# Homeless?



## DKWunlimited (Sep 11, 2006)

What does homeless mean to you? If you share an apartment with your brother and chip in for bills but the lease is in his name. Are you homeless? What about young adults who still live with parents?


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## ticndig (Sep 7, 2014)

well that's not my idea of homeless , living in the woods in a tent or on the streets for those in the city is homeless . to me if you are sleeping indoors with running water , heat and A/C you have a home .


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## frogmammy (Dec 8, 2004)

If you have no place to lay your head.....

Mon


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## GTX63 (Dec 13, 2016)

Homeless means a lack of a place to call your own.
An RV, cabin, shack, condo, trailer, motel, tent, house boat, or McMansion are homes.
An underpass, alley, shelter, backseat, park bench, church or charity shelter are not homes.


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## Elevenpoint (Nov 17, 2009)

Your homeless if you live with any person that can put you on the street at any moment
You need your own base camp


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## Clem (Apr 12, 2016)

Homeless is a rabid **** in the front yard.
Nobody wants you, everybody is afraid of you, and the whole world would be better off if you were dead.


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## oneraddad (Jul 20, 2010)

Clem said:


> Homeless is a rabid **** in the front yard.
> Nobody wants you, everybody is afraid of you, and the whole world would be better off if you were dead.



I was homeless down by the river in my van for awhile


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## Skamp (Apr 26, 2014)

oneraddad said:


> I was homeless down by the river in my van for awhile


 You had a Home.


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## oneraddad (Jul 20, 2010)

Skamp said:


> You had a Home.



No, I had a VW bus, now I have a home


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## Skamp (Apr 26, 2014)

oneraddad said:


> No, I had a VW bus, now I have a home


Tell that to someone living out of a rain coat, Poncho, or Umbrella.


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## oneraddad (Jul 20, 2010)

Skamp said:


> Tell that to someone living out of a rain coat, Poncho, or Umbrella.



It's your story, you tell them


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## Skamp (Apr 26, 2014)

oneraddad said:


> It's your story, you tell them



Ok, I will. A bus is the shiznet.


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## Bungiex88 (Jan 2, 2016)

Matt foley living in a van down by the river


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## Skamp (Apr 26, 2014)

Bungiex88 said:


> Matt foley living in a van down by the river


He had a Hollywood gig, and wasn’t homeless. It’s sightly to see those that joke.


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## ticndig (Sep 7, 2014)

I was homeless as a teenager , after a fight with my dad I was put out of the house .I lived in an abandoned house by the cemetery in my hometown . that week I found a job digging ditches for a plumbing company and upgraded my living conditions by moving into an old motor court cabin along the highway for $ 35 a week . I progressed into a plumber and bought my first house at the age of 21 . now at 59 and being retired 4 years I own everything outright ,the only bills are taxes insurance and utilities . I only have a 9th grade education . I was homeless but never a bum , I've worked hard all my life and got to this point by having a homesteader mentality and a strong will to better myself


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## Elevenpoint (Nov 17, 2009)

ticndig said:


> well that's not my idea of homeless , living in the woods in a tent or on the streets for those in the city is homeless . to me if you are sleeping indoors with running water , heat and A/C you have a home .


I lived in a tent for a month
Seemed like home to me


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## rkintn (Dec 12, 2002)

The kids and I were homeless for about 2 days a few years ago. We did have a hotel room but only for a couple of days with nowhere to go, at the time. It was an absolutely disheartening and degrading situation. I don't wish that on my worst enemy.


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## Cornhusker (Mar 20, 2003)

oneraddad said:


> I was homeless down by the river in my van for awhile


I lived in my car for a few weeks.
Had a friend working at the truckstop, so I could get a shower anyway


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## Oregon1986 (Apr 25, 2017)

My idea of homeless is someone living in their car or on the street


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## Wolf mom (Mar 8, 2005)

If you have an address, you are NOT homeless.


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## Pschmidt (Dec 31, 2017)

I consider homeless when you don't have a place to stay, that's safe. I was technically house-less for six months, but my 'home' was a van. It had doors I could lock, a comfy place to sleep, and I could safely store my essentials. If I didn't have that, I would have felt homeless. It was a strategic move because of the situation I was in, was living with former bf, it was his house. Of course it was my backup plan, one that proved fruitful. 

