A Living Magazine - Day 92 - The With and Without Barrier

I woke, rose and packed up. On the way down the Latah Creek path, I passed the site I'd described some posts back. Another female. Though it was a different person than the Asian woman (I'm assuming), there were similar things hanging; so similar it was a bit uncanny. Underwear and a (formally) nice black sweater. She hung up the sheets, presumably for privacy. I think all they do is call attention, but what do I know?

From my still-very limited knowledge of the differences between how male and female street folk live, I am developing a clearer picture. I could be dead wrong about any of this though, and am admittedly generalizing to beat the band...

Male sleeping sites are usually simple, having a small bag of trash; sometimes socks or a t-shirt. Female sites are set up like mini-bedrooms, with a bedding area, separated clean and dirty laundry piles, sometimes utensils, etc. As many toiletries and beauty products as she can accumulate.

At the Asian woman's site (for example, near where my tarp was stolen) was a small pile of burnt sticks. She had been making tea for herself. She knew how to live--or maybe more accurately, how to try to feel comfortable - some semblance (or remembrance?) of domestic life - in the most barren of circumstances. Men are seemingly more willing to give it all up.

Women care more than men about how clean they are. They hold on to their personal effects, they wash and dry their underwear (ha!), they try to eat more regularly... Gosh, I guess I'm saying that they are more responsible for themselves. If you remember the site I found on the cliff top in Vancouver, Washington, sometimes there are children involved--as one might expect. I find a lot of religious pamphlets and church brochures, coloring books, small McDonald's "Happy Meal" toys.

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The With and Without Barrier

Were I not immersed in this culture right now, I could become overwhelmed with just how different life is for children who live never knowing what a "home" is, nor how important a reliable schedule is, appropriate education, nor regularly eaten meals, prepared or provided by parents who care about their nutrition. There is a barrier that disallows the with from seeing the without, and from allowing the without to live like the with.

In a way - because children have never seen what life is like living in a house, going to school each day, eating an evening's hot meal - they don't miss it, until they see that kind of lifestyle in a movie or something. The media makes it look like three car garages, jet skis, annual vacations, pizza and video nights, dinner out each week, digital gadgets for each family member, etc. are the norm. And, truthfully, most families do have some of these luxuries. Come to think of it, the percentage of people who don't have these things is so small, it is almost ridiculously unimaginable, that the "bottom class" can't have them also.

How devastated, how astonished; what a surprise, what a rude awakening it would be if my little niece and nephew were to suddenly be transported to a dirty spot, beneath a concrete overhang, with graffiti tags for wall decorations; trashy, stained blankets for bedding; having to walk 4 miles everyday for breakfast handouts by standing in line at a "mission" or "feeding" with a bunch of other unsatisfied, depressed, unhealthy and defeated souls--while cars pass with head-shaking, prejudiced faces, and then walk all the way back to a dingy spot to sleep each night.

Middle class parents struggle with their own economic, social and personal stressors--there is no doubt. I know. I've seen it many times. I grew up with it. However, their CHILDREN are beginning their lives in a much more structured and caring environment in most cases. The middle class usually hides its problems from its children until those kids have made it past their most vulnerable years--when they can better psychologically handle just how cold and rough the real world can be.

The "bottom class" shares all of their insecurity with their kids. They are forced to. Not only do kids grow up too quickly, with not enough opportunity to simply have fun and be healthy--to feel security, but their parents are then infantilized by a patronizing, paternalistic social services system, demeaning government and unsympathetic community--made to feel like children themselves, IN FRONT of their own kids. How demoralizing!

"Bottom kids" grow up thinking their parents are sub-citizens (which, in any practical sense, they are). Unhealthy kids, with overdeveloped street smarts, extremely low expectations for living standards, who have been catching the hints all their young lives that there is no need to dream of attaining anything better, grow up watching their parents submit to the indignities of being marginalized, and simply expect their lives to be the same. They are - in fact - trained for it.

Dreams are for people with money. It is that simple. Any economic system that accepts the trashing - the literal "throwing-away" - of another group of human beings, so that the "other half" may have comfortable lives--deluding themselves that their easier existence is due to their own "hard work" (which it ISN'T), deserves to have a heavy conscience weighing it down.

In this advanced nation, where most of what we touch each day is also simply thrown in a trash can (food, food wrappers, napkins, grocery bags, worn out plastic junk, etc.), it is a crime against humanity to let people languish in a state of uncertainty, hunger, sickness, and disrepute; essentially treating them as disposable. But are you ashamed? Na!! Not a chance. I wasn't either, until I saw what I am describing every single day. I will be ashamed for all of us. And you can bet your "bottom" dollar (get it?) that I will not stop showing you the uncomfortable, along with the pretty pictures.

