4 ms·

I was homeless for a period of time that extended to my first year at college. Was honestly not a bad life. I learned something fundamental... that one can get

by Daub 6y ago

I was homeless for a period of time that extended to my first year at college. Was honestly not a bad life. I learned something fundamental... that one can get used to anything except being cold. I would go to sleep when the parks closed, around 10. Cold would wake me up at around 3 or 4 in the morning, and grab some more sleep around mid day. It’s one reason why homeless people have dogs... they serve as hot water bottles. One thing it left me with is that it changed the way I walk through the city. For most people, streets are places they use to get from one place to another. They do not inhabit them as places in themselves. For me and other homeless, they were our homes. This changes how you walk a street... gives you something approaching a swagger.

alexpetralia 6y ago
This change in perspective is really interesting. Would love to read more if you wrote about it elsewhere.
- Daub 6y ago
  Thanks for taking an interest. If you don't mind, I can share a few reflections here. > One thing it left me with is that it changed the way I walk through the city. On this subject... I recognize this same quality in the people of the working class district of Vietnam, where I now live. For them the gap between the public space and private is very narrow. This is common in Asian countries, where so much commerce is done on the streets. It is hard to define, but easy to recognize. Perhaps one reason why I feel so at home here. > I learned something fundamental... that one can get used to anything except being cold. Related to this topic was the importance of regular shelter. In that time, I slept in three places: a large doorway of an opera house, a bush in the middle of a large public park and under a bridge. Of these three, it is the bush of which I have the fondest memories, to the point where I even now I sometimes look at it on Google maps when I need reminding of who I am. Inside was open, clean and mostly dry. Living on the street reduces one's life to prime values, and the need for regular shelter is one of them. For me the regularity was as important as the shelter (hell... I had plenty of bushes to choose from!). It was the atomic beginnings of my sense of home. Odd to look back on now, when I am actively planning to design and build my own house. As for how I had found myself in that situation, it was around 20% unfortunate circumstances, and 80% low-level thinking on my part. At the time, my only response to situations that gave me harm was to avoid them. I had not yet figured out how to construct situations that benefit me. It was this failure of consciousness that led to to the streets, and the day I left the streets was the day intentionality came into my life. I was in McDonalds, ordering a Fillet-O-Fish. When I handed over my money to the guy serving me, he refused to accept it and gave me a look I can only describe as beatific... like saintly glow. It took a while for me to recognize that this was a look of pity. "Why on earth is he pitying me?" Behind me was a wall covered in mirror tiles. As I turned to go, I caught sight of myself in these tiles, and I saw myself for what I had become: a disheveled monster. That very evening I went home to my fathers house and started to take college more seriously.
  - shadowprofile77 6y ago
    If you don't mind my asking, how old were you when you had to pass through this time of homelessness, (I mean, what age range until it ended) and how long afterwards did it take you to reach the point you're at now?
    - Daub 6y ago
      I was around 17 when I was homeless. Now nearly 60. I am gonna guess the experience would be very different had it happened now. For a start, the toilet I used, the public bathroom I used and the park I slept in are all now fenced off. Also... begging money had less competition then.
  - alexpetralia 6y ago
    > For them the gap between the public space and private is very narrow. I found this very insightful. Thanks for sharing.
  - latchkey 6y ago
    Interesting that you ended up in Vietnam. I just spent the last 4 years there and the last 2 of them on the road on a motorbike. I came back to the US for work and got 'stuck' here because of Covid. I 'get' what you're saying a lot having experienced living there. I've never been homeless, but I have adopted a minimal lifestyle. Because of this new direction, I recently bought a campervan that I'll live in full time, over getting an apartment (or buying a fixed home). Something I wouldn't have done 4 years ago. My perspective has changed considerably. Anyway, thanks for sharing your story. Interesting to hear other like-minded people.
ggm 6y ago
Your inability to "get used to" cold may reflect a survival technique the body has, to avoid hyothermia. Sleeping cold has very high risks. Aside from this, I am truly sorry you had to live through this experience, and that others continue to live through this experience. It has been a revalation to me how quickly local authorities here in Australia could house rough sleepers when they had a specific intent (disease prevention) in mind. I always suspected persisting homelessness was both complex (causative reasons) and simple (to fix) but what surprised me was how simple: they just had to decide to do it. Shame on them, shame on us, for continuing to vote for authorities so apathetic to the problem of homelessness.
- noneeeed 6y ago
  The same thing happened here in the UK. A relatively tiny amount of money (a million £/month or so) got >95% of rough sleepers off the streets and into secure accomodation where many have taken the opportunity to deal with their addictions, mental health issues, even education and job prospects. Turns out it's way easier to get off drugs/alcohol and sort your life out when you don't have to spend all your time finding the next meal or a safe(-ish) place to sleep. The problem of rough sleeping can be dealt with using tiny amounts of money (at least in the UK), but unfortunately the wider problems of homelessness, where many are inviisble because they are permenantly couch surfing or stuck in hostels or at chronic risk of losing their homes if they have them are much more complex and difficult to deal with without changes to how housing works here.
  - 082349872349872 6y ago
    At least housing probably works better now than it did in 1931? The Spike http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300011h.html#part1 http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300011h.html#part1 Note that Blair/Orwell is spotted immediately as NRS social grade A, which may explain why Winston Smith couldn't make the to-me-reasonable jump to the free proletariat in 1984: > "The terrible Tramp Major met us at the door and herded us into the bathroom to be stripped and searched. He was a gruff, soldierly man of forty, who gave the tramps no more ceremony than sheep at the dipping-pond, shoving them this way and that and shouting oaths in their faces. But when he came to myself, he looked hard at me, and said: > 'You are a gentleman?' > 'I suppose so,' I said. > He gave me another long look. 'Well, that's bloody bad luck, guv'nor,' he said, 'that's bloody bad luck, that is.' And thereafter he took it into his head to treat me with compassion, even with a kind of respect."

by Daub 6y ago

alexpetralia 6y ago

This change in perspective is really interesting. Would love to read more if you wrote about it elsewhere.

