Jack London Square

After work last Friday I decided to bike a few blocks down Broadway and over to Jack London Square and do a little reading down by the pier. On the way there, I was stopped at underpass next to a guy holding a sign that read “Homeless, anything will help. God Bless.” He showed all of the cars at the intersection his sign and then he turned to show it to me, I diverted my eyes slightly, and then I heard a laugh come from the man, and he said, “Hey, I know you!”

I was slightly caught off guard and it took me a second before I recognized the man and I said, “Hey, I know you, too!” We’d read the paper and drank coffee together at the same table in the men's center earlier in the morning.

I sat there, propped on my bike seat, and we shot the breeze (as the kids say) for a few minutes about things down at SVdP. I will openly admit that I’m not a huge fan of panhandling, especially at intersections, and as we continued to talk I kept thinking, “Why are you here?”

And then I caught myself. It was a reminder that homelessness can’t be summed up in numbers and statistics, and that it can’t simply be legislated away. There are drunks and addicts and many are mentally-ill and smell unbearably bad—but, there are also guys who are funny and likeable and can talk intelligently about sports and politics.

It’s scarier to think about them. It’s so much easier to think of the homeless as a population that can be easily boxed in--who’ve made decisions and done things that we would never do. It is disconcerting when you look at a homeless guy and you legitimately wonder, “Are we really that different?” Maybe there is a big difference, and at that point you can ask, “Is there really any difference between him and my crazy uncle that shows up to random holidays every couple of years?” Probably not.