The first night I spent living in my car, I almost wet myself. Happily, this fact had nothing to do with any terror I may have felt over my first night homeless, but was actually due to the fact that I had failed to schedule one last sojourn to a public toilet before settling down to sleep. This was a mistake I would never make again.
I did not end up making many more mistakes that summer; at least, not many more mistakes that could be considered tactical errors. With each passing day, I discovered the finer points and the laws of survival as a homeless citizen. Within a week, I had black felt curtains taped up over the windows in the bed of my truck; by the end of the month, I knew which neighbourhoods lacked streetlamps and which supermarkets had public toilets available at eight in the morning. My nocturnal routine usually involved sitting in a Barnes and Noble, cheekily reading my own book and drinking my own tea until ten minutes prior to closing time, at which point I’d sneak off to the toilet to have my final wee and to brush my teeth. I would then get into my truck and drive to whichever quiet neighbourhood I’d decided on that day and park the car in the darkest location possible. At that point, all that was left was waiting until I was certain no local resident was peering at me through their curtains, then slithering quickly through the small window between the cab of the truck and the bed. From there, it was a simple matter of climbing into my sleeping bag without shaking the truck too violently. Strategically, I was getting by considerably well. I learned my lessons quickly. It was the other lessons I learned that summer that I found more difficult to digest.
A week before I moved into my mobile residence, I graduated Cum Laude from the University of California, Irvine. That same day, I moved out of the beach house I’d been sharing with three other girls who, nice as they were, found it difficult to mask their mild feelings of disgust that, in order to save money, I would rather be homeless for a time than move back into my mother’s house or pay rent in Orange County, which I couldn‘t afford anyhow. There was no talk of helping me out, which at least one of them was in a position to do. It didn’t matter. Even though we’d all light-heartedly acknowledged in the past that I was cut from a different grain of fabric than the three of them, that final year at university demonstrated just how striking that disparity was. What had made that year tolerable were the friends I maintained outside of the house, in particular my mate Lisa. The night of our graduation, I slept in the spare bedroom of her house after she and I got ridiculously drunk at a house party. There, I re-learned an important lesson I had already been taught during my academic tenure but had failed to remember after consuming a bottle of red wine entirely to myself: although I am indeed very good friends with tequila, she is an exceptionally jealous friend who refuses to be merely an encore to another alcoholic headliner. I was very sick. All over the carpet of the bedroom I was sleeping in. Fortunately, the girl who technically occupied that room hadn’t lived in it for months and wouldn’t be back to claim her possessions until the other housemates and I had vacated the premises at the end of the week.
Over the course of that week and for the rest of the summer I continued to work at the job I’d had since the new year, a job that paid well and impressed people because it was in the field of my degree. The combination of degree and relevant job meant that I found myself to be a member of a peculiar, and lonely, social class: Middle Class and Voluntarily Homeless. Any passing stranger would never guess that the 21-year old girl brushing past them was living out of her truck, because she lacked the physical traits they had long since learned to associate with homelessness. She wore clean clothing, was acceptably well-groomed, was sober, was walking with a purpose and not lazing about on a park bench. But if they had looked into her eyes, and they were particularly perceptive, they may have seen the dull aching and the desperation for empathy that is undoubtedly common to any human without a physical place to call home in this society.
As strong as I considered myself and as courageously as I had intended to survive my temporary lifestyle, I hadn’t expected the struggle I would come up against in my own mind. I could easily go about the routine of finding quiet neighbourhoods, of showering on the beach, and of brushing my teeth in a bookstore, and had I been able to completely shut off my brain, that routine would have faithfully seen me through. Instead, I found myself slowly going around the bend in loneliness and anxiety. It generally took me ninety minutes to fall asleep at night due to the panic that every approaching vehicle was a police car that had been called out by a nervous neighbour who, in my fantasies, was an excessively wealthy middle-aged woman with a brackish orange fake tan, nervously standing in the window with her cordless phone, wearing designer pyjamas (with her monogram stitched into it somewhere) whose two pre-teen children (Kiki and Ashlynn, names that provide the only convincing argument against atheism, because how else could people ridiculous enough to name their children Kiki and Ashlynn have accrued such vast amounts of wealth except via the machinations of a cruel and unforgiving god who loves to laugh itself silly) were waiting excitedly at the upstairs window for the cop to arrive, praying that the scene would unfold in such a way as to deliver a truly cracking story at school tomorrow. Usually at this point in the waking nightmare, I fell asleep.
