What is home?

I was homeless for about 8 years - from 1986 to 1994. There were periods during those years when I lived inside a building, but I did not have a home. Home is not just a room or a bed or a structure. Home is a place where you belong, where no one will tell you to get out, where it's ok to just be.

Home is where they will tell you that you are not doing the right thing without condeming you for being wrong.

The role of mind altering substances

Almost everyone I knew when I was homeless used something to one degree or another. What and how much they (or I) used is not the point.

IMHO (and that's what a blog is - right?) addiction & homelessness are only two symptoms of the same problem.

My drug use did not cause me to become homeless. It was despair and hopelessness that drove my drug use.

Using something to numb out the pain of just being was common on the streets. I know that it worked for me for a long time. For many that I knew, it was self medication for some sort of mental illness.

I thought that I used because I was in pain, and once whatever was causing me pain stopped, I would no longer choose to use. Hah! The idea that using contributed to the pain was anthema to me. If I admitted that, I might have to stop using before the pain could be removed. Hard to trust that there was anything that could be done about the pain in lieu of burying it inside a cocoon of cotton that drugs gave.

It wasn't until I stopped using that I could even determine what hurt and what might be done to make it stop.

List of stories to tell

I was thinking about some of the stories and people that I want to be sure to write about.

I decided that the best way to remember to tell them was to create a list. Not sure how to do that in Blogger, but maybe this post will help me.

People I remember - leaving the names out for now:

• man who fought the devil every day
• man whose wife and child died in car accident
• two men who worked signs
• friend prior to street - last visit
• Vietnam vets
• older friend with diabetes
• Friend who tried to help me get clean
• two hippies and their kids
• The street vendor
• The man from Catholic worker
• Compassionate cops
• E & E - a man and his dog
  

Incidents and other stuff

• Bicycles
• Not dead yet
• bicycle accident
• Don't do misdemeanors if you are going to do felonies
• Police rides
• Crazy acid trip
• living in the park
• The last time - Hand of the Goddess
• Standing on the overpass
• How I got the scar on my hand
• How not to starve
• Bowling for beer bottles
• Good news and bad news
• stealing my brother's car
• What to wear
• No shoes is a good thing
• Flowers for everyone
• Toys on Benches

Places to tell stories about:

• train tramp camp
• other marina locations
• freeway underpass camp
• the crawl space
• park annex

The Bulldog

Ok, this is not a story about the streets, this is actually just a picture of my sweet bulldog and my niece.

First entry - Stories from my Homeless times

A friend and I were hanging out yesterday and the subject of my homeless period came up. I got to talking about the people I knew, and the way we survived and he suggested I write these stories down.

Everything I write here is filtered thru 12 years of time, distance and the fact that I was under the influence of some sort of mind altering substance most of the time then.

With that being said, there are times and people I remember vividly.

I don't intend to use real names here for there are some others like me who have created different lives for themselves.