Immobilization

Some days I look at all of us homeless kids and wonder how we all got here. It's not really something people talk about. Sometimes it seems we've all fallen from the sky and landed on the doorstep of shelter. When you really think about it it doesn't really matter what brought us here; we are all the same amount of homeless.

Regardless our stories are sad. I hear more sad stories in shelter than I have anywhere else and I hardly feel my problems could even begin to compare. Many of the gay kids are here because of family rejection. One of the girls says she is here because her family practices dark magic. Many are here because the options are staying in shelter or being abused. There are kids who cut themselves daily. Drug addicts are here for obvious reasons though what's not obvious is that for the most part it's relatives and care givers that got them strung out. The majority of us are foster care alum.

It's difficult for me. Previously I held down three jobs and a 4.0. Many of the kids have zero job experience and haven't even graduated high school. They don't care about books or literature or science. Why should they? The system has failed them. I in no way feel like I'm better than any of them for these reasons. I just don't know how to relate to them because of these differences. Many of them struggle with addictions and problems beyond my comprehensions. I often don't understand this world we are living in. I don't understand how I got here or how to get out.

A billion times a day I must walk past the place I used to go to brunch and the church I used to attend. My former friends are simply on the other side of the walls that separate us. Just on the inside of that building they do all the things we used to do just without me. My roommate who so abruptly kicked me out to the curb goes on without caring about what she did too me or where I am. She sings Unitarian hymns about peace and love and helping your neighbor but it was so much easy for her to just cast me aside when she knew I had nowhere else to go.This infuriates me to no end.

KL is consistently frustrated with being immobilized with her broken foot. She rants endlessly about not being able to go where she wants and being dependent on people to push her. I understand her frustrations because I feel immobilized too. I am immobilized by my health and the mountains of debt that surround me. I am immobilized by stigma and the abandonment of my so called "friends". I am immobilized by the nightmares that plague me nightly. I am immobilized by having to walk past my old life a million times a day. I am immobilized by being in a hole so deep all I can do is dig myself in deeper.

--mm