can ever be accused of raping you, you are just asking for it,"  "I am spending no money on college for you, you are not worth it,"  "Any child you have is your responsibility, so do not ever come to me for help."  While no one else in the family ever agreed with him, or said those same words to me, I believed that must be how everyone felt.  So, I accepted what was happening in my life, and did not try to tell anyone what was going on, because I assumed I was getting exactly what I deserved.   I just wasn't sure what I had done to deserve it.  Once I figured that out, though, I believed things would improve.
     I remember once, my stepfather telling my stepbrother how I had not paid for car insurance because I was "...thumbing my nose at the system."  My inept ability to think or vocalize under moments like that kept me from speaking up to explain that I HAD no money for insurance, and had never figured out how to magically make needed funds simply appear.  With all of my warped beliefs back in '90, I decided that there was something intrinsically wrong with me, because I could not make 660.00 a month pay for 550.00 in rent, as well as buy food and pay for power and gas, and still have enough left for insurance.  Others must be doing it, so it was my fault that I could not.  My naive acceptance of this self-hatred hurts my heart now.  I was not bad, and I did my best not to hurt others.  I worked hard and tried to follow society's expectations and rules.  I hated myself for not having the common sense most folks seemed to have.  I failed to see that the only life-skills I had gotten from my father were how to silently withstand abuse, and how to hate myself.  I was very good at those skills.  Looking back now, I know that if I had called and told my Grandad that I was in need of help, he would have let me come live in his home until I got on my feet.  He had done this for other family members, including my mom, with me and my sister, when our parents divorced the first time, and my sister again while she attended college.  I know, if my mom had any way of knowing or understanding the situation I was in back then, she would have found a way to help me.  I also know now that I could have turned to my friend Vince, and his family, for help.  I had no way of understanding any of this in my twenties, though.  So, my son and pets and I became homeless.
     At first, I parked my car close to a playground near the hospital where my son had been born.  There were huge trees to keep the car cool enough for the dog and cat, a grocery store nearby to spend the last of my money on food, and a bathroom by the playground that my son and I could use.  A few days into this, my son started looking a bit grungy, so one morning, I figured out how to wash him over the drain in the bathroom floor, using a cup to pour water on him like a shower.  The warm water faucet in this bathroom worked, which was something we later discovered was not the case in every public restroom.  I washed his dirty clothes in the sink, and hung them from the car to dry.  He looked neat and tidy again, but I started to wonder how I was going to get clean. 
     I rigged up a cardboard box with dirt in it, on the floor behind the driver seat, so Scallywag had a bathroom.  Alf was fine with being walked in the park, and he enjoyed playing there with his boy in the early mornings, when no one else was around.  Those first few days were not so bad.  That swiftly changed.
     About 5 days into our stay, a man came and sat next to me on the park bench, where I was watching my son play with other kids on the slide.  The man started talking to me quietly, beginning with the words, "You need to be careful."  He said that my son had told some of the kids that he had no home now, and some of the neighbors were starting to be concerned about us and were going to call the police.  He said I needed to find a new place to hang out for a few days, and then move on to yet another place, and to keep doing that, because otherwise my son would be taken from me, and I might even be arrested.  He told me to stay away from shelters, because they were not safe for women and children, and I would probably lose my son if I went to one.  He told me where there were places around the county to safely get a meal once in awhile.  He said to always keep our dog close, that he looked like a good dog.  The man handed me ten dollars, stood up, and left.  He had said so much so fast, I sat in shock for a bit, then called my son over to the car, and we got in and drove away.  The car was low on gas, and was leaking about a quart of oil for every 10 miles it drove, so I was very worried about what we were going to do.  I remembered a gas card in my purse that my mother had loaned to me on a trip I had taken to see her and my stepfather.  I knew there was a gas station that accepted that card near the Antioch Bridge, so I drove there, and parked behind the station.  We listened to the radio, read a few children's books I had packed in the car, and as the sun set, we walked the dog and used the gas station bathroom.  I bedded my son down, and visited the bathroom a few more times, throwing up yellow bile because I had not eaten all day, and my stomach was reacting terribly to the stress, as well as the morning sickness.  That was a very long night, the beginning of some of the longer days and nights of my life.
