My Journey through Homelessness Part Three: A New Pair of Glasses

My Journey through Homelessness Part Three: A New Pair of Glasses

Commentary by Andy Pope | FāVS News

I’m a person who tends to keep track of important dates.

For example, I know I first became legally homeless on April 1, 2004. That was the day I left my rental and lost my official on-paper place of residence.

But I didn’t yet think of myself as homeless. I had plenty of money in the bank, and I figured I’d soon climb out of it. So I kept finding places to stay — motel rooms, a motorhome owned by a friend, etc. — until one night there was no such option.

I had finally become flat broke.

For some reason, I never made a note of that very important date. Maybe I was too frazzled or harried at the time. In any case, I recently decided to calculate back and pinpoint exactly when it was.

I knew I had gotten off the psychiatric drug Klonopin on May 10 of that year. I made a mental note of that important date. And I was still inside when I got off the drug.

I also knew I had lost my prescription glasses sleeping in Golden Gate Park on May 20. I made a note of that date as well.

So the first night I slept outside must have fallen between the two. I remember crawling onto a bench outside the Burlingame CalTrain Station in the wee hours. I slept, mostly sitting up, concerned I would be approached by a cop. At eight in the morning I gathered myself and wandered over to the Lutheran church where once I had been the minister of music.

I remember it was a Monday. Therefore it was May 17. So for whatever it was worth, the first night I slept outside was on May 17, 2004. At that point in time, I was truly homeless.

A New Pair of Glasses

As I wrote in my last column, it was 12 years later — on July 17, 2016 — that I prayed the prayer whose answer would free me from homelessness, 10 days further down the road.

There is a parallel between the two 10-day periods. In the first, I was liberated from a drug dependency. In the second, as a result of that prayer, I was liberated in a different way.

So you see the parallel. Each of the two periods began with an experience of liberation and ended with a radical change in life-circumstance. In each case, the change in circumstance led to a new way of seeing the world — a new pair of glasses, if you will. 

It took a while after losing my glasses before I began to view the world through the perspective of an outsider. For years, I clung helplessly to the “inside view” — the way things looked when I was still sheltered and had no idea how indoor living appeared from the outside.

In the same way, it has taken me some time to readjust my lenses, now that I live inside. Only in 2023, seven years after the fact, have I come close to seeing things the way other indoor-dwellers do.

Our Outdoor Perception

When I was homeless, I hung out with people in my peer group who were also outside. Often, we identified over a common perception that those who were inside lacked compassion, understanding and vision. 

When they tried to show compassion, we usually did not perceive it as such. We thought we saw through their transparent displays of feigned empathy. After all, they had never been in our shoes, and could not possibly identify.

If we pointed out their hypocrisy, they were often offended and shocked. This was because they saw themselves as compassionate people. But we who were homeless admonished them for being cold of heart. 

How much better it would have been, had they seen themselves as earthen vessels, made up of nothing but depraved sinful flesh! For we all share a common human flesh, for which Christ died on the cross.

But that’s not how they saw themselves. Instead, they clung to this notion that they were “good people” — rather than incorrigible sinners — and they saw our objections as hostile and heartless.

After all, we were the “bad people” they were trying to help. But to us, this appeared to be utter arrogance. For they, too, were sinners, equal to and not greater than ourselves.

Were we cold? Were we all cold? Were we heartless, every one of us? Perhaps. But let me ask you a question.

The Great Division

How would you feel if you were stranded in a thunderstorm, and someone, who minutes earlier had promised you a night in a hotel room, reneged on the basis that to stay at the computer for another minute would “hurt their back?”

When this in fact happened to me, I exploded.

“How can you be so lacking in compassion?” I asked her.

“How can you say such a thing?” she shot back.

In my world, the death I might face overnight was a far more serious situation than someone’s aching back. I was only asking for another minute or two, for her to navigate the PayPal website. Yet where was I to stay in the storm? Would I even survive?

In her world, I seemed ungrateful, lashing out at someone who wanted to help.

Christmas 2014 was a brutal example of something similar.

I was huddled with my laptop, shivering under a Starbucks awning in a rainstorm. All services for the homeless were closed, since social workers had the day off to celebrate. The Starbucks was closed. The library was closed. The only people I saw that day were about 25 angry homeless people.

When I went to Facebook and saw someone displaying their Christmas gifts beneath the tree, it appeared to be nothing but a boastful show of extravagant decadence. How dare they spend such money on a superficial social custom, when I and countless others were deprived of the right to celebrate Christmas, and instead were struggling in the storm!

This dynamic was repeated, multiplied, and magnified, until I and others became aghast at the warped priorities of an entire nation — a culture lost in trivial pursuits, while thousands upon thousands suffered before their eyes.

And yet, eight years later — in 2023 — I recently had lunch with a friend who by his own admission is a millionaire. I remember saying these words:

“Homelessness messed with our heads. We got to where we sincerely believed that everyone who lived inside was letting us die.”

As I said this, I chuckled at the absurdity of such a view. My friend laughed too. Of course the conglomerate of ordinary Americans, many of whom also struggled to make ends meet, had no vested interest in hastening our deaths.

Yet to us, it seemed they were all unwilling to make the relatively minor sacrifice of letting us stay in their spare rooms even for a single night — when we could have died overnight in all that horror.

