found out I was in a family way the day after he shipped out. Helen was born while he was fighting in France. We planned to have lots of babies, I came from a family of 12. Eugene was the a big man, born and raised on his granddaddy’s dairy farm. Before he came back from the war he used to be able to scoop me up in his arms, picnic basket and all, and carry me from Duncan’s crossing up the hill to Friar’s Oak where he proposed. That’s why it was so hard to recognize him when he came back, they said it was the mustard gas. He never got strong enough to go back to the dairy, but Mr. Towns at the variety store gave him a job working the cash register. There were no more children either, they said that was on account of the mustard gas too. Not long after The Depression started Mr. Towns had to let Eugene go. We were able to hold on with a little savings and I did extra sewing just to try and pay the rent, but eventually there was barely enough money for food. So when Helen read about Sargent Water’s Bonus Marchers in Washington, asking to redeem those certificates all the veterans had been awarded by Congress, we decided to join them. By the time we arrived at the city of tents in early July they say there were over 40,000 veterans and their families. We were supposed to wait 12 more years to get the bonus, but people were hungry then, even if we didn’t get the full amount it would mean we could hang on for a little longer. I couldn’t believe it when President Hoover sent the army to drive us off. We barely managed to get our things and out of the way before the tanks destroyed everything. Congress finally gave out those bonuses in 1936, but by then Eugene was gone. They say that was on account of the mustard gas too, that his lungs finally just gave out.
Single voice (sung):
Remember my forgotten man,
You put a rifle in his hand;
You sent him far away,
You shouted, "Hip, hooray!"
But look at him today!
Vietnam Vet:
I survived 3 years in combat in Nam. When my mom died in ‘72 I thought, I can survive this, I survived Nam. When my knee got destroyed in a motorcycle accident in ‘75 I thought, I can survive this, I survived Nam. When I lost my job in ‘79 I thought, I can survive this, I survived Nam. When my wife and daughter were killed in a car accident in ‘82, I didn’t want to survive. You’d think as good as I was at shooting at other people in Nam I’d be able to off myself pretty easy. I woke up in the hospital with part of my skull gone and full of morphine. Now? Well, as long as I stay full of morphine I can survive this, I survived Nam. They call guys like me MIAs, missing in America. But we’re not missing, if you look you can find us surviving under freeway overpasses everywhere.
Single voice (sung):
Remember my forgotten man,
You put a rifle in his hand;
You sent him far away,
You shouted, "Hip, hooray!"
But look at him today!
Afghanistan Vet 1 (male):
My wife left me four months after I got back from Afghanistan. She said she couldn’t live with someone who woke her up screaming every night. The counselor at the VA Hospital told me I have PTSD. Ya think?
Afghanistan Vet 2 (female):
I have TBI, traumatic brain injury, how am I supposed to find a job when I can’t even remember what the hell happened yesterday?
Single voice (sung):
Remember my forgotten man,
You put a rifle in his hand;
You sent him far away,
You shouted, "Hip, hooray!"
But look at him today!
Voice:
According to the VA, on a typical night in 2010, about 131,000 veterans were homeless. They represented every war and generation, from the "Greatest Generation" to the latest generation of veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Currently, the VA operates the largest system of homeless treatment and assistance programs in the nation and has developed a plan to try and end Veteran homelessness by 2015.
Ensemble (sung):
Remember my forgotten man.
PRESIDENTIAL QUOTES #2
Voice 1:
Presidential quote #2: Lyndon Bains Johnson’s response to economic hardship:
Voice 2:
“The richest nation on earth can afford to win the war on poverty.”
ALWAYS WEAR A BELT
Man
Dude, I was in eighth grade, so I’d already done the trip to St. Anthony’s Dining Hall with our youth group the year before. I liked it. Ya, it was sad to see all the homeless people, but some of them were really cool, like Tony who played jazz piano the whole time we were serving, and Ned who used to be a homeless guy and was now one of the people in charge of security to make sure there weren’t any fights or disrespect in the dining room.
Since I’d been there before I knew exactly which job I wanted. I wanted to be one of the people who took trays back to the section where they seated the families with kids, the old people, and the people in wheelchairs. I liked that job because it kept me moving. If I had to stand behind the counter and dish out mashed potatoes I would have gone crazy. Besides, when you went through the line and served trays to the people in the back of the room you got to talk to them and I really liked that. I loved joking with them and playing with the little kids.
