Across the Great Divide

For Some Homeless Folks, Bipolar Awareness Day is Every Day.

Shan told me he heard on the news that today is National Bipolar Awareness Day. Actually, the national day is in October. This World Bipolar Awareness Day.

For him, though, it's every day. He said Ned is bipolar, too. He knows because Ned had an episode last night at the shelter.

My view from the window at the Day Center. Across the street is housing for formerly homeless vets. At the corner we offer free bike and dog parking.

Shan said he's lost 30 pounds since coming to town a month ago. He can't always afford a monthly bus pass, so he walks everywhere. He's on disability and is thinking about spending $37 a month of his check on a health club membership so he can lose more weight.

I'm sure Shan and Ned aren't the only ones in the Day Center who are supposed to benefit from our awareness today.

JB was in town for an appointment with his mental health case worker, who's supposed to see him twice a week. He's living in Delta now, a smaller town about 45 miles away from the clinic. That's a bit far to come for an appointment on a low-end fat-tired bicycle.

However, Medicaid will pay for transportation to and from appointments. In his case, that's a cab, at $3 a mile, or $270 a trip. JB thinks it's crazy, but he doesn't have the services where he lives. 

He said, I tried to get them to cut it to once a week. Or just buy me a house near the clinic and I'll walk. It'd be cheaper. They told me next time I could go to jail for a few days until I calmed down, but that's expensive, too. Everything with mental health is expensive, he said. Counseling, inpatient, medications, self-medication. What ever you do, it's expensive. 

Some of the people here bear the physical signs of their illness. Loud voices, confused speech, wagging tongues, tics, flat affects, hyperactivity, visible nervousness or severe introversion. But many are like JB, who would pass for "normal" on the street.

Like Shan, some have shared their diagnosis (epilepsy, Tourette's, anxiety, schizo-affective disorder, depression, cancer, and so on). Others keep it to themselves.

But living on the street, it's not that easy. Episodes in public can earn you some jail therapy time.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm too tolerant or gullible. Whether the system that pays for cab rides from Delta but not a room next to the clinic is a bit dysfunctional itself. I wonder if we should be doing more here than provide weak coffee and laundry for the people who walk through that door.

But then I remember it's not my job to judge or diagnose or treat. It's to welcome. To listen. To answer questions. To see the person, not the symptoms.

It's to keep the doors open to a safe place—one that's a few feet north of that bottom they are supposed to hit before they turn their lives around.

 

 

Being Homeless is Never Easy.

He was young and tall and seemed slightly stunned. She was older and clear-eyed. They shared a last name. It was their first time in the Day Center.

Where can he take a shower, she asked. And where does he do laundry? 

I explained the sign-in system; two different clipboards. He'll be called when a machine is available. Same with a shower.

But what if he's called for laundry before the shower, she asked. He's wearing the clothes he needs to wash.

Being homeless is not easy, even the little stuff.

I gathered that she was his mother, watching out for him. She seemed very patient and caring. But he was at the Day Center, not her house. Maybe she was visiting from out of town. I didn't have a chance for a conversation

Being homeless is not easy, even the mother-child stuff.

Another newbie, just off the Amtrak from Boulder, traveling with his longboard and not much else. A young guy who needed a change of scene. Again, only snatches overheard. He'd been a caregiver for an elderly doctor who became too frail and had to move into a more intensive care setting. He'd done aircraft part assembly in California and was looking for work, but he didn't have a resume.

Being homeless is not easy, especially the looking for work stuff.

He said he just needed to use the restroom, but I saw him ducking out the door with one of our regulars, too soon to have done any business. They were going for a walk, she said. I waited a minute and then went around the side of the building, where they were sharing a bowl of marijuana. 

Not here, I said. I don't usually confront people about their substance use and weed is legal in Colorado, so it's a fine line. But taking advantage of trust is not cool. Doping outside the Day Center is not cool 

The woman apologized for not being honest. She said she respected the place and was sorry.

Being homeless is not easy, if you're expected to honest 100 percent of the time.

I had an intense discussion with a guest as he was leaving. He has a very flat affect and there's some switch in his head that is either silence or long monologues. He talked about intelligence, respect and disrespect and the $53 million his family had in Mexico and how four exact sprays from our cleanup spray bottles over a plate of food could cause a man's lungs to be sucked out of his chest. It was a bit longer and more complicated than that but I had trouble following.

Being homeless is not easy, if you can't make sense when you speak.

Another regular went to see his parole officer. He rode off with his bike and trailer and dog on a leash. Later I recognized his sleeping bag in the street and went out to retrieve it in case he came back. He did.

My PO is mad at me, he said. She said to come back when you're feeling better. I'm going back at four but I'll never feel better than I do now. 

The Varieties of Vulnerable Experience.

