... One Year Later

You know those TV shows and movies where the story leads up to a dramatic cliffhanger and the screen blacks out and the legend "One year later ..." appears.  (Alternately, writers use the "24 hours earlier", "One year earlier", etc.)  I've always felt that device is some thing of a cheat.  Like the filmmakers didn't exactly know where to take their story after building it up to a dramatic point; they seem to have decided, "Hell let's skip ahead a year and fill in the details as we go along".

While I think it's something of a cheat and cliche when used in film/TV, wouldn't it be cool if you could use that device in real life?  Magically skip ahead X amount of time to a given point in your life where everything has turned out fine.  I wish I could have done that over the past year.  You see, while you might view Halloween as a time to trick or treat, I'm afraid it marks a bitter anniversary for You Humble Narrator.  It was about a year ago that I became homeless.

Yes, things certainly did build up to a climax:  I succumbed to major depression, lost most of my possessions and money (not to mention my pride), was evicted from my apartment and literally wound up on the streets of Las Vegas with no where to go.  (If you'd like to read my tragic tale in detail, please refer to earlier posts of this blog entitled "HINJFCA"; you'll learn what the clunky acronym stand for.)

During the past year I traveled a path I could have scarcely imagined. I arrived at the Salvation Army of North Las Vegas with less than $100 to my name (if not for the generosity of a cousin I would not have had even that much).  I encountered circumstances and people I had only read about or seen portrayed in the media.  I effectively became part of a shadow society of beggars, drifters, and malcontents.  I sometimes marvel that I didn't simply fall in with many of those who have chosen to take their chances on the streets.

You might not believe how easy it is to make the choice to simply abandon society, cast away responsibility, and lose yourself in the anonymity of the streets.  All it takes is for a person to lose so much that making the effort to regain it isn't worth the effort.  Many have chosen to find comfort in the filth and danger of the streets.

During the past year I was a client in the SA vocational program.  I worked in food service for the first time in my life.  I went to culinary school and learned basic cooking and garde manger (well, sort of).  I made friends with people I would have not long ago deemed as undesirable:  Ex-cons, junkies, thieves of all sorts, hookers, and those with questionable mental stability.  I tried to learn as much as I could from them and about them.  In some ways, I think the process helped me learn about myself:  That I wasn't as fucked up as I feared I was.

Time made events into a kind of blur.  I applied for and was accepted for a job at the Grand Canyon, where I presently live.  I think the change in atmosphere from the urban jungle of Vegas to the rugged landscapes of the GC have acted as a tonic of sorts.  For whatever reason I've felt revitalized since coming here.  The work is somewhat tiresome but it's easy to save money, and I don't feel the day to day pressures of living in a large city. I like many of the people I've met here, especially those from overseas.  The atmosphere is, overall, agreeable.  I actually grew up in a village; now, decades later it seems I have found some degree of peace in another village some 7000+ feet in elevation.

 The experience of the past year has been humbling to say the least. I could never have guessed these events would have taken place in my life.  In some ways this experience has served as a time of re-examination and reassessment.  It has made me appreciate the things I previously took for granted.  In some ways it feels as though I have been broken down piece by piece, atom by atom, into my base elements.  And slowly, piece by piece, atom by atom, I am being reconstructed, re-forged if you will, into something new; hopefully into something better than before.

There are any number of lessons I could take away from this experience.  Here's one:  I guess if you really want to survive, you'll find a way to survive.  Forces unseen will somehow come to assist you if you really want to survive.  I say this because there was a time in the past year where I wasn't sure if I did wanted to go on.  I only wanted everything to go away;  I wanted the pain to go away.  Instead, the pain got worse. But I survived it; I'm still surviving it.  So somehow, at my core I guess I did really want to survive after all.

I'm still here.