If we CAN make it better (and WE CAN), why AREN'T we?

Laziness, arrogance, greed, self-imposed blindness, indifference? Take your pick--after all you (and I) should know. We are the complacent citizens of World War II Germany, as the Jews are being sent to the ghettos. We are the pre-Civil War, white southern land owners who go to church each Sunday to hear about the religion of Jesus, who said that ALL human beings are equal in spiritual status--as we pass the slaves working in our fields. We know that our inaction is unconscionable, but we delay the Karmic consequences by rationalizing how we fit into the whole picture.

We see the beaten man lying in the road and have become the "priest and the Levite", NOT the Samaritan... "A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite..."

It appears that the Samaritan is still yet to come. Doesn't it? Let us "pray", believer and non-believer alike, that there will even be a better future. Otherwise, we are going to bleed out into the metaphorical ditch.

Look for the signs, though. It shouldn't be difficult, because they are all around you NOW. THIS is the time. The very words that are dripping off of my fingertips and into your consciousness are part of it. You know this--whether you rationalize it as something else or not. History will see what we are doing (or not doing) much more clearly than we see ourselves. Our great grandchildren will pity our complacency--once they are finished blaming it for the twisted morals of the early 21st Century.

In my eyes, there is no difference at all between a relatively secure person who claims to care about the suffering of the great unwashed American masses (not just the homeless, but the perpetually and multi-generationally poor--people with the potential of contributing to our society, but have no opportunity to do so), but who does nothing at all to address the situation, and the pan handler on the street who shakes his cup in that secure person's face, but refuses to do anything for his handout. NO DIFFERENCE. People take no action, and expect things to work themselves out. Instead, things rot away and prevent the solutions from being found.

There is an immoral balance between those who refuse to give and those who refuse to do anything for what they are given. Neither deserves to blame the other. And, neither IS progressing forward. How much more plainly could I say these things? How many times must I be moved to try?

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Maybe it's my frame of mind, but I always see these ditches as little grave sites.

I headed back downtown. What problematic thing do you see affecting motel guests in the next picture...?

I missed the iris on this bridge painting the first time I saw it...

Is those tears?

I swung by the library and then remembered that it was closed on Sundays. So, I wrote my post outside in the park. Then I sat on a window ledge at the library and used its Wi-Fi to send it. 

The batteries died again in my camera. It is really becoming an issue. I go through about 1 pair of AA batteries every three days. That means in 92 days I've plowed through 30 pairs--or about $50 worth of batteries. The camera is having other issues too. My back up camera is gone. I really do need a new camera (or good used one). Although it sits among the many-items on my priority list, it is one of the biggest. We'll see how all of that plays out...

This is the sushi place I keep hearing about.

Sometime in a future life, I'd love to check it out.

Senmut has been REfaced at the Masonic Temple (albeit a bit roughly)!

As I sat, sending out my post, two gentlemen in brown shirts and dark brown ties walked slowly toward me. I ignored them, but they continued kind of slinking closer and closer. I knew what they were: Jehovah's Witnesses--coming to talk to me about Jesus.

As you may know by following my thought patterns about social religion, I'm NOT the guy you want to ask, "Have you accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior?" It makes me cold and highly irritated to be proselytized at. 

One of these guys walked up and stood right in front me, saying "Hello there!" I greeted him, then looked back down at my screen. He walked over and sat beside me so closely that he was actually touching me. The monster began to rise in me, along with my blood pressure. He said, "Have you got a little time to talk?"

I grit my teeth, and looked deeply into his eyes, and then said, "NO. I'm busy." 

He looked frightened for a moment, and then said, "Okay, catch you around!"

I mumbled, "I hope not." They left quickly, making their way across the street to shove their belief system down someone else's throat.

After the post was made, I headed directly back to the creek. I was not in the best mood, but I rallied once I was among the the trees and rippling water of the creek banks. I decided to explore more, finally finding the end of the path that runs the length of the creek. I thought there might be better sleeping places there, but there really weren't.

I returned to "Sleeping Place 3", sitting down by a tree there to wait for darkness before rolling out the sleeping bag. Just after sunset I heard a truck pull up to the edge of the bank above (in the frisbee golf coarse parking lot). Two guys got out, and although I couldn't hear what they were saying, I heard rocks tumbling down the hillside toward me. It sounded like they were on there way down there. I strapped on the pack and went back to Place 2 again--the old reliable spot.

I was done for the day, laid down the laundry bag, the raincoat, the sleeping bag, and my plastic bag pillow and immediately fell asleep.