Homeless in A-merry-ca

"..I do have one question though, whats up with all the homeless people? DCs had a boom on our homeless population, and we're still trying to figure out why, but whats up with Philly?"

That quote from a commenter (lola) from my last post got me thinking about our homeless population here in the city of "brotherly love." Lola is right, our homeless population is getting worse.

Seems there is a homeless person on every corner hitting you up for money. And our homeless people and beggars aren't like homeless people and beggers in other cities. They will sing for money, tell jokes for money, and damn near rob you at cup point if you let them. We have white bums,black bums, old bums, young bums, female bums, I mean you name it, we got em. I haven't seen children yet but I am sure that's coming....although we do have the Girl Scouts with their cookies. I guess that's a form of begging when you think about it.

Our homeless problem has gotten so bad that the city has finally started to notice. And please believe that when our city government finally notices a problem, then you can bet your last penny---if you didn't give it to the bum--- that it's too late.

Oh and speaking of bums; remember when I blogged about one particular homeless guy by my plantation? I promised to find out more about him, and I never got back to blogging about it. Well, sad to say, I haven't seen him in awhile, and someone told me that he might have passed away. I kind of miss that guy, and I sure hope he just got his life back together and is doing alright.

**Finally, since I am following up on shit. Remember when I blogged about the sister who gave me a hard time at the Criminal Justice Center? Well, I had a chance to watch her a little bit this past Monday, and now I have to apologize to her. Because girlfriend was hard on everybody. Everybody had to show their credentials, and she made no exceptions. So I was wrong, girlfriend wasn't singling me out, she was just doing her job.

Damn that felt good. First Anita now this. I feel like a new man.

Brother can you spare some advice?

There is this homeless man (At least I think he is homeless) who is always hanging out in front of the Dunkin Donuts by my job. Every morning on my way in for coffee, I break him off. I swear I should just get dudes Social Security number and claim him on my taxes. But its all good, dude is like my muse. Honestly, it seems like on days that I don't see him or break him off, things don't go quite as well for me.

So anyway, he always has a panhandling cup out, and no matter what time of the morning you get there, it seems my man is always there first. Everyone just drops some change in his cup and moves on, most people don't even look at him. You just drop the sh** in his cup by habit.

But not me, dude and I have this relationship of sorts. We always exchange a few words, talk about the news of the day, my job, and whatever else is on his mind. And I respect my man and his opinions. When he compliments me on what I am wearing "That's a nice suit my man" I feel good about what I have on. But on days that he doesn't say anything, I actually worry about my hook up. Last summer dude even went as far as to tell me that he didn't like a particular suit I was wearing. I haven't worn it since.

I always wonder about all the homeless people in Philly, and how they even got that way. I know most of them suffer from drug or mental problems, and some of them just fell on hard times. But this cat doesn't seem to have a drug problem, and he sure as hell doesn't seem to have any mental problems. I am thinking he just fell on some hard times. Maybe a bad marriage, or some woman broke his heart. Just looking at him he could be any ones pop or grandfather. I am guessing he is in his late fifties, and he has this distinguished look about him that says: I didn't always live this way.

One day I am going to seriously engage him in some conversation just to find out more about him. But every day I am so rushed, so caught up in my day to day life, that it's almost impossible to engage my man in a conversation for any period of time. Today I saw him again, I mentioned the crime wave and the murders in the city, and as usual he had a witty come back. "Hey, let them kill each other, it's just the laws of the jungle at work baby". Out of the mouth of bums. But you know what; maybe he has a point. Maybe it is just the laws of nature. Just like in the animal kingdom; there is a certain dog eat dog only the fittest will survive order of things. The animals kill each other and nobody cares. Why should we? They don't care about each other or themselves, so why should we care about them?

But I can't think like my cynical homeless friend. After all, he can't help it, look at the type of hand that fate dealt him. I have to have more faith in my people, and feel more sadness for my young brothers who are taking each others lives on a daily basis. Still, my man seems to have a way of seeing things that others can't. (I haven't worn it since) I just hope that he isn't right about this one.

Tomorrow I am going to have to ask my man his name.