We were cranking out trays, I think we’d hit the 1,000 mark and I was walking back with a tray in both hands. There was some kind of runny meat thing over rice so I really needed to use both hands to keep the tray level or I would have ended up wearing it like one of the seventh grade girls already had. That was funny.
A guy who looked like Morgan Freeman, sitting at the end of a table said, “Excuse me son,” and reached out to get my attention by gabbing my baggy jeans. Yep, they went right down to my ankles and everyone got to enjoy the Chicago Bulls boxers I’d gotten for my birthday. There I was with my hands full of tray, nothing I could do except join in when the whole room stopped talking and started laughing.
The elderly gentleman who had accidentally pantsed me, stood up and took off his frayed brown belt and said, “Son, I think you need this more than me, get those baggy pants up from round your ankles.”
And that’s why every year after that I came back to the youth group to tell all the guys why it was important to wear a belt to the soup kitchen.
I still have that belt.
SOME ADVICE #1
Woman
Posted by Kylyssa Shay on her blog “Advice for the Homeless from an Old Pro”
“Some advice on getting a good night’s sleep. After a string of beatings I actually crashed in a port-a-potty for a few nights. It stunk to high heaven but it gave my ribs a chance to heal. It's amazing what a locking door can contribute to a good night's rest, even in the most disgusting of accommodations. “
VEGETARIANS
Woman
Cheryl had a slight cold that day, and her nose was running. Chris hadn’t caught it from her yet, but he was fussy from not getting a nap. I tried to get him to sleep that afternoon, but our usually quieter alley had been the scene of a car accident just as I was settling in to nurse him. I pulled the kids and our radio flyer wagon piled with all our stuff as far into the unused doorway as I could to block some of the noise; but the woman who had rear ended the other car kept yelling that she was late for her therapy appointment while the police tried to get the story from the other driver. So no nap for Chris. By the time it was all over and the tow truck left I was just about ready to scream myself.
I always tried to have some quieter time for my children in the afternoon, that’s why I liked this alley in Chinatown. It wasn’t real crowded between the lunch and dinner rush at the restaurant, and the owners mostly ignored us using the blocked off doorway.
Chris was crying and Cheryl was sneezing and I needed a nap myself when a big group of loud teenagers came into the alley and stood in front of the restaurant. They were all wearing the same t-shirt like they were a school group or tour group. Some of them looked at us, but mostly they just talked and laughed and pushed each other like kids do. One kid almost got pushed into our doorway and when he realized we were there he mumbled, “sorry.” I just wanted them to go away. Finally they went into the restaurant.
Since we found this spot a couple weeks earlier my children and I would leave during the dinner rush to check the street and trash cans for bottles and aluminum cans to turn in for the recycling money, but after the crazy afternoon I could hardly move and Chris had finally fallen asleep. So I sat with Cheryl curled up next to me and Chris in my arms and must have nodded off myself leaning on the doorway, because the next thing I knew that big group of loud teenagers came swarming out of the restaurant and woke us up.
A woman, who was wearing the same t-shirt as the kids, came over to us and squatted down in front of us. She said, “We have a bunch of left overs, would you like them?”
I hated this part, we’re vegetarians and people coming out of the restaurant were always trying to give us their left over sweet and sour pork, or lemon chicken, or Szechuan beef. The first few times it happened I told them no thanks that we were vegetarians, but one person actually yelled at me and called me a bad mother and told me, “Beggers can’t be choosers.” After that I mostly smiled and took the food and then tried to trade it with other people on the street.
I think because I was so tired and they had just woken me up I wasn’t thinking clearly and so I said it, “No thanks, we’re vegetarians.”
The woman smiled and some of the kids came over. One girl said she was a vegetarian too and that they had been working at St. Anthony’s Dining Hall that afternoon and that they served this gross chicken thing and she wondered what it would be like to be a vegetarian and have to eat there. I laughed and told her it wasn’t easy. It turned out they were all vegetarians and that all the left overs were vegetarian.
After they left I unpacked some sweet and sour soup for Cheryl and hoped it would help with her cold.
PRESIDENTIAL QUOTES #3
Voice 1:
Presidential quote #3: Ronald Wilson Reagan’s response to economic hardship:
(the cast stops, looks at each other uncomfortably for a few beats expecting someone to speak, then shrugs their shoulders and moves on with the show)
DAD
(written by Jonathan Dodson)
Looking at me you wouldn’t think that my family has any history of homelessness. I am cleanly dressed, my hair is combed, and I sound like I’ve had a fair amount of education. But that’s the thing about homelessness. Just by looking at someone and judging their outward presentation is not the safest practice if you want to identify those affected by homelessness.
