Dying on the streets today we look at death, square in the face, death. No warm bed, no hospice nurse, no medications to help ease the discomfort, no family and most often it is not gentle. It can be unexpected in one’s sleep, it can be murder at the hands of another homeless one, it can be suicide, or an accident. Yes, maybe welcomed at times. However after death there is none to miss, grieve, plan a service or buy a headstone, they are forgotten in death as in life, they are just a homeless one.
Simply Deceased, Another Slipped Away
Morning, what’s up Howard, any stories today? Man no stories today, nope, just this, Cornerman is dead. What, no way, he was one of the slippery ones, one of the few that knew how to stay hidden and out of the way. Yea, but he did not make it through the night last night.
He was he found under his pile of cardboard boxes hiding? No, he was trying to clean up and he drown in the retention pond behind the store. Darn, really? Man, I thought with his hiding skills that he could make it longer then any of us out here, those boxes were disgusting but they work to hide him well. But that is why got the nickname Cornerman, in that deep corner he piled up boxes that looked like recycling and he slid under them and hid.
The police were always on him because he was so dirty and stood out like a sore thumb, but they were never rough with him. I think that he has some medical stuff that he refused to talk about and hid it with the alcohol. He was trying to cope with the junk on the street. He took to hiding because he just got tired of the police and having to talk to them so much, I mean even the food people knew just where to land his food bag for him.
If he had been able to get help when he first landed on the streets I wonder if he would have been able to avoid turning to alcohol? Yes, that is right, he was not alcoholic when he first landed, it was a job injury, right? Yes, it was. A question that will never be answered. Unfortunately, many turn to addiction to simply cope with the stress of the streets, that if they found a program, housing and help the addiction would not even need treatment, it would just end, because the stressor is gone.
Man what those blessed with having a home just don’t seem to have the ability to understand is how quickly life events can happen that are unexpected and can turn a life upside down. Of no safety net one can land on the streets unexpectedly. Who would have thought that going to wash up would end by him falling in and drowning last night?
But, Tim, those with homes are protected way too much, it is called comfort bubble and they cannot see and will not see, because it frightens them, and they cannot admit to that. No one can comprehend that this, homelessness, may happen to them, it is a frightening thought of one’s nightmares.
Then mix in the police and sheriff officers, they have a tough job to do, they have mandates to follow, and we are the ones on the receiving end.
We are seen in the eyes of society as the bums to be dealt with, but how can we bring change and help them see just how easy it is for life to flip and them end up out here with us?
Even at risk of drowning in a retention pond while just cleaning up and not in their nice warm shower. There are some dark, lonely nights I wonder quietly if it would not be better to end up like cornerman, dead and gone instead of being here still being chased, harassed, and bothered from one point to the next with no peace in between. In mean cornerman did not do anything on purpose to not be here, but he is no longer suffering and struggling, and we still are, just makes one wonder what peace and rest are like.
Will You Continue to Die Nameless, Cold and Alone
OR
Will You Simply Work for A Better Solution for All
