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Homelessness As Social Death

on September 03, 2019

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Independently Poor: A Twist on FU Money -- a.k.a. "FU, Money"

While I was homeless, I had a descriptor in my profile on some forum that I was "Independently Poor." That was more than just tongue-in-cheek humor. Although I was homeless, I had alimony and I was doing freelance work and I had a degree of agency that you rarely see among poor people. I was able to arrange my life to prioritize taking care of my health in part by doing gig work (and this post is being written expressly for r/GigWorks , a forum I run). In other words, I had a degree of independence and agency that you normally only see in the Jet Set -- people who get called independently wealthy -- or comfortably well-off retirees. I had more control over my time and my life than your typical working stiff. I was able to get to that point in part because I'm pretty financially savvy. I think anyone can get to that same place mentally and logistically, even if you don't currently have much money. A lot of it has to do with feeding your mind the right stuff in

When The Family Safety Net Fails.

(This is a piece about homelessness and how people end up on the street. If you are the type who needs Trigger Warnings , you might want to skip this article.) She's a good girl, loves her mama Loves Jesus and America too Once upon a time, long ago and far away, there was a teenaged girl with a seemingly bright future. She graduated at the top of her class. She didn't sleep around. She didn't drink or use drugs. She won a prestigious scholarship. She traveled. She pursued her dreams. She was a very serious and responsible young woman. Friends of the family sometimes asked "Did X, Y or Z make her so serious?" The answer given was "No, she was always like that." She was the proverbial All American Girl living some variation of the American Dream. Or so it probably seemed to acquaintances who didn't know her well. I'm a bad boy, cause I don't even miss her Once upon a time, even longer ago and farther away, a bouncing baby boy was b

This is Real. That's Not.

We all grow up in our own little bubble. Getting perspective on ourselves and/or our own lives is one of the harder things to do in life. I've always liked the following scene from the movie Overboard (1987), but it took on new meaning for me after I was homeless: Most of us go through life...knowing only that one little station to which we were born... you...have had the rare privilege of escaping your bonds for just a spell... I was on the street about a year before it dawned on me how upper class my mother's expectations were. It took even longer for me to begin to comprehend how well off my parents had actually been at one time. While I was growing up, my parents always conveyed this narrative of "We are just plain folks with blue collar jobs." I was a child, so I believed what I was told and it took a stint "on skid row" to get a clue that this wasn't the whole story. I actively and intentionally used my time on the street as a me

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