Homelessness

        



          In my apartment I had a couch. My roommate and I went in on it together. It was brown and darker brown fabric and it wrapped around the room in an almost 'C' shape. It was comfortable and cheap. We bought it to replace these sticky, slippery, absurd leather couches that were there before. He had one side. I had the other. It was entirely comfortable.
         We had a TV. The TV had DVR. The TV was hooked up to the DVD/VHS player and we had A/V cables that ran to our PC's. We could watch the wireless internet and DVDs and television all over the place.
          Sitting on that couch you could look behind you and find the kitchen, complete with dishwasher. To your right the washer and dryer and a closet for my clothes. The left, a hanging picutre of Christ calming the seas. The bedroom had two beds and a bookshelf filled on his side with text books, financial advice novels and LDS church history reads. My side was neatly separated into topics. Religion. Philosophy. History. Americana. Pop Culture Commentary. Comedy. "Classics". And others. I had laundry hampers under the bed.
       The bathroom was small but we had a shower curtain displaying a map of the world and all its countries capitals that kept us busy memorizing and exploring. Yeah back then I had it all.

      Here I sit, tailgating in my van, wondering if any of the students walking by are alarmed at my presence. Wondering if someday someone will complain to someone else that I dont belong and Ill be removed from all that I have. I, day by day, feel myself slipping, perhaps being pushed, into the shadows. I am no longer welcome some places. I dont feel comfortable where I used to feel free. I notice that thoughI havent changed, people have moved me into a different category of society. I am recategorized for convenience and to preserve the beauty of the town. I am less than, not equal to. I may not be treated as such but it is the way I make myself feel. I dont belong where I used to thrive. I retreat around to avoid embarrassment, hiding the actions that I once never gave a thought to. I wander. I have a purpose but I cannot take the most direct path to it, I am limited to the side streets and back alley ways. So I weave through town in the most polite way I can, offending none, keeping to myself, and moving quickly.
       I have this van. I have a framed picture of Washington kneeling by his beloved horse, Nelson. I have tupperware filled with gadgets, wires, movies and books. The books are in one category now: Misc. I have a basket of clothes. I have blankets to sleep on. It was so difficult to coax myself to sleep the first night. My body drops to the bed like a dying man every night now and I stir almost never.
      I have my bicycle. I would cry if something happened to that thing. It facilitates my every move, my actions through a day. Without it I'd have been worked to tears by now. It turns my output into more than I can do on my own and for that, I cherish it.
      I have a garden. I have 110 tulips, daffodils, and chrysanthemums planting, stored up for the winter and anticipating spring already. I have three rows of corn coming in. I have land to do with what I might.
     I have friends. I have friends in my life that cannot be found or matched by another. I have loyal companions who I am loyal to. I have confidants, confederates. I have a gang. I am part of others lives. I live vicariously through them and they through me.
        Sometimes I think back on my house growing up, my apartment, the cars Ive owned. I think "my how it would be good to be back home" and then from in me comes a little chuckle. Silly me. Why would I want to give up all that I have now for that! I have so much more than ever and it all is exponentially better in quality!
        And sometimes I think to the future. And in it there is no van. There is no shadow and no ducking, hiding, crawling. For a family and a wife, and a house Ive built with my own hands with a wrap around porch; for the security of eternity Id light this van all ablaze and run it off the highest cliff. Id do anything.

                                                                                           - Kurt Russell Anderson

Listening to: The Mountain Goats, a song called Genesis 3:23
Reading: All Quiet On The Western Front