I diplomatically kept these details of paranoia away from my mother’s ears. She phoned up periodically to ensure that I was still alive and still not in jail, two states of existence I was able to sustain for the duration of the summer. My mother hesitated in accepting my decision to live in my truck, but ultimately overruled her discomfort by realising that, in the end, she trusted me and my choices. This trust was a great comfort to me, and was what ultimately forced me to stay strong, to prove to her and to everyone else that I was capable of this task I had set before me. I also assuaged her fears by casually mentioning that I would sleep the odd night on some kind soul’s couch.
The truth of the matter was that after a few weeks I was spending as many nights on couches as I could, anywhere that didn’t involve the fear of cops or dogs or bright lights or angry Orange County Republicans with legally purchased, self-righteously loaded guns. Overwhelmingly, however, it was the desire to have company that drove me to ring up my friends at night, attempting to tactfully ask to spend that night in their living room. All of my closest friends who would have let me sleep on their floors as long as was necessary had unfortunately moved to or were already living in Los Angeles, which was just far enough away to make any sort of daily commute to work from their homes a fabulously stupid enterprise. The friends left in Orange County were a curious assortment of acquaintances, lukewarm comrades, and friends who I was destined to become closer to over the course of the summer. What brought that destiny to fruition was the loneliness I found creeping up all around me as I lay in my car, staring at the ceiling, wishing for nothing more in the world than a small room with a comfortable chair or sofa, a lamp, and a kettle coming to the boil. Above all, I yearned for that small room to contain other people. For those four years spent at university both in California and in England, I had spent nearly all of my time sharing sitting rooms, kitchens, pasta dinners, beds, bodily fluids, joints, books, music, bedrooms, and lecture notes. Being forcibly submerged into the cold water of solitary confinement was a shock I had not prepared for and I found myself floundering in it, grasping for the rope of human company that would lift me from those murky depths.
I had a few saviours scattered around the county, and while most were happy to be hospitable once or twice, few could be called upon frequently. I understood, deep down, why many would be unwilling to house me repeatedly, and was always truthful when, turned away, I said it was OK. What followed was a case of cognitive dissonance I chide myself for to this day because, though I hated myself for asking to crash on a couch in the first place, I found myself feeling resentment towards those who didn’t return my phone calls or who deflected responsibility onto housemates or partners. It was an insidious beast that took hold, for it was my survival instinct at its most odious, and I had been convinced that I was stronger than it was. I was extremely proud, and it took an enormous amount of courage to request a stay on a living room floor, for doing so meant that I was weak and scared and not at all the mature university graduate I was meant to be. What followed was hatred towards myself for resenting others, for they were merely going about their daily lives. What need have they to be concerned with me? I was desperate to be stronger than that. One day in early July, I was reminded of my task, and was given a chance to regain that strength.
I approached the Newport Beach Public Library as I had every other time. Usually I held a book or two in my hand to return, along with my keys and wallet. On this particular day, July 7th, I arrived before the library was open. I sat outside with the other patrons waiting to gain admission. I noticed a man opposite me. His clothes were somewhat dingy, and the duffel bag to his side suggested itself to be the sum total of his worldly possessions. My circumstances that summer had made me particularly sensitive to the presence and the plight of others in situations like mine, but incalculably more desperate. The man opposite me was in his late 30’s, with skin that had spent much time in the sun. He needed a shave, and probably a hug. As we sat there, two squad cars pulled up and parked wherever they damn well pleased. Two police officers emerged, in clean, crisp blue uniforms with shiny buttons and flattering sunglasses. My stomach tightened somewhat, but I knew there was no possible chance they were there because of me. My stomach stayed tightened when it realized they had come for the duffel bag man. I was too far away to hear the conversation that ensued between the three men, but from scraps I could pick up it sounded as though he had walked the circumference of the library. He claimed he was there to return some books. I heard little more, but my heart swelled and grieved for the man, for what possible criminal undertakings could he have been devising whilst walking around a library? His only crimes were being dirty and daring to mingle with the decent, respectable folk. I wondered what his business had been. Had he been scouting a place to sleep, as I often did? Had he merely been looking for the book drop window? Before I had a chance to ponder further, he was being patted down, and his hands being held behind his back. The library doors opened. Gratefully, for I was finding it difficult to stand by and watch any longer. I wasn’t able to meet his eyes before I scurried into the building, but I longed to communicate with him.