Indeed, I saw many of us die in the heartless cold, in the dead of night.

Let Us In

“Hey Andy,” my friend Jerome said, as he lay awake next to me at our illegal sleeping spot on the Cal Berkeley campus. “If you ever get inside again, you’re not going to be one of these guys who never lets us in, are you?”

“Oh no, Jerome! I could never not let you in! These are the strongest bonds I have ever formed in my life!”

And yet, what happened when I donned yet another new pair of glasses? The ones I began wearing on July 27, 2016? For now I was no longer outside, but inside again. Slowly but surely, things began to look different.

At first, I was quick to let anyone and their brother inside my apartment. As soon as I learned they were homeless, I let them in — no matter who they were. I knew what it was like out there, and I didn’t want anyone to have to endure it. 

One of them stole three items on the single night he stayed with me. One of them talked violence in my house. One of them simply never stopped talking — largely about crazy conspiracy theories — until I could not sleep at all.

And one of them did something even worse. I don’t want to say what it was. Suffice it to say that it prompted me to vow never to let anyone inside my house again — whether homeless or not. Henceforth, my home would be my castle.

But that resolve was short-lived.

A lady stood with her luggage outside the gas station near my old apartment. She was friendly enough, but I sensed she was stranded. On a hunch, I asked if she needed a place to stay, and I offered her my spare room.

When she got inside, she gave me forty dollars in cash. She made her bed when she left. When she left, she smiled at me and softly said: “God bless you.”

I remember thinking she might have been an angel, or superhuman, because she treated me with such dignity and respect. Though I never saw her again, her visit prompted this podcast.

While she was sleeping, I remained awake. I thought of several things she could have done that she did not do. She did not refuse to leave. She did not trash my place. She did not drink or use drugs in the house. She did not make excessive noise. Moreover, she has not since come knocking on my door.

I found myself wondering if these were among the reasons why people wouldn’t let me stay with them, when I was outside. Did they think I would steal from them? Would I make a mess and trash the place? Would I keep them awake all night? Would I refuse to leave?

Or were they only judging me? I shuddered at the thought. And yet, was I not judging them? It was as though there were two camps of people asleep in this world. There were those were slept inside, comfortably — and those who slept outside — often in danger, desperation and fear. And never the twain should meet. 

Uniting to Survive

Grim memories indeed. But I’m older now. I am in my seventies, and I have learned the peace that comes from a quiet life of indoor solitude. For when I was homeless, I often told myself these words:

“If I ever get inside, I am going to write music, I am going to write columns, I am going to make podcasts, and I will probably write an entire musical! All I need is a lock on a door, a window and a power outlet — and I will do great things!”

Now, I do have what I call a “spare room” in my new one bedroom apartment, since I sleep on the floor in the living room by preference.

About a week ago, I took pity on a homeless alcoholic who looked like he needed a good night’s sleep. I had him over, he fell asleep at six in the evening, and we both awoke at six in the morning. He was respectful and appreciative, and we stayed out of each other’s ways.

The next day, he ripped me off.

Will I let that guy stay in my house again? Of course not! One has to be discerning, and one’s discernment is often faulty — especially when sentiment is involved. I know what it’s like to be out in the cold. But if someone had let me in, would I not have been grateful? Would I have stolen from them in return?

My friend Jerome might be disappointed in me. On the other hand, I would probably let him in. He’s not just some stranger stranded on the streets. He’s Jerome — he’s my friend — he’s special.

Or is he? Have I changed so much that I wouldn’t even let Jerome through my door? Or Sherpa J, or Biker Bruce or Lauren, or any of the others with whom I bonded so closely on the streets?  

I can no longer fault the many people who did not let us in when we were homeless. But I must proclaim that something needs to be done about the present situation. After years of homelessness, I doubt I can ever return fully to the worldview I had embraced before.

When we were homeless, we bonded so incredibly — we of different ages, genders, orientations and races.

We forsook all thoughts of courtesy, correct language and social platitudes. We spoke and sometimes screamed at each other with brutal honesty. We cussed like drunken sailors and wished everyone else would loosen up and do the same.

We saw people walk past us as though we did not exist. We heard them discussing their differences, trying to reach agreements. But none of that stuff even mattered to us. What mattered was that they were inside, and we were not.

That single disparity was so huge, it transcended differences in culture, religion and politics. Being outside, did our differences make any difference? Not at all.

And though our conversations appeared to them to be “complaints,” and though it seemed to them we were “commiserating,” to us those conversations affirmed our common dignity and gave us the strength to carry on.

Simply put, we were survivors. We were survivors, bonding together in unity, embracing our mutual need to survive.

Sometimes I think this is what America needs for her people to be. Survivors who will cast aside our petty differences and preferences, realize we are all in this mess together, focus on our mutual survival and, in so doing, save the world. 

I often wonder if the entire culture would be better off, if all of us saw the world as we did — when we were homeless.

If you’re interested in the other parts of the series, here’s “Part One: Turnstiles and the Night Sky,” “Part Two: A Prayer that Released Me from Shame,” “Part Four: Body Armor” and “Part Five: Learning to Live Outside the Box.”

The views expressed in this opinion column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of FāVS News. FāVS News values diverse perspectives and thoughtful analysis on matters of faith and spirituality.