     The next morning, I bathed my son in the gas station restroom, washed up a bit myself, used the gas card to get fuel and oil, and my son and I drove to Martinez, because I was feeling dizzy and weak, and the only hospital in Contra Costa County that accepted patients with no insurance was located in Martinez.  By the time we got there, I was barely able to walk.  I was severely dehydrated, but after receiving IV fluids, I felt much better.  We left the hospital that afternoon, and drove to Concord, where I remembered a park we had once visited.  I had the windows open at what I thought was a safe level, to keep all of us cooler, but I had not anticipated how tired our cat was getting of living in a car.  At an intersection stop sign, he leapt through the small opening in the window, and dashed down a street with very upper-middle-class-looking homes.  My son and I were devastated.  We circled that neighborhood for hours, calling for Scallywag, looking for him everywhere.  I secretly scanned the streets and gutters, worried that he might have been hit by a car.  We never saw him again.  We stayed near that neighborhood a few days, longer than we should have, and only left when I was quite sure the neighbors were watching us, and a police car started driving by us very slowly a number of different times.  The wind of optimism that usually spurred me on in the face of difficulties was nearly gone, and a kind of dull acceptance overtook me.
     The next few weeks and months were a blur of events that all ran together.  We used back roads to travel around.  We found places to get food, and places where we could park in shade for free.  I learned which fast food restaurants did not always lock their trash receptacle gates, so we could scavenge their timed-out food items.  I tried to use the gas card only once every four or five days, hoping my charges would get lost among the expenditures of the step-family members who were also using cards on that account.  Some gas stations had food marts, and I could buy a loaf of bread, some bologna, milk, dog chow, and ice, and my son and dog could eat for a few days without me having to search fast food garbage.  When I scraped together enough cash for tolls, we sometimes ventured closer to San Francisco, where there was access to more free meals, and it was easier to walk around with my son and dog, anonymously losing ourselves in the crowd.  I learned to panhandle near the BART Stations, and sometimes, if it was too late to walk all the way back to our car, we would spend the night in one of the station bathrooms.  My son would cuddle up under his blanket, Alf as his pillow.  I always wanted to sleep, always told myself I would sleep, but I never drifted off far enough to relieve my utter exhaustion.  I lost all track of days and dates.  Each day was spent surviving to the next meal.  Every moment was focused on evading the police, nosy people, and predators.  Each night was spent trying to figure out how I was going to get through the next day.  I met other homeless people, some openly homeless and hopeless, others (mostly those with kids), furtively homeless, trying to pass as a legitimate part of a society that would hurt them if they were caught.  None of us talked much to each other, and we tended to avoid each other if possible.  One homeless mother did tell me about a store-opening that was taking place.  There would be free hot dogs and soda, and she thought my son might enjoy that.  We did attend that store opening, and my son had a good time.  
     I had to keep returning to the hospital in Martinez, each time receiving fluids for extreme dehydration due to hyperemesis gravidarum.  This was our whole existence, our world, for months.  We made our way around the county slowly, eventually ending up back near the hospital where my son was born, this time at a park with some bushes next to tennis courts.  We slept out under those bushes, which was one of the few times I actually felt like I got real sleep, but waking up was terrifying, because I worried that in my sleep, a cop may have gotten close to us without me knowing.  We stayed a few days around there.
     One of those mornings, I woke to some labor pains.  I told myself they were Braxton Hicks contractions, but as the day wore on, they increased in intensity and frequency.  By afternoon, I started to get scared.  I was barely showing, and knew I was nowhere near far enough along to safely have this baby.  I was too scared to go through the process of finding a gas station for gas and oil, so I could drive all the way to Martinez.  Instead, I went to the ER at the hospital where my son had been born.  Even though I had no insurance, they took one look at me and admitted me right away.  The ER doctor ordered blood tests, fluids, and medication for me, and the OBGYN who had delivered my son was called in.  This obstetrician was a friend of one of my uncles, and had always treated me with kindness and respect.  He told me I was admitted for the night, and that my son could stay with me.  The contractions were starting to subside, but I was going to need to see him for an office visit, to have an ultrasound, and start some actual prenatal care.  I said I had no insurance, and he told me not to worry, that would be taken care of in the morning.
     I called my partner at home that night, and was glad when he, not his mother, answered the phone.  He said he would come walk Alf, and make sure the car was parked in a shady area.  He also decided to go with me for the office visit the next day, to see the ultrasound. 
     The next morning, the person who came to help me sign up for Medi-Cal was a lady who attended a church I had gone to a few times, soon after my oldest son was born.  It was the local SDA church, which my doctor also attended.  (It was through the SDA boarding school and medical school systems that my uncle, who is also a doctor, had met my OBGYN years earlier)  This sweet lady, named Kathy, remembered me from my church visits 3 years earlier.  She greeted me warmly before she sat down next to my bed to help me fill out forms.  As she asked me questions, I could see her face grow worried.  Finally, she put down her pen and said, "Honey, are you homeless?"  She whispered the words, aware of my son playing in the corner.  I decided to take a risk, and nodded yes.  She patted my hand, and said she knew how to find me and my son a place to stay.  I hoped this was true.