I sat down at a computer terminal, eager to distract myself from the absurdities occurring outside. I opened an email from a friend in England, whose email simply read, ‘I wanted to let everyone know that I am OK, and that neither Chris nor I have been in London recently.’ My blood instantly vaporised and my breathing became hurried and shallow. My fingers tripped over themselves to open the Guardian homepage, but once open, my fingers fell away from the keyboard and landed with a dead thud in my lap. Bombs. Carnage. The fluorescent jackets of rescue workers. I attempted to steady myself but was helpless to the confused sobbing that overtook me. Where was everyone? Were they OK? I had spent my third year of university in Norwich, England, and had there met with an unnaturally amazing group of friends, a group I had found to be a once-in-a-lifetime assembly of the most diverse proportions, all getting along suspiciously well, considering the university had thrown us all together at random into the same hall. They were the reason I was saving money this summer, for the plan was to return and live with them in their third year. To be with them, to drink tea with them, to go to the pub with them. These were the reasons to be homeless. I dashed out the door of the library, sprinting over the grass and pavement to my car. I dug out my address book and phone card and set to immediately phoning every single one of my friends, starting with the Londoners. Katy was completely unreachable. The phone wouldn’t even ring, the mobile networks jammed with people ringing loved ones. I next tried Chris who, as it turned out, was in Africa, and therefore safe, if not a little annoyed that I had just cost him some silly amount of money to make sure he was alive. Next on the list was Hannah, for she of all people would be the one to know everyone’s whereabouts. After two tries, there was her voice on the other end, alive and glowing.
‘Hannah! It’s Nika!’
‘Nika! Are you alright?’
‘Are you??!! I just found out.’
‘Yeah, we’re fine. I’m at the pub.’
And thus did I know that all was well. And thus was I empowered once more to be strong, for I had prepared myself to mourn for these people, and they were alright. Frankly, I knew deep down in my heart of hearts that they were alright, for the chances of any of them being in London were slim, they being far more inclined to stay at home and watch telly, followed by a spliff, followed by a frozen pizza, followed by the pub. The world as I knew it had only slightly been shaken, after all.
What I took from that episode, however, was a newly resolved drive to persevere. At that time, as well, my friend Christy insisted that anytime I needed it, her floor was mine. Christy and I had only met that year, as she had transferred to UCI while I was away in England. We were in the same course, but it was the fact that we were also co-workers that made us friends. That summer saw Christy become something of a godsend for me, as she frequently handed me the key to her front door and said, ‘Help yourself.’ My mother sent my post to Christy’s house. In fact, were it not for the delicate relationship with her somewhat older housemate Kathleen, Christy would have assured me permanent residence in her apartment.
In hindsight, I have to inevitably be glad that Kathleen was such a mesh of barbed wire of a woman, for had I been able to have long-term squatting rights in Christy’s home, I would not have proven to myself that I could do it. I would not have the ability to look at myself and say that I sacrificed in order to make something happen. Perhaps more importantly, had I not had that summer of life outside a home, perhaps I never would have even paid attention to the man with the duffel bag, his humanity made more acute through my empathy. I do not now see a homeless man and know exactly what his life is like, because to be quite truthful, I have never been where he is. Mine was a privileged and paltry variety of destitution. However, through being vagrant and longing for the company of others, my conviction that it is for others that we live and because of others that we survive has been buttressed. And I know that my reckless resolution to be strong all of the time was not folly because I am weak, but because no one is so strong that they do not require the support of their friends and families.
But, really, everyone should try showering on the beach.
