Homeless

Claudia Smith

Period 3

4/13/12

Homeless

            Homeless is sleeping outside year round.  It’s being so cold in the winter that you can’t sleep and you shiver so hard you feel like an earthquake.  It’s being so hot and sticky in the summer that you can’t do anything.  It’s sitting outside in the rain and snow and sleet and hail.  But, it’s also sitting outside getting sun burnt and having the sun drain the little energy you have left.   It’s calling a rock your pillow and a park- bench your bed.    It’s using your coat that you got from the local church as a blanket and using an old pair of socks you found as gloves.  Being homeless can turn someone from a human being into something that is looked down upon. Homelessness makes people desperate.  It makes you do things you know is wrong, but do it anyways, just to survive.   

            Homelessness is sitting under a bridge and overhearing parents say terrible things about you to their kids.  It is knowing that you haven’t achieved everything you and your parents wanted for you.  It wishing you had changed your life when you were younger, but now it’s too late. Your only chance it to become famous, but yeah, like that will happen.  If you are lucky you find a job, but since you have no car you will probably continuously be late and get fired.  Back to square one. 

            Homeless is begging for money or food from complete strangers.   It is basing your next meal off the charity of others.  It is hoping that you find someone who will show you mercy and give you just enough to stay alive. It’s dumpster diving at fancy restaurants to get their extra food that they threw away.  It’s living in a dumpster just because it hold in heat better than the great outdoors.    It’s waiting in line all day to get into the local shelter, but them closing the doors when you are the next one to get it.  It’s waiting around to get food from the local food shelter, but them running out of food because the need is so great. 

            Homeless is “joining” the local cause, not because you believe in it, but because they hand out free food and drinks to their members.  It’s being at the mercy of others. 

            Homeless is being dirty.  It is taking a shower once a week, if you’re lucky. It’s taking baths in the local McDonalds in the sink.  It’s using ketchup and warm water to make tomato soup.    It’s having a serious disease and living with it, because you don’t have the money for a doctor or insurance.  It’s visibly being affected by an illness and having no one help you. 

 Homelessness is preventable. It takes privileged people stepping up and giving a crap about someone besides themselves.  It takes people giving up the $10 they were going to buy McDonalds with and giving it to a charity that helps others.  It takes people spending less time on the couch and more time at food shelters.  It takes people spending less time worrying about how they are going to charge their IPhone and more time worrying about whether others have food and a blanket. 

            I’m not saying that everyone should give up everything they have to make the world a homeless place, but I am saying that everyone deserves to have food and shelter and that with just a little bit from everyone we can make a dent in the problem.