Daub 6y ago
Thanks for taking an interest. If you don't mind, I can share a few reflections here. > One thing it left me with is that it changed the way I walk through the city. On this subject... I recognize this same quality in the people of the working class district of Vietnam, where I now live. For them the gap between the public space and private is very narrow. This is common in Asian countries, where so much commerce is done on the streets. It is hard to define, but easy to recognize. Perhaps one reason why I feel so at home here. > I learned something fundamental... that one can get used to anything except being cold. Related to this topic was the importance of regular shelter. In that time, I slept in three places: a large doorway of an opera house, a bush in the middle of a large public park and under a bridge. Of these three, it is the bush of which I have the fondest memories, to the point where I even now I sometimes look at it on Google maps when I need reminding of who I am. Inside was open, clean and mostly dry. Living on the street reduces one's life to prime values, and the need for regular shelter is one of them. For me the regularity was as important as the shelter (hell... I had plenty of bushes to choose from!). It was the atomic beginnings of my sense of home. Odd to look back on now, when I am actively planning to design and build my own house. As for how I had found myself in that situation, it was around 20% unfortunate circumstances, and 80% low-level thinking on my part. At the time, my only response to situations that gave me harm was to avoid them. I had not yet figured out how to construct situations that benefit me. It was this failure of consciousness that led to to the streets, and the day I left the streets was the day intentionality came into my life. I was in McDonalds, ordering a Fillet-O-Fish. When I handed over my money to the guy serving me, he refused to accept it and gave me a look I can only describe as beatific... like saintly glow. It took a while for me to recognize that this was a look of pity. "Why on earth is he pitying me?" Behind me was a wall covered in mirror tiles. As I turned to go, I caught sight of myself in these tiles, and I saw myself for what I had become: a disheveled monster. That very evening I went home to my fathers house and started to take college more seriously.
- shadowprofile77 6y ago
  If you don't mind my asking, how old were you when you had to pass through this time of homelessness, (I mean, what age range until it ended) and how long afterwards did it take you to reach the point you're at now?
  - Daub 6y ago
    I was around 17 when I was homeless. Now nearly 60. I am gonna guess the experience would be very different had it happened now. For a start, the toilet I used, the public bathroom I used and the park I slept in are all now fenced off. Also... begging money had less competition then.
- alexpetralia 6y ago
  > For them the gap between the public space and private is very narrow. I found this very insightful. Thanks for sharing.
- latchkey 6y ago
  Interesting that you ended up in Vietnam. I just spent the last 4 years there and the last 2 of them on the road on a motorbike. I came back to the US for work and got 'stuck' here because of Covid. I 'get' what you're saying a lot having experienced living there. I've never been homeless, but I have adopted a minimal lifestyle. Because of this new direction, I recently bought a campervan that I'll live in full time, over getting an apartment (or buying a fixed home). Something I wouldn't have done 4 years ago. My perspective has changed considerably. Anyway, thanks for sharing your story. Interesting to hear other like-minded people.

ggm 6y ago

Your inability to "get used to" cold may reflect a survival technique the body has, to avoid hyothermia. Sleeping cold has very high risks. Aside from this, I am truly sorry you had to live through this experience, and that others continue to live through this experience. It has been a revalation to me how quickly local authorities here in Australia could house rough sleepers when they had a specific intent (disease prevention) in mind. I always suspected persisting homelessness was both complex (causative reasons) and simple (to fix) but what surprised me was how simple: they just had to decide to do it. Shame on them, shame on us, for continuing to vote for authorities so apathetic to the problem of homelessness.

noneeeed 6y ago
The same thing happened here in the UK. A relatively tiny amount of money (a million £/month or so) got >95% of rough sleepers off the streets and into secure accomodation where many have taken the opportunity to deal with their addictions, mental health issues, even education and job prospects. Turns out it's way easier to get off drugs/alcohol and sort your life out when you don't have to spend all your time finding the next meal or a safe(-ish) place to sleep. The problem of rough sleeping can be dealt with using tiny amounts of money (at least in the UK), but unfortunately the wider problems of homelessness, where many are inviisble because they are permenantly couch surfing or stuck in hostels or at chronic risk of losing their homes if they have them are much more complex and difficult to deal with without changes to how housing works here.
- 082349872349872 6y ago
  At least housing probably works better now than it did in 1931? The Spike http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300011h.html#part1 http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300011h.html#part1 Note that Blair/Orwell is spotted immediately as NRS social grade A, which may explain why Winston Smith couldn't make the to-me-reasonable jump to the free proletariat in 1984: > "The terrible Tramp Major met us at the door and herded us into the bathroom to be stripped and searched. He was a gruff, soldierly man of forty, who gave the tramps no more ceremony than sheep at the dipping-pond, shoving them this way and that and shouting oaths in their faces. But when he came to myself, he looked hard at me, and said: > 'You are a gentleman?' > 'I suppose so,' I said. > He gave me another long look. 'Well, that's bloody bad luck, guv'nor,' he said, 'that's bloody bad luck, that is.' And thereafter he took it into his head to treat me with compassion, even with a kind of respect."