    Later that morning, I was discharged, and walked over to my doctor's office, which was next to the hospital.  Medi-Cal rules had changed since my oldest son was born.  I had to submit to a drug test and sit through an explanation about how to avoid gaining too much weight during pregnancy, neither of which applied to me in any way.  I did no drugs, and had done very little eating in the past few months.  Finally, I went in for the ultrasound.  I was very worried about the condition of the baby, and was sure that my next punishment for my sins was going to be finding out that my homelessness had harmed the child inside of me.  The ultrasound tech placed the goop on my skinny belly, and then put the transducer in place.  As he moved it around, I watched his face change, and my worst fears were confirmed.  Something was abnormal.  My mouth went dry from fear.  He continued to move the wand over my abdomen, starring intensely at the screen, then he stopped and clicked a still shot.  He looked over at me and spoke six words I will never forget:  "Do twins run in your family?"
     "No," my dry mouth croaked.
     "Well, they do now!" he said, with a big grin. 
     I spent the next 10 minutes or so saying "Oh my God," over and over, as we looked at two tiny babies, both in the upright position, seeming to be punching at each other as they obviously interacted together in their watery world.  It was an overwhelming experience.  The tech said one twin was definitely a boy, the other was most likely a girl.  I looked over at my oldest son in shock.  When I first found out I was pregnant, I had asked him if he wanted a brother or a sister, and he responded by saying he wanted a brother and a sister.  I now told him to look on the ultrasound screen, because he had gotten his wish.  Even my partner, who had acted distant and angry since arriving at the hospital the night before, seemed moved by the two babies on the screen.
     I was directed to an exam room to wait for my doctor.  My partner and son went to the waiting room.  My doctor came in grinning and congratulating me, but quickly switched into serious mode.  He told me to forget everything I had heard in the nutrition class earlier, because at 126 lbs, I was dangerously underweight for a twin pregnancy that was five months along, according to ultrasound measurements.  The nurse came in, and I was given a thorough exam.  I was anemic.  My teeth were loose and my gums were inflamed.  My toenails were loose and a few were infected badly.  I had a bladder infection, and most of my blood test numbers were way off.  My body had been leeching every last nutrient from me to provide for my pregnancy, but if I remained so unhealthy, I would lose these babies.  My doctor spoke of the extreme morning sickness as a sometime-sign and common symptom of multiple pregnancy, and he let me think that he was blaming my malnutrition on that alone, but some of his words betrayed his knowledge that I was homeless.  He wanted me on strict bedrest, and he told me that Kathy would help me find a way to make that happen.  He sent me off with bottles of iron and prenatal vitamins, and a prescription for Terbutaline, to control the preterm labor.  He told me to avoid anything with even minute traces of caffeine (including decaf coffee and chocolate), and he told me I must avoid stress, patting my arm as he said it, his eyes admitting that he knew how ridiculous this must sound to me in my current situation.  Then he sent me to meet with Kathy.
     Kathy had me signed up with Medi-Cal, and had gotten me vouchers to stay at a motel.  The motel was a place well known for drug busts and shootings, which concerned Kathy, but all I could think about was sleeping in a bed after taking a nice long shower.  In the past 3 months I had only showered once, in a boarded up old shower stall in one of the parks along the Delta, which I broke into and used as quickly as possible.  That had been about 2 months previous, so I was a mess.
     Kathy gave me the names of local landlords who accepted low-income people.  She told me I could qualify for assistance, because I was pregnant and it was a high-risk pregnancy.  She had gotten me an appointment to see a caseworker, so I would not have to risk increasing my contractions by waiting in line for hours.
     The next few weeks were a flurry of activity.  The motel, while scary to some, was a godsend to me.  My son and I were eventually placed in a one-bedroom apartment, although my new landlords thought at first that I was only expecting one baby, and did not know about my dog.  My son and I had a roof, and I was able to semi-follow the bedrest my doctor had prescribed.  My twins arrived, at 32.5 weeks, and were relatively healthy, for preemies who weighed only 5lb 3oz and 4lb 13oz.   My valiant car got me to the hospital to deliver my babies, and died right there in the parking lot, never to start for me again.  But even without the car, life felt better.  My mind began to come out of the basic survival mode homelessness creates.  I registered to vote once more, and watched local news on the tiny black-and-white TV the Salvation Army had donated to us, along with a couch and some dishes.  I was starting to feel like a real person again.  My mom came to help with the twins for a week, and the twins' father stayed over once in awhile to help, too.  I was starting to experience some of his abusive behavior, but my relief at escaping homeless life kept me blind to things that felt trivial at that time.  I was simply thankful to have a roof overhead.