Now I'm aiming to get as far away from that feeling of never having a place that isn't mine. Never did feel 'safe' in a house that I didn't own. Even now, I own the home but pay lot rent, it still doesn't feel all mine. Hence, the want to move the paid home to land that is ours outright. Taxes are cheap on the land, I checked, bout $100 a year for our small spot. 

The fear of homeless has been with me a long time. I no longer have my former home-van, but still have a minivan I can live in should I need it. Plan B, if you will.


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## oneraddad (Jul 20, 2010)

My time being homeless was a very enlightening time in my life. I had just retired and sold my house for close to 3x its real value and was waiting to put in a bid on my current property. 

While living in the bus for 3 months I was often told to "move along" and treated differently than just a few weeks prior in my life. I was judged not by my character but by people's perceived view of my situation. It was then that I realized others opinion of me wasn't important because I was secure with who I was and still am.


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## muleskinner2 (Oct 7, 2007)

In the late 80's I was living in an old International Travel All, sort of like a Chevy Suburban. I was working at a dude ranch and taking care of one hundred head of hoses and mules. When I met my future wife she was about to be evicted from her apartment. I went down to the office and paid three months back rent, and the next month in advance. I had been living in my truck for about eight months, and often kept five to ten thousand dollars in an old bank bag under the front seat. That weekend she took me to meet her parents, and her mother called me homeless.

Muleskinner2


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## Elevenpoint (Nov 17, 2009)

A SUV or minivan type vehicle is best to own
I've camped in the middle of nowhere with my pups
Fold back seats down
Load back up with sleeping bags and pillows
What a good nights sleep


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## survival49 (May 6, 2018)

GTX63 said:


> Homeless means a lack of a place to call your own.
> An RV, cabin, shack, condo, trailer, motel, tent, house boat, or McMansion are homes.
> An underpass, alley, shelter, backseat, park bench, church or charity shelter are not homes.


A tent is not a home, it’s a shelter. For purposes of employment or public assistance a home has to have a legal address. But don’t mind me, I’m assuming this is suppose to be humor.


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## geo in mi (Nov 14, 2008)

‘Home is the place where, when you have to go there, 
They have to take you in.’

Robert Frost, "The Death of the Hired Man"

geo


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## muleskinner2 (Oct 7, 2007)

survival49 said:


> A tent is not a home, it’s a shelter. For purposes of employment or public assistance a home has to have a legal address. But don’t mind me, I’m assuming this is suppose to be humor.



There are a lot of people in this world who would be glad to have a tent. A Mongolian Ger (Yurt) is a kind of tent and has been home to millions of people. I was employed for years and lived all over the western united states before I ever had a address or a house.

I have lived in tents, bunkhouses, trailers, and camp wagons. My home was wherever I threw down my bed roll, and I could do it again if I had to. As for public assistance, I have never used it and never will. I am sorry to come across as mean or harsh, sometimes I get carried away. I have always been able to take care of myself, and don't understand people who can't.

Muleskinner2


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## AmericanStand (Jul 29, 2014)

Ive lived in a cave , under a bridge, in a plane and in a tent for months at a time. 
It never occurred to me I was homeless.


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## cindilu (Jan 27, 2008)

For the last two years I have lived at my dads house/rv while building my forever home. Even though I call my dads house home, it really isn't. I will so glad to finally quit living out of a suitcase, and put my toothbrush in my forever bathroom, be able to put my clothes in my own house and walk around nekkid if I want to or my favorite joke, drink out of the milk carton.


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## Elevenpoint (Nov 17, 2009)

cindilu said:


> For the last two years I have lived at my dads house/rv while building my forever home. Even though I call my dads house home, it really isn't. I will so glad to finally quit living out of a suitcase, and put my toothbrush in my forever bathroom, be able to put my clothes in my own house and walk around nekkid if I want to or my favorite joke, drink out of the milk carton.


I just got done eating and finished drinking the last out of the jug
No sense getting a glass dirty
I dont have any glasses anyway


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## mreynolds (Jan 1, 2015)

I lived under a bridge one winter. Took baths in the creek. Picked up change I found to buy oatmeal with. You could buy oatmeal for 50 cents back then. Enough to last almost a week. Mix it with creek water...no salt or sugar... and go to town. Once dug a septic tank with a shovel for a guy for two sacks of groceries. I was rich. 

