Days Officially Unemployed: 48
I decide that before I begin my volunteer work, I'd like to pass through the San Diego facility as a homeless man to see what the experience is like from the other side of the counter, especially since we're not supposed to fraternize with the clientele. I park my car at my girlfriend's place and ride my bike downtown this morning. I pass by a couple homeless men close to her apartment in University Heights, and realize they must make it hustling on their own. While cruising down Park Blvd., down past San Diego High School and City College, I spot some high school aged kids smoking a bong in a closed car garage doorway. Not a joint but a foot long bong. When I near the homeless facility, I see several homeless people beginning to converge on the charity and line up.
I ride around back and look for somewhere to lock my bike up, before riding back out front and locking it in plain view of the line inside the gate. I stand outside the gate and loiter next to a streetlight and wait for the doors to open. Men and women sit or lie down with their bags within the roped off, safety-coned lines, while others mill about outside by me. I have on my black hooded sweatshirt and keep the hood over my head and a scowl on my face. With my scruff, I think I can easily pass as the jobless man I am.
Just yesterday, after a week of trying, I finally managed to do the impossible. I got ahold of an actual person at the EDD––only because I found the interview phone number in my cell phone's old dialed calls––to ask them where my unemployment checks are, and they said it showed one authorized in the system, but it never went out. I applied a month and a half ago. I spoke to my mom last night and said, "If I didn't have any savings, I would have been screwed. How would I pay rent?" And she said, "That's how people end up homeless."
So here I am, posing as a homeless man but actually jobless. I move from my place by the streetlight to closer by the gate entrance. A short, portly Latina woman stands next to a taller, thin black man right at the entrance. While I'm watching the scene, a man approaches the black man and hands him two bucks. The black man, wearing a beanie and heavy coat, reaches into his pocket and slyly produces a pack of Marlboros for the other man. Then he does this for a woman. Then another woman. They guy is a human cigarette machine, working his angle. He unfolds a wad of ones, straightens them out, then refolds it before putting it in his pocket. A couple of other men wandering in and out of the gated area carry whole cartons of cigarettes, and I get the feeling smokes hold almost the same currency here as in prison.
I'm trying to stand here and mind my own business, so that no one will talk to me or ask me my story. But I'm a magnet for attention. A resident chaplain beelines it out of the gated area and right toward me. In an Irish accent he asks me how I am, if I have a place to stay, and how my strength is. I tell him I'm staying with a friend up by the park, a half-lie, and that I lost my job in January, the truth. He tells me my health is the most important thing, then he asks me if I believe in the Creator. I'm extremely uncomfortable with public discussions of religion, but I sheepishly tell him yes. "Do ya believe in Jesus Christ?" Without thinking of the connotation he implies––that Jesus is a form of God and the Messiah and Savior, dying for me on the cross––I answer yes. "So you're a Christian?" he says. I tell him sort of, or at least I'm trying to be, in the sense that I'm trying to follow Jesus' example. "Would ya like to pray with me?" he asks. I shrug, almost say no, then answer, "I guess so."
He lays his hand upon my shoulder and asks God to help me stay healthy, to find a job, and to meet the right people. My head is bowed and my eyes closed, and I appreciate everything he asks in my name, since I would never ask for it myself. When he finishes his lengthy prayer, I shake his hand and thank him. He says, "Would you like to pray for me now?" I stammer and say that I'm not comfortable with public prayer and that I will remember him tonight in my prayers. He tells me his name, and I begin asking him questions about where he's from. He says he's a retired missionary and has been in the U.S. for about 15 years, and, no, he hasn't been back to Ireland for a long while. That makes me sad for some reason. He asks me if I know who Saint Francis of Assisi is, and then tells me I look like him, especially with my sweatshirt hood and scruffy beard. I tell him I wish I were St. Francis.
When the cafeteria doors open, I walk inside the gate and sit on the curb at the end of the long line. They only allow a dozen or so people in at a time, so the line moves slow. The majority of the people standing in line are white and over forty-years-old. Black people are second in numbers, followed by a few Asian men and a couple Latinos. I would expect more Latinos because of the overall demographics of San Diego and its proximity to Mexico. Their underrepresentation here makes me hypothesize about the nature of families within our various cultures. I think white people are the most likely to be isolated from their families, though this is only speculation. Could be that they're more willing to accept handouts, dating back to the Great Depression––the old soup line photos show mostly white men and a few black men––who knows?
I spend my time in line staring at the ground, looking up every once in a while to observe the faces or to see who's telling the story about how he's looking for work and an apartment. A young Asian guy, who wears a black Henry's Market beanie and appears to be in fantastic health, stands next to me in line. He keeps looking at me and sizing me up, probably thinking the same thing I am about him: what are you doing here?
An unshaved, fat white man with a worn out, black ball cap and a silky, black windbreaker enters the line behind me and starts complaining to his lady friend about how they wouldn't let him in through the handicap line. He said he asked where R is, because R always lets him in. The man takes pains to outline how, even though he seems quite capable, he isn't supposed to stand for more than fifteen minutes at a time, and that even the handicap line takes more than fifteen minutes to get through, while this regular one can take an hour. I realize he's holding a fluorescent, laminated card. I look around and see other people are holding these too.
I turn to the guy behind me and ask if you need a pass to eat. "Yeah, you get them at the office," he says, pointing to the front of the building outside of the gate. I walk over there and enter. The young black man minding the front desk ignores me while I stand at the counter. After several seconds pass, he finally looks at me and asks what I want. I tell him I need a pass to eat, and he says I have to go around the block to another building and get a special I.D. card there. An I.D. card? To eat at a homeless shelter? The place in Fresno doesn't ask for I.D. "Won't take but five minutes," he says. I really just want to leave at this point, since I'm feeling guilty for even trying to eat lunch here.
But I walk up the sidewalk. Then stop. I walk back to the building and get my bike, then ride up the street to see if I can find the other building, which has the word "day" in its name. When I turn the corner, I see many homeless people, in a less secure setting, wandering the streets or standing with their shopping carts on the sidewalk. I ride up to the gate of the place that issues I.D.s and the courtyard looks like what can only be described as a homeless prison yard. Apparently, it's an area that provides daytime relief to the homeless. I don't have the nerve to enter through all the tents and rough characters, plus I worry about having to face an interview and lying about my situation. Looks like I'm going to have to experience the place purely as a volunteer. I turn around and head up the street toward my girlfriend's apartment, satisfied with my attempt to get a free lunch. And I vow to return in the morning to feed the poor.
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