Don't get me wrong.
Homelessness specifically and poverty in general are huge and very real problems in our country, and anyone who claims otherwise has made a conscious decision not to see the truth lest he be required to do something about it. I work downtown in one of the largest cities in the U.S., and I give away a lot of money on the street, in addition to the money I give away by mail and the money I slip into the poor box at church and....you get the point. The homeless are there. There are many, many reasons that they can't "just get a job" and stop pestering us for money. Some of those reasons include lack of contact information to write on job applications, lack of the necessary literacy to fill out job applications, lack of transportation, lack of a place to shower, lack of suitable clothing to show up to fill out a job interview, lack of access to newspapers or internet job banks (don't tell me "they can always go to the library!" You need a DRIVER'S LICENSE to use the internet connection at most libraries!), lack of proper documentation to complete I-9 forms...and much more.
Still, I'm analytical by nature. A lot of people view this as "finding fault" or "picking things apart", but it's not something I DO. It's just the way I see things. Some people love this about me, some hate it, but for better or worse, it is what it is. And so, a few things have been bothering me about the homeless downtown ever since I started my current job.
I'm not talking about the usual things like, "That guy is dressed as well as I am and clean and apparently young and healthy--what is he doing out here?" or "Why is that woman walking down those stairs when she was sitting in a wheelchair yesterday?"
No, I'm talking about real mysteries.
Things like Where do they get the markers?
You know what I'm talking about. Every homeless person on the downtown streets has a cardboard sign written in black marker. Sometimes they're written in multiple colors, which raises whole other issues, but for the time being, let's stick to black.
I work in a thirty-story office building and a lot of times I can't find a good black marker. How is it that every homeless person in town has easy access to one? And, since they're homeless, where ARE their markers while they're sitting there on the streetcorner with their signs, and no apparent marker in sight?
And, on a related note, where do they print out those full-color pictures of Jesus they have taped to their signs sometimes? (Let's leave aside for a moment why they think it's cool to use Jesus as a marketing ploy and stick to the practicalities.) I don't know about anyone else out there, but I never have color ink when I need it. I, of course, have a home, and a computer, and a printer, and a regular income, but it's not all that easy for me to print out a full-color picture...and I think twice before doing so, anyway, because it eats up so much of a cartridge that runs about $35.
So I guess the real question in my mind comes down to this: where do the homeless keep their office supplies?
2 comments:
When I was young and idealistic, I spent two years working for the local Food Bank. I taped quarters to business cards and gave them to people who held signs that said, "will work for food." The thing is, I had access to where they could GET food!! I told them --call me, I can help you find where to go.
In two years, I did't get a single call. Not one. I don't give money away on the street anymore.
When I worked for legal aid in Georgia, I had a friend who always asked those people, "Don't you get food stamps?" If they said no, he'd give them a business card and tell them that he could get them food stamps, and they never called him, either. But I think it's more complicated than we realize. They don't, after all, have phones. And if you have to choose between making a phone call that may or may not pay off (and after who knows how long) or spending the quarter on a cup of coffee on a cold day...well, they haven't exactly been conditioned to believe in solutions. I can't tell you how many people I encountered in that job who had gone to sign up for public benefits and been flat-out turned away with some outrageous bullshit--one of my clients tried to apply for emergency food stamps and was told that she wasn't homeless because her hair couldn't look so good if she was.
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