I never look at oatmeal the same to this day. 

There is a distinct difference between homeless people and bums. They are not the same.


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## DKWunlimited (Sep 11, 2006)

Thank you. I think what all these posts have said is that HOMELESS is a state of mind. 

I recently visited with a man who chooses not to be tied down to one location. He doesn't feel that he is homeless and is really tired of "do gooders" who approach him and try to help him get an apartment. A few years ago he gave in and got a place, they furnished it and he lived there for about 6 months and he hated it. He enjoys seeing the stars above him at night and likes knowing that everything he owns fits in his car so that he can move somewhere else at a moments notice. 

The flip side of that is a friend of my son who went on and on about being homeless because he doesn't have a lease in his name. He has a bedroom and a bed and a bathroom of his own.


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## mreynolds (Jan 1, 2015)

DKWunlimited said:


> Thank you. I think what all these posts have said is that HOMELESS is a state of mind.
> 
> I recently visited with a man who chooses not to be tied down to one location. He doesn't feel that he is homeless and is really tired of "do gooders" who approach him and try to help him get an apartment. A few years ago he gave in and got a place, they furnished it and he lived there for about 6 months and he hated it. He enjoys seeing the stars above him at night and likes knowing that everything he owns fits in his car so that he can move somewhere else at a moments notice.
> 
> The flip side of that is a friend of my son who went on and on about being homeless because he doesn't have a lease in his name. He has a bedroom and a bed and a bathroom of his own.


This is often true. Mine was self inflicted. I could have went home to Daddy but he had told me when I moved out that I would be back in less than a year. 

I sure showed him didn't I?

But I learned I lot of good things that I have never forgotten. I also met some of those that want to sleep under the stars.


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## AmericanStand (Jul 29, 2014)

If someone decides to hike the Appalachian trail and it takes a year is he homeless if he doesn't pay rent on a home someplace that he isn't using?


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## Evons hubby (Oct 3, 2005)

If I'm having to pay rent for a place to hang my hat and wash my back.... I'm homeless. If I own a building lot, have a blue tarp stretched between two trees on it, I have a home. I have lived in lots of places, under a variety of conditions. Sometimes broke, sometimes in debt and once in a while with some cash to spare. I prefer to have a roof over my head, a little spare cash in my pocket, food in the pantry and nobody telling I can't live where I am. Ain't America great!


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## Oxankle (Jun 20, 2003)

I think, for me, no place is "home" unless it has a good woman in it. No one owns a woman, but it is dang nice to have an independent woman, one who does not need you, who thinks that you are good enough to put up with anyway.


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## GTX63 (Dec 13, 2016)

"...wherever he laid his hat was his home..."

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## hiddensprings (Aug 6, 2009)

I believe that the definition of being homeless is in the eyes of the beholder. To some seeing a person living in a tent means that person is homeless. To the person choosing to live in the tent, it is their home. It’s all a matter of opinion.


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## gerold (Jul 18, 2011)

hiddensprings said:


> I believe that the definition of being homeless is in the eyes of the beholder. To some seeing a person living in a tent means that person is homeless. To the person choosing to live in the tent, it is their home. It’s all a matter of opinion.


I have never been homeless. Last week riding the tractor up the county road close to my house a fellow was walking up the road. I passed him and he seen me and picked up a small rock and was looking at it when I passed. I said hello and he just nodded his head. I parked my tractor and was sitting on the front porch and he walked up the road and passed without looking my way. I could tell he had been on the road for a long time and didn't want to talk. Later when down by the creek I saw a ID card in the water. I looked at it and it had expired 10 years ago. The man was 47 years old. To look at him he looked 60. I think he had been on the road a long time. Most of these men go from town to town and eat at places where there is free food. Most are doing what they prefer doing. Just roaming around doing nothing. I have seen a few at the VA hospital at times.


