I Hate My Life

My Story

I became homeless in March of 2002 through a series of bizarre events (that I am not posting here as I am trying to sell the story or the screenplay). But it was a happy ending; I got off the streets April 1, 2003.

I was not (and am not now) a drug addict or an alcoholic. The fact is working/sober people can become homeless too. Indiana Congresswoman Julia Carson knows this to be true. A member of her staff found my web site and wrote me an e-mail informing me that "40% of the homeless in America are employed."

I'll be honest, before I became homeless I knew very little about homeless people. While I gave them money occasionally, I was really ignorant about their situation. Why were they homeless? Didn't they have any friends or family to help them? Well, I had "friends" and I was homeless.

The worst part about being homeless wasn’t living on the streets or being hungry, it was having my friends, or the people I thought were my friends, turn their backs on me.

When I called these people they treated my situation with absolutely no urgency. It was as if I told them I just "had a cold" and it was no big deal. What was really amazing is many of them would tell me how hard they had it. Here is the very phone I called people from:

These people were living in houses, condos and apartments and would actually tell me their sob stories while I paid for the phone call!

Here were some of my friends' reactions:

"Is this being homeless a comedy routine? No, I can't help."

"So, why are you callin' me?"

"Please never contact me again."

"Wish I could help, I'm in exactly the same boat as you. I'm getting killed in the stock market."

"Yeah, well, I gotta go, bye!"

"Wow, Sorry to hear times are so tough for you (Expletive) (Expletive) (Expletive)."

"(Expletive) (Expletive) I'll pray for you."

My parents' reaction:

"We're not going to help, but please keep in touch, we sure are thinkin' about you!"

Out of desperation I even called the church I had gone to for many years. This was the same church Ronald Reagan went to for decades, so you would think these wonderful Americans would help, right? Even though I had given them money of the years to build their newest sanctuary, they were not about to help me when I was homeless.

Bel Air Presbyterian Church

Pastor Mark Brewer's office via phone: "You never took the new members class, and because you're not officially a member, we can't help."

Not all churches are like that. Many churches go out of their way to help the poor. If your church, synagogue, or house of worship doesn't help the homeless, ask them why.

At this time, I didn’t even have my car. I was actually sleeping inside this shopping center:

I slept right here in this concrete hallway behind the stores.

After a few nights of sleeping on concrete and using my shoes as “pillow,” I decided to pretend I was suicidal (which wasn’t too far from the truth) and checked myself into this hospital and was transferred up to the mental ward.

My plan was to get a private room and a soft bed. I was doing what they call a “voluntary commitment” and was told I could “leave anytime I wanted.”

Well, they stuck me in a room with a guy who thought he was Hitler, and things pretty much went downhill from there. The hallways were full of old women wandering around with glazed looks in their eyes…it reminded me too much of my mother, so I decided to ‘check myself out.”

When I told them I wanted to leave, the nurses told me they had to get permission from my doctor. “But I am here voluntarily,” I reminded them. “We still have to get the approval from your doctor,” the nurse said. “That doesn’t sound voluntary to me,” I shot back. “Now don’t get upset,” the nurse warned. I knew I was one smart-ass response from not ever getting out so I waited for over an hour until I was released out of the nut house through this electronic door:

Fortunately I soon got my car back. I checked out the shelters in downtown L.A. and they were overflowing and depressing. I knew if I ever ended up there I would never get out. I recalled an interview William Shatner gave. He said right after Star Trek was canceled in the late 60’s no one in Hollywood would hire him and he had to go on the road and do dinner theaters. To save money he said he lived in his car.

I figured if Captain Kirk could pull that off, then so could I. I knew Los Angeles like the back of my hand. I knew where it was dangerous and where it was safe, so I decided to live in my car.

When I was homeless the first question people would ask me was not, “Are you hungry?” “Do you need a place to stay?” “Do you need a doctor?”