My family experienced financial hardship when the cold war ended. The U.S. defense department cut funding to defense contracts in the early 1990’s, and my father lost his job. I was in Middle School. What I remember about my family’s dynamic at that time was the high levels of stress. My mother became the only bead-winner for the family, and as a nurse that was barely enough to pay the mortgage and feed us 5 kids. My parents separated, then several years latter divorced. My father struggled to find a job, and lived on and off the streets in Colorado Springs. He would sneak into local hospitals and use the shower. He had no cell phone, lived out of the red cross shelter and his run-down car, and slept in a tent. Going out to lunch with my dad meant the soup kitchen. He introduced me to his friends who lived on the street. His experience shaped my family and my life. Because of this I am more aware and compassionate towards issues of mental illness, access to clean shelter, access to meals and medical care, and concern for basic human dignity. My family is a face of homelessness. It’s not just something that my church committed to eradicate. I am your neighbor, I am the family that goes to your church, and I am the cleanly dressed student standing before you, and homelessness has affected me.
There’s a Me In Here
(written by Valerie McEntee)
People don’t see me. They only see my illness and think that is me. They see the state of my clothes and my dirty hands and they pity me, but they never ask what is going on under the dirt. They see the state of my teeth, but never ask what my favorite flavor ice cream is (Cherry Garcia). They want me off the street and out of the way so they don’t have to look at me and feel guilty, but they don’t understand that my voices are too loud when I’m cooped up in a room by myself. No one asks if that was my dream, to be stuck in a room like that. Was it your dream?
People only want to talk about did I take my meds. No one wants to discuss politics or art or religion with me. No one asks about my family except in terms of can they ship me off to them. Make me someone else’s problem. No one asks if that is a problem for me. When I want to brag about how fine my son turned out to be, no one asks questions about his career, just would he take me in for a while. I’m not going to put a drain on him. Don’t want to live in Florida where he is anyway.
People want to give me resources, no one asks what I have to offer. Yes, I stand in the street and yell sometimes, or even cry. But that doesn’t mean that that is all I can do. I can cook. I used to be a great cook. Fried chicken, and spaghetti and tuna noodle casserole and I had a great recipe for baked fish – with leeks and tomato sauce. I made cookies, too. I danced, when I was little. I was in the Nutcracker when my ballet school did it when I was ten. And I learned to knit. Now no one cares about that. No one cares what books I could recommend, Madeline L’Engle or C.S. Lewis, or what I think of St. Paul. They just want to give me the resources to do what they want me to do, whether it’s what I want or not. Follow their schedule of appointments with this person or that person who is getting paid to help me. Making money off of me. Why not just give me the money they’re making instead?
They all talk about me. Don’t think I don’t know it. I hear them murmuring under my voices. But no one wants to talk to me, not for long, only to tell me what I ought to do. The working people step around me like I’m contagious. And a woman out here had to be very careful whom she trusts, even among the other people living and dying outside. If I was inside, with a family again, it might be ok. But no one is offering me a family. Just a room alone with my voices and my anger and there’d be a bed, but there wouldn’t be any dreams there for me. No one to see me, instead of just the label they give me.
SOME ADVICE #2
Man
- posted by Mobile Homemaker on his blog Survival Guide to Homelessness - No matter where you go, there you are.
Some advice for getting a good, nearly waterless shave. I suggest a dab of generic sex lube and a thimbleful of water to help the razor glide over your skin.
I've never had a complaint about this advice. No one has ever told me that it didn't work well for him. Maybe because no one has admitted to trying it. Come on. Are you afraid the cashier will think you are having sex? And the downside of that is?
THE GREEN
Dude, I was in eighth grade, so I’d already done the trip to St. Anthony’s Dining Hall with our youth group the year before. I liked it. Ya, it was sad to see all the homeless people, but some of them were really cool, like Tony who played jazz piano the whole time we were serving, and Ned who used to be a homeless guy and was now one of the people in charge of security to make sure there weren’t any fights or disrespect in the dining room.
Since I’d been there before I knew exactly which job I wanted. I wanted to be one of the people who took trays back to the section where they seated the families with kids, the old people, and the people in wheelchairs. I liked that job because it kept me moving. If I had to stand behind the counter and dish out mashed potatoes I would have gone crazy. Besides, when you went through the line and served trays to the people in the back of the room you got to talk to them and I really liked that. I loved joking with them and playing with the little kids.
