A Veteran of the Streets...

A Veteran of the Streets….

I am a long time veteran…. A veteran of living, or rather merely existing,

around the periphery of life. Due to physical challenges, I was never

allowed to serve in the military, but you do not need to serve in the

armed forces to become a veteran of life.

Though, instead of being honored for my service,

I’m repeatedly told my very presence is illegal. No one would

want the veteran status of living on the streets for decades.

It has long since stopped being days, or months, or even years….

Living Life on the streets has turned into decades, as I have been

forced to live in decades on the streets. Seen as an obtrusion to others,

and a threat, instead of a living, feeling, breathing being.

Anchors drifting in the sea of nowhere. The threads; the barest of threads

at that, fraying more with each passing moment. Life is viewed differently

when you are not part of society, but rather sitting, or in some cases, lying

around the seams of society… we are certainly treated

differently from being part of “regular” society.

I never set out to become a veteran of the streets.

But being readily and continually denied and refused

the services and assistance I need, has forced me to become one.

Much like the military veterans who are denied, year after endless year,

of all the services and assistance they need. So I know the battle of

endurance of going through this screwed up system, one that wants you to just

give up and quit. A lot have done just that. Suicides from veteran’s are

at an all time high, and a large portion of that is being denied their service

and help after returning from war. Not being listened to, not being heard,

being dismissed completely and just plain flat out ignored. It is the same when

your life is lived on the streets; no one wants to listen, you are not

considered “society”, and not clumped in the “Human” group.

But really, given the way the “Human” group acts and behaves….

It is really not a group I want to be part of. It is because of the “Human” group

that the services and assistance needed has been denied and refused.

It is because of the “Human” group that I have been forced to live my life

on the streets. It is because of the “Human” group that I have experienced

hundreds of bouts of food poisoning because of people’s gross non-hygienic

practices when preparing food for others, which some have done purposely.

And their practices have caused permanent damage through my digestive tract,

I am left paying the heavy, excruciating painful price of their actions.

So I am glad not to be associated with the “Human” group.

My veteran status should not be one anyone should be forced to endure

or become a part of. And like military veterans, those of us living out our

lives on the streets…. You lose hope and no longer look forward to life, in any regard.

Just serving your time until your time is up and you are sent “Home”, one way

or another. Being sentenced for a crime you never committed by this “Human” group.

It is truly sad that Veterans on the streets, and Veterans of life living on the

streets are treated in a similar manner. Our voices muted and covered up,

our experiences closer together than not. Experiencing the worst of the underside of this

“Human” group. Humanity…. Where has it gone to? Does it even exist?

When humanity turns their backs on those of us on the streets,

regardless of how we came to be out here, our stories start to mesh together,

blending and becoming a single story, where one starts and another

ends becomes one and can no longer be separated. Our battleground becomes

the streets, and the “Human” group wages war on us daily for the

very presence of our presence that the “Human” group imposed on us.

We live in a war zone all year long.

Being a veteran of life on the streets takes a

tremendous toll on your life, on your heart, on your mind….

And soon ... your body…. Denied the nourishment of life; Love.

So is it any wonder that no one forced to live on the streets, thrives?

How can one thrive when your very existence and mere presence is swept

under the rug; ignored, dismissed, and unwelcome?

Who thrives without nourishment? But that nourishment is kept from

us when life is cast out to lived on the streets. So instead of thriving,

we become hardened inside and out. While our insides corrode on the

deepest levels and seeps into the very core of our being.

Life on the streets changes

who you are as a person, from the inside out.