I am reposting this from another thread, since a couple of people seemed to think it was a good idea.


I miss quoted myself on the last bit, when I checked. I should have written:


"Be seeing you..."

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Grassaf, Eolas

Be aware that this is really happening, in every major city. I know lots of people don't like to give money directly to pan-handlers, particularly street-youth (I understand the fear that they will use the money to buy drugs/alcohol, and thus that you will be aiding them to hurt themselves... but addictions don't go away because you didn't give someone a quarter, after all!) If you want to help indirectly, then give a donation to agencies that provide health assistance to the homeless (they frequently die of very preventable causes for lack of money to obtain common medications, and lack of diagnosis), or to a group that provide coats/sleeping bags and raingear to the homeless.

Don't allow yourself to be swayed by news media that frequently demonize the homeless in general, street-youth and panhandlers in particualr. Realize that no one in their right mind prefers the street to having a place of their own; and no young person is on the street simply because they won't accept their parents' "rules" -- the level of abuse, neglect and indifference that these kids endure before they choose the street is truly infernal. (I have spent many a sleepless night trying to deal with some of the things they have told me.)

"Be seeing you..."
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this is also taken from the original thread.

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Grassaf, Eolas

Nice post, EP.

Shalom,
Vern

indeed it is really happening... I used to be homeless myself.

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peace for all
love for all
bliss for all

...may your journey be graceful...

If anything is possible, then the statement, "anything is possible," is possibly false.

...that you and EH got through it. It bothers me, though, how many people don't want to face it, don't want to think about it. Here in Ontario, at a time when homelessness has rarely been worse, it managed to drop off the radar entirely in the recent election.

And, of course, nearly everyone in North America is about 2 months away from being homeless, even though most do not know it.


"Be seeing you..."

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Grassaf, Eolas

I too was once homeless I spent a total of six months living on the street. Some people don’t panhandle they go to labor halls hoping to find some work for that day. The shelters I stayed in kick you out at 4 Am & expect you to find a job. The labor halls pay you about $30.00 a day maybe more once you got enough to get a motel that you can pay weekly in you make just enough to buy food & just enough to pay rent.
Its easy to get caught up living like that & a lot of them stay there. No major bills just making enough to pay rent & have a roof over your head. There is no easy answer to the homeless problem unless you’ve been down that road your guessing at best.

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I worship the old Gods because my heart tells me too not because I am told too.

My dad used to be an alcoholic, my whole childhood, which is what started the liver cancer breading inside of him. He waited in line for jobs. Always slept in a mission. He was used to doing these things because he had been orphaned when he was 6 years old and running away from foster homes and family members of his parents all of his young life. He was mostly used to riding on rail road cars to get out of any given town he grew tired of.

When he got married to my mom he would always get a permanant job and keep a place to live for us all. When they divorced I wouldn't see him for a long time and then he would come in and out of our lives with jobs trying to keep a place for us to be able to come stay with him on the weekends. It was hard for him, but as a child I never knew that.

When I grew up and have my own life and my own children my dad had stopped drinking and for the last 20 years lived a sober life. He went to dalton Georgia to the work lines, day labor. He lived in a mission sometimes, but mainly kept a place to live for himself and my youngest sister who was considered his baby even on up into her adult life. When he died at the age of 72 years old he had no home (which he had always struggled to have) and he had no car--which he had always had and never did with out all of his grown life--and he was stuck. He hated to come and live with me, because he said I lived in the middle of nowhere, in the country and not the city. He died in a nursing home in the city which is where he wanted to be, because the children he wanted to be with were homeless themselves.......

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When a man sleeps in his bed, his soul leaves him to soar above, each soul according to its own way.......
The Zohar