One of our long-time volunteers was killed Monday coming to work at the Day Center. The freak accident started with an errant left turn from the center lane of the one way that passes in front of our building. A vehicle coming up on the left side clipped her and spun the car around. The accelerator pedal stuck and the car raced at high speed for two blocks before it hit a concrete barrier.

These moments of sudden vulnerability come as shock to most of us. We walk, drive, eat, shop, work, socialize and sleep in relative safety.

For guests at the Day Center, however, it's not unusual to have something taken or lost or to feel at risk. A constant state of vigilance takes energy. Trying to recover or replace lost possessions is stressful. It's one of the cognitive costs of poverty.

John bought a new phone on Monday. He still had the box and the paperwork, but his phone was stolen yesterday. He let someone make a call with it, and when they handed it back, he didn't notice that he'd been given a non-working version of his phone.

Kay left a friend to watch their camp but TJ had to leave before she returned. Apparently, a camo blanket didn't provide enough cover for the bedroll. I didn't catch what turned up missing but I could hear TJ's voice tremble when he explained to Kay. She gave him a hug in return.

Tomi has multiple physical health issues and suffers from anxiety. She spends most of her time at the Day Center reading a book, which helps to take her out of the chaos and noise. Naturally, the loudest and more vociferous of our regular visitors fastened on her last week and she nearly flipped out. I watched the situation more closely when he came in today and I had to tell him that she didn't want his attention. I could still see how she hunched her shoulders and restricted where she went while he was in the building.

Brandy has a dog, a cute little terrier mutt who's a faithful companion for someone with anxiety and anger issues. But the dog can't come into the Day Center or the shelter or most other public places a homeless person must spend the day. Dog people do watch out for each other's pets, but they can get away or be snatched easily enough.

Unwanted visitors are a peril for formerly homeless people who get into stable housing. People with apartments can feel guilty about their good fortune, have empathy for folks on the street, and can have those feelings preyed upon. Ervin is in his seventies and lives in the veteran's housing nearby. We just discovered that one of the younger drug users moved in with him—totally against the rules—and cranked up him with meth. 

Jayeff's wallet was stolen yesterday as he was passing through town. It contained his money, his driver's license, his birth certificate and social security card.

We'd never do that, right? We have the birth certificate in the safe deposit box and the social security card... Well, when was the last time we had to show that puppy, 1978?

But if  you're carrying all your possessions on your back, objectively, what's the difference? It might actually feel safer to keep those documents on your person. Backpacks have a way of walking. And camp is nowhere to leave anything you care about.

Jayeff is from New Mexico, making his way to Washington state to find work on the fishing boats starting in June. He'll need identification when he gets there, so this morning he started the process of reconstructing who he was.

For most of us a lost ID would be a pain, but not insurmountable. However, doing it in a strange place with no official residence or supporting documents involves a number of steps to various agencies, plus fees.

He'd been given an info sheet that laid out the steps for different situations, and I can tell you it was still challenging to figure out where he could start the process. Also, each person he talked to told him something slightly different. 

Then there are the silent ones. When I ask, they say they're doing all right. I've been at this long enough to see it's not the case but my bag of tricks is limited. I watch and smile and say their name when they step back out on the street.

A Lenten Walk with Rabbits.

The dog, who has scorned fetching the newspaper until the sun breaks over the mammillated hill, breaks fast this morning and we continue toward the trail.

A snakeskin tread runs plain through the sand. A sign my neighbor is riding before work.

We hit the wash. A fresh splash thrown up on the rocks, too high for the steam to have done on its own.

The tread resumes and I think we might meet on his return.

But one small paw print crosses over and suddenly there is nothing to track. The sand a muddle. In a sweep of foot and rolling fur, coyotes have covered his escape.

The dog knows where to go. Up-canyon were the coyotes den.

The rubber tire snake is back. 

As we ascend, the track turns old. Now I see another hiker's mark in the cold mud. A sliding Sisyphus in LL Beans has clodhopped craters, days old now and concrete. 

A shard of cloudy church glass ice fills a shaded hole. Today may be its last unbroken.

Why did you keep climbing? To reach the top of the mountain? There's nothing there but another mountain. All will still be there when it's dry.

We turn at the accustomed place, a rock ledge good for pissing.

I have been watching the scat all the way up and mean to examine it on our descent.

Winter's mince pies of fallen quince and crab apple and rotten prickly pear alternate with grey poop, some like dryer lint but also plugs of high-caliber wadding.

Soon, no more vegan coyotes. The rabbits mill in the greasewood, tourists pretending to make up their minds.

On the way up I had my eye on a red conglomeration studded with what might have been juniper berries still blue, but the dog was too eager on the downhill and I did not want to hold her back.

We cross the stream again. The dog drinks coyote water but has a pointer's indifference toward chasing the rabbits. 

Given the choice, perhaps the coyotes would prefer Taste of the Wild.