Amazingly, it was always, “Where do you bathe?” I guess they were concerned that if I died in a gutter my carcass would be nice and clean.

I would bathe anywhere I could. The best places were Starbucks and Coffee Bean because they have individual bathrooms with locks on them so no one could barge in on me while I was taking a sponge bath. But even the best sponge bath could and did go bad….

Once, while in the bathroom having my sponge bath at Coffee Bean, I heard a knock at the door. So to make it sound like someone was in the bathroom "taking care of business" I flushed the toilet…which for some reason started to overflow! I scrambled to get dressed before the water reached me, and when I pushed my hand through my shirt sleeve I accidentally smashed the light fixture above, which fell and shattered on the floor!

There was water and glass everywhere! Some of the water and glass had actually gone underneath the door and was now seeping out in the restaurant. I opened the door and people were stunned. I walked out like it was the most natural thing in the world, got into my car, and never came back!

When I was homeless I spent a lot of time in the public library looking for jobs on the computers online. I would send resumes out by e-mail and bye-mail/fax with faxaway . Of course people berated me for this tactic and said I should be out walking the streets. But I found I could get my name in front of more employers by sending resumes.

But like anything public (bathrooms, buses, school) the library stinks because it is filled with the… public! Here are fond memories I have of the library.

There was “old-retired-man” who sat behind a row of books near the periodicals. He had the most God-awful cough I had ever heard. The poor senior sounded like he is hacking up a lung… and it made me laugh every time.

To my right on another computer sat gay-guy. While surfing online, gay-guy would often let out soft little sighs. I thought this to be rather cute and once peeked over to see what gay-guy was looking at online… it was a gay porno site! He was looking at gay porn in a public library right next to the kid's section!

There was also “Toad Man.” He was a short little guy with a reptilian face. Toad Man was always making the librarians’ lives hell. The computers in the library were numbered from 1 to 18, but he would always ask a new librarian for “Number 19” and give this evil grin when the newbie hopelessly searched for 19 on the sign-up sheet.

My favorite library moment was when Colon-Man would enter the library bathroom. He would close the bathroom door, and a few minutes later he’d begin grunting, "Oh God, help me, Uhhhhhh." Because the bathroom is right in the middle of the library, we library patrons and employees would all hear this anal drama being played out.

For all its wackiness, the library really saved my butt. You see, no one would hire me for a menial job. No matter how much I dumbed down my resume or dumbed down my job appliaction, it was always the same rejection: "You're overqualified." So by sending out resumes on the library computers I was able to get freelance writing jobs. With those gigs, unemployment checks, welfare and participating in clinical trials I somehow survived for a year.

I joke about being homeless, but there were some bad times too. Like when I got turned away from the UCLA Medical Center because I didn’t have health insurance. My father is a retired doctor and always assured me no hospital could ever turn anyone way. For that reason he opposes universal healthcare.

There was also the time my tire blew and I had to leave it overnight at this gas station so they could replace it the next day. Well, because I lived in my car, I had nowhere to go. I waited a few hours and then returned to my car, slipped in, and went to sleep. I usually woke up at 6am with the morning sunlight so I knew I could get up before the mechanics arrived at 8am.

I tried some wacky things too.

There was the time I went to this sperm bank and tried to make money doing what I love. I did a “sample donation,” but was told my count wasn’t high enough. I was crushed, not because I wanted to have kids, but because that was one job I really wanted.

I really couldn’t make any friends. I'd either have to lie so they never discover I was homeless… or tell them the truth and they'd bolt for the door. The toughest times when I was homeless were the holidays. There was no one to hang out with and the libraries and most stores were closed. Also there were times when I was sick or hurt my back and had no choice but to sleep in my car.

Every night I slept in my car I risked being mugged, arrested for being homeless, or possibly worse. My car was seriously leaking transmission fluid, brake fluid, steering wheel fluid, and oil.