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## hiddensprings (Aug 6, 2009)

gerold said:


> I have never been homeless. Last week riding the tractor up the county road close to my house a fellow was walking up the road. I passed him and he seen me and picked up a small rock and was looking at it when I passed. I said hello and he just nodded his head. I parked my tractor and was sitting on the front porch and he walked up the road and passed without looking my way. I could tell he had been on the road for a long time and didn't want to talk. Later when down by the creek I saw a ID card in the water. I looked at it and it had expired 10 years ago. The man was 47 years old. To look at him he looked 60. I think he had been on the road a long time. Most of these men go from town to town and eat at places where there is free food. Most are doing what they prefer doing. Just roaming around doing nothing. I have seen a few at the VA hospital at times.


Yes, there are a lot of veterans who most people would call “homeless” but it is their choice to not have the traditional home. I sat on the board of directors for a non-profit call Operation Stand-Down and our mission was to assist homeless vets and try to get them off the streets. While we offered free housing, it was hard to get any of them to stay. Of course some had substance abuse issues or mental illness, most simply wanted to just roam. They’d come in for a haircut, tell their stories, and then head back out into the world.


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## tesla_coil (Sep 17, 2016)

Oxankle said:


> I think, for me, no place is "home" unless it has a good woman in it. No one owns a woman, but it is dang nice to have an independent woman, one who does not need you, who thinks that you are good enough to put up with anyway.


Thank you! 
That made the most sense that I’ve heard!! It’s the truth— you do it together!!


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## Shrek (May 1, 2002)

DKWunlimited said:


> What does homeless mean to you? If you share an apartment with your brother and chip in for bills but the lease is in his name. Are you homeless? What about young adults who still live with parents?


Our local news often carries pieces about the "homeless" camps around the outskirts of a nearby larger metro city. The brother of a guy I worked with lives in one because that is where he feels most at home. Some of course question his mental health but his brother told me that when they had him checked as to his physical and mental health all they could ascertain was that he was not a social conformist and when forced to conform to the prevalent society was when he ended up in trouble with employers and the law.

For at least 25 years now, his brother has lived in the camp in a tent and worked as a day laborer and aluminum collector before returning to the camp at night to call it a night in his tent.

I went with his brother to visit him at his tent in the camp and it was a surprise to see 25 or so people living in bivouac style in an orderly sub society.

While he was talking to his brother, I noticed small vegetable gardens by some tents, guys reading books, cleaning the area, one guy brokering aluminum cans and some watching a 6 inch portable battery TV.

On our way home, the homeless guy's brother told me he really didn't consider his brother homeless because as long as he lived in the camp, he supported himself, stayed out of trouble with the law and the camp had its own version of police , social services and medical care in the fact that the camp had some who acted as security to keep drunks and drug addicts out of the group, a former medic who monitored the residents health and sanitary conditions and some in the camp often sent the ones most weather vulnerable to shelters during extreme conditions.

Most noticeable was how clean those in the tent city were.

He said his brother told him there were camps he would never consider going to because of the drunks and drugs, but he was happy in the one where he lived.

They still visit each other and in the winter sometimes his brother moves in with him for the cold snap but they both know that ultimately he will choose to return to the tent city because that is just how he is.

Mentally ill? Not enough to be committed. Sociopath? Yes since he doesn't conform to the dominant society of the area near his tent city.

But is a tent city like that much different than modern homesteaders wanting to live off grid and use 5 gallon buckets of sawdust as a toilet?

"Homeless" is a ambiguous term hard to pin a definition on sometimes.


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## Goat of the Sea (Jun 3, 2018)

The word homeless seems to not come from the people living it. Homeless is a state of mind, a low vibration. Those who are happy in there outside-the-box living preference probably don't think of themselves as homeless.

I've lived in a tent for about 8 years. On a deck with a roof-overand walls. I started in a canvas wall tent with an open floor. The last one was a 20x30 built with 2x6s and 4x4s. I was planning for it to hold up through moderate hurricanes lol. The state of Florida considers that homeless.even though I had running water and electric and paid rent for the lot.
I wasn't homeless. I work. I pay taxes. I had a home in a 12x12 room. Apartments are smaller. If I have a big empty space I will fill it with stuff. I would like to condense down to an empty truck bed and a 15ft living trailer.


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## Goat of the Sea (Jun 3, 2018)

It's best to be able to pack up and move quickly when the hurricanes roll through. I've never had a quick tear-down set up. Ive had a house. Was married once. But this is my bliss. When I travel partner finds me I want to experience the continent in the summers.


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