LAURA

PHOTO BY RANDY BACON

LAURA’S STORY

I had a child custody battle in which I gave up my child support to keep my son and then things started going downhill and this is where I’m at. I ended up on the streets here, and my son is in the state I left. I didn’t want him to be a part of this, so I’m trying to get him back. And I miss him. Being homeless is one of the things I never thought in my life that I would be; fifty-seven years old, and on the streets. It's bad. You see people from of all walks of life. You see a lot of wonderful people down on their luck; people snub their noses up at you, they don't wanna sit by you because you have an odor. They act like you're just a piece of dirt. I’ve seen people not sit by somebody because they were on the bus and they were homeless. I’ve seen people call you homeless and that you need to get out and find a job, you’re just a piece of dirt. My family does not know that I’m homeless, my children do not know that I am homeless. Women out here have it hard because you're trying to stay brave and everywhere you go you have to defend yourself.

Things need to change for the homeless, I mean there’s no place for them to sleep, they sleep under the bridges, in alleyways, and it’s sad when it’s raining and cold and you have no shelter. You just keep telling them they have to be brave, one day it’s going to be better. But then you’re wondering if it’s ever going to get better. Each morning I get up and I think what’s today gonna be, you know? Go look for a job and they're gonna turn you down because you don’t have a home address, or they don't like what you're wearing, and it's sad when you see all of these same people every day standing in line for food and you see the same people trying to stay warm, or stay out of the heat and there’s no place to go, and you think how did life get like this? When you see somebody that’s a parent out there and you're thinking, how did it get so bad? We forget what it feels like to have a bed, and not sleep on the bench or the floor. And you get these people just saying that you don't matter, but everybody matters. Homeless is not a way of life. Nobody should be homeless.

I want to feel like a person again. I want to feel beautiful. I want my own place. I don't want my children or grandchildren to know that I lived on the streets. I don't want them to know that I had to stand in line to get food, or just walk around because I have no place to go. I want people to know that I am a person. That every homeless person out there is a human being. And just because they have to carry laundry or baggage with them, they’re still a person. That every person that you snub because they’re homeless; they have feelings. And they want to feel special. They want to feel beautiful, not just some piece of trash that everybody treats them like. The women would love to have their hair done or just to put a smile on their face and say, you know, that today’s going to be a better day. But each step you take, somebody knocks you back down, everywhere you go.

My dream is to go back to school to be a drug counselor. And to have my own home. Before I end up giving up on the streets. I tell everybody not to give up, but it comes to a point where you wake up and you think you can’t do it anymore. And you try to put on that brave smile saying yeah, you can. When you're so sick you just don’t want to go anymore. I want people to stop treating other people like they're dirt. Stop putting a label on people that don't have what you have. We’re all humans, we’re all people, and we all have feelings. It doesn’t matter what part of life you come from, people didn’t choose to be homeless, it just happened. I’m a mom, I’m a grandmother, I’m a person. Might be out on the street, but I’m still a person. I’m still a woman; still want to feel like I’m a woman instead of a piece of dirt. Stop treating people like they’re nobodies, because they’re somebody; they’re somebody’s mom, somebody’s dad, somebody’s child. Something’s got to be done.