I’d park my car at midnight, but would have to move it by 6:00 am so no one in the neighborhood discovered me sleeping in my car. I averaged between 4 and 5 hours of sleep at night. To help guard against discovery, I hanged shirts on hangers in the windows.

But I persevered and kept sending out resumes.

My life changed when I answered an ad in the L.A. Times for an editor/writer at a magazine. They liked my resume and I went in for an interview. They asked for writing samples, which I faxed them. But the job went to someone else. About a week later the magazine called me and told me the person they picked had quit and asked if I was still interested.

The week my unemployment ran out, and I had two bucks in my pocket I got the job at the magazine. They had no idea I was homeless. For the first month I worked at my job and slept in my car. After saving up money, I was able to move into an apartment less than two miles from where I used to sleep in my car.

I don’t think I’m brilliant or even smart. I am just extremely stubborn and refused to give up. Remember all those people who turned their backs on me? Had I given up it would have made the all of them happy, and I’m not about making those kinds of people happy.

I knew if I survived it would make them miserable. That may sound negative or bitter, but that’s what kept me going then and still keeps me going.

But no man is an island, and there were people who helped me along the way:

The Sova Food Pantry of Los Angeles
The West Hollywood Food Coalition
The Hollywood-Melrose Free Clinic
Naomi Wieshe
Sandra Abney
Jerry McCusker
Larry Smith
Many homeless people

To those people I am eternally grateful.

You may have heard a song by Bruce Springsteen called "The Ghost of Tom Joad"…

Families sleepin' in their cars out in the Southwest.
No job, no home, no peace, no rest

That was my life.

For millions of men, women and children, that is their life right now. There are an estimated 3 million homeless people living in this country. While you read this, there is someone out there trying to find shelter, or food, or some sort of hope.

Maybe you're that someone. If so, this web site is here to help you. (Even if that's not you, please keep reading.)

I get e-mails everyday from people in desperate situations. I also get e-mails from people who are living very comfortably, but are deeply depressed with their lives. If that's you, I urge you to help someone who is in a desperate situation. This will do two things:

1. It will help relieve someone else's suffering.
2. It will help relieve the depression that you feel.

You may be thinking, "How will it help me to feel good by helping someone else? I need someone to help me!" To tell you the truth, I have no idea why it works, but it does. It's better than Prozac and cheaper.

Most of the organizations listed and linked to this site need volunteers. Just call them up and volunteer for one hour or two. Nothing weird or scary is going to happen to you, just give it a try. You might even meet a hot chick or a hot guy with strong ethics and real compassion for other people, how often do you meet people like that?

True story: When I was homeless I used to stand in line to get food from the West Hollywood Food Coalition, a great organization that still feeds the homeless everyday in West Hollywood. One of the volunteers was a girl wearing a UCLA sweatshirt and she was a knockout. Obviously, as a homeless person, I couldn't ask for her phone number as she filled my plate with food, but had I been a volunteer, I would have!

If you don't want to volunteer, that's okay too. All I ask is that you please support the Bringing Home America Act which is sponsored by Indiana Congresswoman Julia Carson. If passed, this bill would provide affordable housing, job training, civil rights protections, vouchers for child care and public transportation, emergency funds for families facing eviction, increased access to health care for all.

Most Americans truly want all that. This is not a Republican or Democrat issue. This is a human issue. 3 million homeless is too many. Over 40 million uninsured is too many.

Keep in mind:

That woman who can't afford to see a doctor is someone's sister.

That kid wandering the streets is someone's daughter or son.

That homeless guy who was on the streets wrote the words that you are reading right now.

If you have never contacted a Congressman or Senator in your life about anything, please do it right now. Don't wait for someone else to do it. They are not going to. It's up to you. Don't wait for someone else to do it; they're busy watching TV. It's up to you. It's fast and easy, all you have to do is click here.

If you have any questions or need help, e-mail me at: Thanksforsavingmyass@yahoo.com

If you need more local and national listings of agencies that can help you Click Here

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