SF Day 3: The Homeless

I wrote a note in my journal today that I should write about homeless people in my blog post.  So here I am.  Writing about homeless people.  There is definitely a difference here in the crazies versus those in Lawrence.  I had an up-close and personal encounter with one at the BART station today while I was asking a guy at the information desk a question.  I had just watched the officer walk back to his booth after having told the homeless guy to get out of there or else he would call someone.  But the guy...actually it could have been a woman for all I know...started saying incomprehensible things.  It wasn't even wearing proper bottoms.  Just a sweatshirt tied around their waist.  Sometimes I wonder what it must be like, having grown up or developed a mental disorder.

There are certain characteristics that I have noticed about many of the SF homeless:

1. They use luggage bags to carry around their stuff.  Or a modified cart of some sort.  Grocery carts are too big for the sidewalks here, but they manage to find other metal carts with wheels. 
2. They collect other's waste--today I saw a man frantically open up one of those cigarette butt holders and go searching through it.  All week I've seen them collect the cardboard that's set out on the sidewalk.
3. They don't always appear to be in terrible physical condition.  
4. They don't always hold signs.  Today I saw one that made me sad: "Will accept verbal abuse for change".

One thing that I recommend to anyone who is not familiar with an area:  Don't smile at people, and don't look in their direction when you see that you're coming close to them.  They take kindness as a hint that they'll get more from you, and maybe I should be one of those people that is generous with her money and time and help others out, but I wasn't raised that way.  So I apologize to any of my readers who are offended by my advice or my behavior.  I know others who don't have this instinct, and they either find themselves grasping for words to escape the situation they put themselves in or searching frantically for exit in the opposite direction.  

I remember giving money to a homeless man in Lawrence one time.  I was downtown with a group of students, and I was in elementary school.  I had a quarter in my pocket and we had just passed the man when I decided to run back, plop it into his cup, and catch up with the others.  The teacher scolded me, but I felt really great inside.  Very happy and proud of what I had accomplished.

Now, things are different.  I've been cultured to believe that there exists a "me" and "them".  

Today, I accomplished a lot.  In my eyes, at least.  Let's see...breakfast!  Oatmeal that wasn't so great until I added some sunflower peanut butter to it and then I was in a happy place.  Typed up a blog post, packed my bookbag.  Left the hostel to wander around and got my socks soaked all the way through.  Pants got pretty wet too.  Found refuge in a coffee shop called Muddy's, bought a scone that I forgot to take a picture of I was so hungry.  Left for a burrito at Palazote (or something like that) around the corner.  Voted best burrito in SF.  I got the chicken mole burrito and realized after drinking some water that I was really just thirsty.  Saved 3/4 for dinner, but now I'm thinking breakfast tomorrow. 

Found the public library.

Best moment of my day, hands down.  I think I need to make this a new tradition when I travel.  I thoroughly enjoyed being surrounded by locals in a quiet place of books.  I stayed for about an hour and a half and read Eat, Pray, Love while trying not to get too distracted by the guy across from me unfolding paper towels.  He also had a couple of vitamin bottles sitting in front of him, a pair of scissors, and a couple of glue sticks.  Who knows what that man was up to....From the amount of concentration on his face, I could tell that it was serious business.

After that, it was still raining pretty hard when I left the library.  The plan was to walk back to the hostel, drop off my burrito, then head to the Powell stop by BART.  It was the busiest stop each time I rode the rail, so I figured there must be something interesting there.  Turns out I was right!

Made a short pit stop for a scoop of pumpkin gelato, then I was on my way.

My walk back to the hostel zig-zagged like nobody's business, but I had fun doing it and discovered some pretty awesome art.  

Getting to Powell and Market street wasn't so bad.  That's where my run-in with Mr. Crazy occurred, but I figured things out.  Did I mention that I dropped my clipper card this morning?  I swear, just as I was starting to feel confident about things, I go and put it in my pocket, where it's liable to fall out if I try stuffing my phone in there and then pulling it out.  It was basically like dropping $8.75 on the ground.  :(

Bought another card this evening and put $10 on it.  Loaded another $5 online, which will hopefully get me through tomorrow.  After that, I don't know how much I'll need to pick up my car before I head off to Monterey.  Freedom at last with a vehicle of my own!  Hooray!

So Powell Street.  It feels like that big one in Chicago, 5th Avenue it's called, right?  Big.  Tall buildings, expensive designer clothing, and then you make it to the side streets like I did and you find Target and Gap.  Of course I had to do a bit of window shopping before I got this far, so I tried on a $400 dress and felt lovely.  The shirt ($88) and jeans ($158) you see below are from Apothecary.  Yes, mom, you can ask grandma Barbara to sew these look-alikes for me as a gift.  :)

 My view coming out from the BART station.  I felt very small.

This one I just threw in for the heck of it.  It's out of order, but I took this earlier in the day in the Mission District.  There have been a couple of these.  The other one I saw last night said "Stop eating animals".

Now, I am going to find my way back to my hostel, hopefully convince someone to go to tango with me at El Valenciano, and if not spend a lovely evening reading some more.  I felt more calm today than I have since I got here.  Must be doing something right.