     And now I type the paragraphs I have put off typing, have danced around and kept at bay, while writing all the rest of this tale.  Alf.  The dog who was my son's pillow on the floors of BART Station bathrooms.  The dog who kept worse things from happening to me and my son as we survived the streets.  Alf, the dog who was always faithful to us, was discovered by our landlords.  They came over to enter our apartment while we were gone.  Alf had learned never to make noise or bark at anything going on around our home, our car, or the public restroom where his boy was sleeping, but once somebody tried to enter his "den," Alf would let them know he was there, ready to keep them out.  When our landlords tried to open our door in our absence, Alf barked.  Our landlords did not finish entering our apartment that day, but they called me later.  I was told we must get rid of "that dog" within 48 hours, or I, my 3-year old son, and my preemie babies, would be out on the street.  They made it very clear that they did not care that it was Christmas time, they did not care that my oldest son had never known life without his dog, they did not care what would happen to me and my 3 kids if we had no place to live once again.  And I, who no longer had a car, could not figure out a way to survive homelessness with 2 preemies.  I racked my brain, but found no answers.  (There was no Google to access, and I knew nothing about tenants rights, or how to look for foster families that might care for a dog until it could be reunited with its family.  I have no idea if any such help even existed in December of 1990.)  Forty-seven hours later, I surrendered Alf to the local shelter.  When the receptionist there finally figured out, between my grief-wracked sobs, what I was trying to tell her I had to do with my dog, she told me I must pay a surrender fee.  I had no more words at that moment, because I had no money, and I could not simply walk outside and abandon Alf to the streets.  I think she sensed that I was at a breaking point, because she said, "Why don't we fill this out as if you just found him, and are bringing him here to save him."
     It felt like the ultimate betrayal of Alf.  I could not even leave him there with his own name.  His intake was done as a stray.  Nowhere could I put how good he was with my son, how gentle and loving he was with my preemie twins, how quiet he was, how he loved cats, how loyal he was, how he had a story that mattered.  The receptionist was compassionate, but a co-worker behind her said something about how some people should never be allowed to own pets, and with those words ringing in my ears, I hugged that angel dog, and left him, with a confusion on his face that will haunt my memories until the day I die.  Every tear I shed this second does nothing to ease the pain of that moment.  Alf.  I am so sorry.  Every animal I help now, every time I ferociously advocate for keeping pets with the people they are bonded to regardless of poverty or homelessness, everything I have ever done or will ever do in the rescue world, is dedicated to your memory.  Everything. 
     I called the shelter every day, asking about Alf.  One day, I was told he had been adopted by a family who lived on property out in Oakley.  I hope this is true, although it may have been the shelter's way of getting my desperate phone calls to stop.  They were definitely irritated by those calls.  Somehow, my son and I learned to survive without our angel dog.  In the years since, I have sometimes spoken of Alf, but I have never put the details of that last awful day into words until now.  Some of the hardest sentences I have ever written, right here.  A broken part of my heart that can never be healed, ever.

     Since moving into my current home, 23 years ago, I have never taken it for granted.  While 700+ square feet may seem small to some, to me, it is a palace.  The repairs my mom and uncle and friends and family are doing continue to make it more comfortable, and now I will be able to have family and friends stay over again without worrying about plumbing problems or a floor crumbling underfoot.  I will even be able to entertain guests, something I have not done in years because I have seen too many people turn on somebody, and try to get their house condemned.  It is one of the reasons some people are homeless, because someone they allowed into their lives decided to get their home condemned.  I knew better than to randomly trust people to come into my home as it started aging.  My neighbor across the street used to love to remind me on a monthly basis, back when my kids were young, how he and his buddies were going to find a way to make me lose my home.  The terror those words struck in me was awful, because I had been in the homeless world, and the idea that there were humans around me who were purposely plotting to put me and my children back in such circumstances was horrifying .  I would never wish such an existence on anyone, not even on that neighbor who made those threats.  No human should suffer such utter despair and pain.  People who purposely cause the eventual homelessness of others are some of the cruelest humans I have met.  The fact that they never have to see the final results of their behavior, or live in such circumstances themselves, only speaks to their ignorance and cruelty.