We were cranking out trays, I think we’d hit the 1,000 mark and I was walking back with a tray in both hands. There was some kind of runny meat thing over rice so I really needed to use both hands to keep the tray level or I would have ended up wearing it like one of the seventh grade girls already had. That was funny.
A guy who looked like Morgan Freeman, sitting at the end of a table said, “Excuse me son,” and reached out to get my attention by gabbing my baggy jeans. Yep, they went right down to my ankles and everyone got to enjoy the Chicago Bulls boxers I’d gotten for my birthday. There I was with my hands full of tray, nothing I could do except join in when the whole room stopped talking and started laughing.
The elderly gentleman who had accidentally pantsed me, stood up and took off his frayed brown belt and said, “Son, I think you need this more than me, get those baggy pants up from round your ankles.”
And that’s why every year after that I came back to the youth group to tell all the guys why it was important to wear a belt to the soup kitchen.
I still have that belt.
SOME ADVICE #1
Woman
Posted by Kylyssa Shay on her blog “Advice for the Homeless from an Old Pro”
“Some advice on getting a good night’s sleep. After a string of beatings I actually crashed in a port-a-potty for a few nights. It stunk to high heaven but it gave my ribs a chance to heal. It's amazing what a locking door can contribute to a good night's rest, even in the most disgusting of accommodations. “
VEGETARIANS
Woman
Cheryl had a slight cold that day, and her nose was running. Chris hadn’t caught it from her yet, but he was fussy from not getting a nap. I tried to get him to sleep that afternoon, but our usually quieter alley had been the scene of a car accident just as I was settling in to nurse him. I pulled the kids and our radio flyer wagon piled with all our stuff as far into the unused doorway as I could to block some of the noise; but the woman who had rear ended the other car kept yelling that she was late for her therapy appointment while the police tried to get the story from the other driver. So no nap for Chris. By the time it was all over and the tow truck left I was just about ready to scream myself.
I always tried to have some quieter time for my children in the afternoon, that’s why I liked this alley in Chinatown. It wasn’t real crowded between the lunch and dinner rush at the restaurant, and the owners mostly ignored us using the blocked off doorway.
Chris was crying and Cheryl was sneezing and I needed a nap myself when a big group of loud teenagers came into the alley and stood in front of the restaurant. They were all wearing the same t-shirt like they were a school group or tour group. Some of them looked at us, but mostly they just talked and laughed and pushed each other like kids do. One kid almost got pushed into our doorway and when he realized we were there he mumbled, “sorry.” I just wanted them to go away. Finally they went into the restaurant.
Since we found this spot a couple weeks earlier my children and I would leave during the dinner rush to check the street and trash cans for bottles and aluminum cans to turn in for the recycling money, but after the crazy afternoon I could hardly move and Chris had finally fallen asleep. So I sat with Cheryl curled up next to me and Chris in my arms and must have nodded off myself leaning on the doorway, because the next thing I knew that big group of loud teenagers came swarming out of the restaurant and woke us up.
A woman, who was wearing the same t-shirt as the kids, came over to us and squatted down in front of us. She said, “We have a bunch of left overs, would you like them?”
I hated this part, we’re vegetarians and people coming out of the restaurant were always trying to give us their left over sweet and sour pork, or lemon chicken, or Szechuan beef. The first few times it happened I told them no thanks that we were vegetarians, but one person actually yelled at me and called me a bad mother and told me, “Beggers can’t be choosers.” After that I mostly smiled and took the food and then tried to trade it with other people on the street.
I think because I was so tired and they had just woken me up I wasn’t thinking clearly and so I said it, “No thanks, we’re vegetarians.”
The woman smiled and some of the kids came over. One girl said she was a vegetarian too and that they had been working at St. Anthony’s Dining Hall that afternoon and that they served this gross chicken thing and she wondered what it would be like to be a vegetarian and have to eat there. I laughed and told her it wasn’t easy. It turned out they were all vegetarians and that all the left overs were vegetarian.
After they left I unpacked some sweet and sour soup for Cheryl and hoped it would help with her cold.
PRESIDENTIAL QUOTES #3
Voice 1:
Presidential quote #3: Ronald Wilson Reagan’s response to economic hardship:
(the cast stops, looks at each other uncomfortably for a few beats expecting someone to speak, then shrugs their shoulders and moves on with the show)
DAD
(written by Jonathan Dodson)
Looking at me you wouldn’t think that my family has any history of homelessness. I am cleanly dressed, my hair is combed, and I sound like I’ve had a fair amount of education. But that’s the thing about homelessness. Just by looking at someone and judging their outward presentation is not the safest practice if you want to identify those affected by homelessness.
