Steve, 55- Redding, CA

“I look more homeless than you do!”

“Well what does homelessness look like?”

“I have epilepsy. Alcohol and stress is definitely a part of it. That triggered the last seizure. You just go into this tunnel, you have no idea how long you have been there, you have no idea what happened, you just leave reality and wake up in the hospital. It’s like a slice of death. Your world starts to spin and you can just tell you’re not coming out of it anytime soon. Believe me or not, but I’ve seen dead friends and I’ve knocked on the door- I try to go in but the just tell me it’s not my time yet. Now I get a bracelet for every brush I have with death.”


steve1


“I’ve been homeless for basically a year. You don’t think it can happen to you. I had a good job, I have two kids. Aging is a very humbling experience. I saw people on the streets before and i always thought ‘well they can just get a job, doesn’t matter what it is, they can try’- but it’s not like that. Maybe they’re sick, maybe they have mental issues. How are you going to get a job with no address or no phone? How do you get to work without a car? You never know what somebody’s situation is.”


“I’m a mellow drunk, I just want to be left alone in my cave. I would just live drunk basically. I eventually realized I need to just do this for myself. It’s the hardest decision to make when your by yourself. I have nobody by my side telling my which direction to take, I have nobody else to blame anymore. I am responsible for changing.”


steve2


“I’m waiting at the bus stop with all my possessions and these guys are circling around me like monkeys in the Wizard Of Oz. They ask me for a smoke, they ask me how much money I got. I tell myself I’m not falling asleep tonight- no way in hell. Sure enough at around 3:00 AM I eventually pass out and wake up with every bit of my life gone.
That was four days ago. But it’s just shit. Nothing more. Like George Carlin said, ‘when you have shit you always need somewhere to put your shit. Your shit is stuff and their stuff is shit”.  They’re all just possessions. It’s all shit. You think you need it to live until you keep living without it. All money does is complicate things.”


 

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