     For some, it may seem easy to look back at every action I took in 1990, and pick out each decision I made that was wrong.  Even I, with the wisdom of time, can look back and wonder at the things I did that contributed to my spiral into homelessness.  But such thoughts are irrelevant.  I truly was surviving in the best way I could think of, with what I knew at the time.  I like to think that, given a different father, my brain might have developed some logical social and reasoning skills.  I know, once I attended college in '08-'10, in that environment where knowledge was gladly shared, questions were encouraged, and no one around me pounced on my mistakes and made my brain shut down from fear, I was a 4.0 student.  I like to think this means I was not born with a dull mind, my mind was simply dulled by the circumstances surrounding my childhood.  With the gift of time, I have learned a lot about how my brain works, and what I need to do for myself to start healing.  This blog has been a huge part of that healing.  I will never reach a place where I do everything right.  Nobody does.  But I have finally let go of the self-hatred and silence that were continuing to damage my life. 
     I do not ever look at anyone who is homeless and think to myself, "Well, I got out, so you could, too, if you really wanted to."  During my time in the homeless world, I had some things that others do not have.  I had a car, and I had a gas card.  I had a person who gave me some advice in that first park where I was initiated into mainland, USA, homelessness.  I had a dog, who kept some very bad things from happening to me and my son, things that happen to other homeless people every day.  I did nothing different during the end of those three months to land myself in a motel, and then into an apartment.  A kind lady saw a need, and stepped up.  It could just as easily have been a person who might have called CPS, and my son, and later my twins, might have ended up in the system, while I might have lived the rest of my life on the streets, doing whatever it was I had to do, in order to survive.  (With the skill-set my father gave me, I know very well what I would have ended up doing.)  No, I did nothing to warrant my lift from homelessness, another person's kindness saved me, and that is how my life got better.  I will never twist that gift of kindness into something I use to slam other homeless people.   I was lucky, plain and simple.  Life is not fair.  It is more like a lottery.  Some folks get a bit more good, some get a bit more bad, some people fall on the extremes of the spectrum, and all of our actions combine together to cause ripples that create more good and bad.
     I have not been homeless since that time in '90, so I have no idea if things have improved for folks stuck in that existence, but when I read about spikes embedded in the concrete where homeless sleep, and old veterans who are arrested for feeding the homeless, and school lunch ladies fired for feeding hungry kids in their cafeteria, I am doubtful that anything has improved much.  When I hear a politician say that food stamps should not be used for purchasing any processed or canned foods, and anyone on food stamps should have to go back to the old ways of canning and baking everything, I shake my head, because the working poor do not have the time to live as our ancestors did, and zoning laws regarding livestock and gardens, as well as laws against things like capturing rainwater or living off the power grid, make canning and baking everything a family eats way more expensive than any poor person could conceivably do on a daily basis today. 
     On the other hand, I have read reports that the state of Utah is now providing permanent housing for their homeless, and if this is accurate, God bless them.  Just today, my friend Ginny posted about a woman with an apartment complex in California who rents exclusively to people who have pets.  Bless that woman, and all those like her.  Kindness, while rare, still exists.  It gives me some hope amid the current hostility that seems to abound in this country against the poor.  I hope the criminalization of homelessness has lessened, so that the fear of losing the only bonds of love one has left does not keep people from being able to reach out and admit they need help.
      I suppose I could have been unfortunate enough to have been born into poverty in a Third World area.  Of course, if I had been born there with my hip defect, my life would have been dictated by the acceptance and help I would or could have received from my village.  I probably never would have walked, much less given birth to any children.  My twins most certainly would not have stayed in the womb past five month's gestation, when I first went into labor with them, so they would not exist.  I would never have been able to walk hundreds of miles in search of food, so if starvation was my lot, I would have starved to death right where I was.  I would never have had to worry about being arrested for bathing in a river or sleeping under a bush or on a beach.  Of course, a warlord might have used me as a sex slave, rendering my existence hellish.  (If you do not understand the irony in that last sentence, you have not read my blog post A Thousand Words)  I have said this before, but I reiterate:  I despise the comparisons we use on each other to invalidate the horrendous circumstances many folks find themselves in, right here in the First World.  Suffering is suffering, no matter where it is happening.  To allow such suffering to continue, by letting ourselves believe it is somehow better than human suffering somewhere else, is cruel and ignorant.  Each of us could have been born anywhere.  None of us got where we are on our own.  The only answer to decreasing the suffering that exists worldwide is for each of us to try and help decrease some living being's suffering, right where we are today.  Suffering exists in this One World.  All of it is painful.

the end

"What did Santa bring us?"