My family experienced financial hardship when the cold war ended. The U.S. defense department cut funding to defense contracts in the early 1990’s, and my father lost his job. I was in Middle School. What I remember about my family’s dynamic at that time was the high levels of stress. My mother became the only bead-winner for the family, and as a nurse that was barely enough to pay the mortgage and feed us 5 kids. My parents separated, then several years latter divorced. My father struggled to find a job, and lived on and off the streets in Colorado Springs. He would sneak into local hospitals and use the shower. He had no cell phone, lived out of the red cross shelter and his run-down car, and slept in a tent. Going out to lunch with my dad meant the soup kitchen. He introduced me to his friends who lived on the street. His experience shaped my family and my life. Because of this I am more aware and compassionate towards issues of mental illness, access to clean shelter, access to meals and medical care, and concern for basic human dignity. My family is a face of homelessness. It’s not just something that my church committed to eradicate. I am your neighbor, I am the family that goes to your church, and I am the cleanly dressed student standing before you, and homelessness has affected me.
There’s a Me In Here
(written by Valerie McEntee)
People don’t see me. They only see my illness and think that is me. They see the state of my clothes and my dirty hands and they pity me, but they never ask what is going on under the dirt. They see the state of my teeth, but never ask what my favorite flavor ice cream is (Cherry Garcia). They want me off the street and out of the way so they don’t have to look at me and feel guilty, but they don’t understand that my voices are too loud when I’m cooped up in a room by myself. No one asks if that was my dream, to be stuck in a room like that. Was it your dream?
People only want to talk about did I take my meds. No one wants to discuss politics or art or religion with me. No one asks about my family except in terms of can they ship me off to them. Make me someone else’s problem. No one asks if that is a problem for me. When I want to brag about how fine my son turned out to be, no one asks questions about his career, just would he take me in for a while. I’m not going to put a drain on him. Don’t want to live in Florida where he is anyway.
People want to give me resources, no one asks what I have to offer. Yes, I stand in the street and yell sometimes, or even cry. But that doesn’t mean that that is all I can do. I can cook. I used to be a great cook. Fried chicken, and spaghetti and tuna noodle casserole and I had a great recipe for baked fish – with leeks and tomato sauce. I made cookies, too. I danced, when I was little. I was in the Nutcracker when my ballet school did it when I was ten. And I learned to knit. Now no one cares about that. No one cares what books I could recommend, Madeline L’Engle or C.S. Lewis, or what I think of St. Paul. They just want to give me the resources to do what they want me to do, whether it’s what I want or not. Follow their schedule of appointments with this person or that person who is getting paid to help me. Making money off of me. Why not just give me the money they’re making instead?
They all talk about me. Don’t think I don’t know it. I hear them murmuring under my voices. But no one wants to talk to me, not for long, only to tell me what I ought to do. The working people step around me like I’m contagious. And a woman out here had to be very careful whom she trusts, even among the other people living and dying outside. If I was inside, with a family again, it might be ok. But no one is offering me a family. Just a room alone with my voices and my anger and there’d be a bed, but there wouldn’t be any dreams there for me. No one to see me, instead of just the label they give me.
SOME ADVICE #2
Man
- posted by Mobile Homemaker on his blog Survival Guide to Homelessness - No matter where you go, there you are.
Some advice for getting a good, nearly waterless shave. I suggest a dab of generic sex lube and a thimbleful of water to help the razor glide over your skin.
I've never had a complaint about this advice. No one has ever told me that it didn't work well for him. Maybe because no one has admitted to trying it. Come on. Are you afraid the cashier will think you are having sex? And the downside of that is?
THE GREEN BALLOON
(written and performed by Jeannie Merchant-Sadler)
Woman
The other day my six-year-old son was given a green balloon as a prize for being a good patient at the dentist. Seeing the balloon took me back to when I was about the same age as my son is now. I can't remember exactly what year it was but I know for sure that it was March 17th. I remember that because it was St. Patrick's Day and my mother and father had just taken me to the annual St. Patrick's Day parade in downtown Oakland. That afternoon I had the same look in my eyes as my son…the pride of owning a new balloon. Being that it was Patty's day, it was naturally green.
ze a a Family j j St Live Nude St Live Nude
uw f St Live Nude