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04:43 - Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2006 welcome listeners! this is a special podcast edition of the daily drivel by request from sallydally do, woo woo!! and requiel, who dont like the smell of rotten potatoes. i ate a rotten potatoe once. just once. what inspired you to change old habits and old lifestyles and started you on the path to a great new life. tuff question. of which i will try to provide a snappy answer. incarceration. jesus.
i used to go from city to city, begging my way from here to there, working only when i felt like it, living in missions and shelters, motels and hotels, collecting library cards every where i went. sleeping in cars, fancy hotel bathrooms, ya know, i can go from los angeles to washington d.c. with no money in my pocket, and have a full tank of gas and cash in my pocket when i got there, and didnt rob nobody, or steal any gas. all i done was beg for it. baptist churches are best for begging. just pop in anytime, wednesdays or sundays the best, and get ahold of the preacher and tell him a sob story, and convince him you are saved. thats a plus! and riding on the amtrak was so much fun, too!! sometimes, i'd get lucky, and ride 1st class. but i gotta tell ya, riding 1st class aint all its cracked up to be. the 1st class cabin is no bigger than a good closet, with fold down beds, not much room to move around, but the mattresses were nice and comfy!! anyhoo, when on the train, i would meet all kinds of folks on vacation and what not, and would have to socialise with them, so when the question came up as to what i done for a living, i made something up! and that was that. when i was travelling by car, i used to like to make believe i was going to work in the morning, driving in rush hour traffic!! that was fun!! oh, on occasion, i drove a big truck, and lived in the truck, that was fun for a while too. but ya know, between hitchiking all over the place when i was a kid, and for a time when i was married, we rubber tramped all around, til we got tired of it. i had settled down a bit at that point, but my alcohol and gambling were more important at the time than paying bills and rent. and when i got the heave ho from the wench for the last time, i was back on the street, then after i was found innocent in the death of my son, i was back on the street, but then i was angry, very angry, i felt like SOMEONE owed me!!! fuck all this working!! no ones gonna hire me anyway. so i develouped sob stories, mainly by listening to others on the street and what they had to say. heres a typical story: well, i am on my way back home. my wife and i were seperated because of my alcohol use, and she had asked me to leave. i have been in detox, and went thru a program, and ya know, thru that program, i had found the lord! and through counseling, and remaining sober, and joining a church and getting baptised, my wife has decided to take me back. i have 3 kids at home, 2 in diapers, and i have a promise of a job in a wherehouse when i get home. but the problem is, i had some unexpected car problems, and that ate away my cash, and my wife cannot help me, and i am stuck here...yada yada you get the idea, folks!! so, after some counseling and guidence, and lotsa smiles, after all, most preachers i ran into loved to hear this type of talk, about a family reuniting, and overcoming adversity, so out the wad of cash would come, and money was pressed into my hand!! most times, anything between 25 towards a coupla hundred bucks!!! why work when people just give ya cash money? that was my attitude for many years. some times, i didnt even have to ask, the cash would just appear. meanwhile, i was in and out of the VA hospital, varing degrees of mental illness would hit me hard. and i would take meds. and get therapy for my anger and rage. i have a bi-polar disorder. but it was worse at one time. and as the years progressed, and the travelling increased, one of the things i would always say was that if i found a place that was clean and cheap, i would stop and stay put. one of the things i used to do was goto reno in the winter and get a motel room and find some type of job in a casino. cooking, security, money counting, what ever. work in the winter, and scram in the summer. but as the years progressed, reno lost its appeal, and the jobs started drying up. and i started getting tired of wandering all over north america. what i wanted was a real apartment, and a cat. i was getting tired, and too old for this shit. the last few years, i was in a circle of wandering, so to speak, starting from vancouver b.c. and go south to seattle, portland, san francisco, los angeles, vegas, reno, boise then back up to b.c. in 2004, i was in san francisco, one of the cities i love to live in, but can never afford it, i was getting tired of the same old shit. i had a laptop, and i sold it and thinking about where can i go that was good and cheap. a few years back, i spent a winter in klamath falls, and my motel rent was 200 a month. but k-falls was nice, but BORING!!!! nothing at all to do there!! at 5 pm they shut down the streets and shops and busses. and winter was harsh!!! i wanted to give it another try, but the place i had rented when i was there, was no longer available. i thought about boise, boise was nice, and there was a motel there that was 250 a month, but the problem with that was it was 15 miles from downtown!!! woooo!!! and the busses quit at 6 pm. bored yet? im almost done rambling!! so, i was thinking, where have i NOT had been inna long time? then slc came to mind. from time to time, i would look at the slc paper for rents, and noticed that it was cheap to live there, so i took what cash i had left from selling my laptop, and it was a good one too!! (sigh) so, i get to slc, and get to the mission. i found out that the mission here only gives ya 2 weeks. well, time to get busy. i went to the shelter, and signed up for a bed, a two week wait. so, after sleeping at the mission, i went to the shelter. that place was a slob house, fil-fee rotten fil-fee. i started looking around for a cheap place. i didnt have to look very far, cause i passed by the rio grande hotel every morning from the shelter along the way to the mission for breakfast and coffee. they had rooms available, 265 a month. so, after a week in the shelter, i applyed for a room. i met doyle the manager, and my 1st impression of him was that i thought he was an asshole. but i got accepted anyway, and when check day came, i took a pillow and a sheet from the shelter, and thats all i had, and moved in!!! i can afford this!! we will see how this works out. that was in july, 2004. 18 months ago. and here i am working for doyle, and i have my nice and clean, no bugs apartment, assistant manager, and a CAT!!! woo woo!! and i have all kinds of stuff!!! im living like a regular person now, and overall, i am happy. i do worry a lil too much about all of this collapsing and me falling on my fat ass again. but all i have to do is live and breathe and do my job, which is so easy peasy lemon squeezy. i found my place here, and when i get the urge to just up and leave, i remember how it was, and how tired i was of the way i was living. last october, i went to journal con and met poolagirl and mom on roof and chaosdaily, of whom can tell you this whole thing is true facts, cause i been yakking with her on yahoo messenger since 2000. or there abouts. i have a CAT! when i went to san diego on the amtrak, i left creamsicle in a animal shelter, and pay when you come back, and i gotta tell ya, the thought did occur to me to just go to this journal con, then not come back. but the thought of that made me cry real bad. i was crying because of creamsicle. if i didnt come back home to get him, i dont wanna think what would happen to him. he needs me. i now have a purpose. i have a living breathing being who needs my love and care, and i have people who depend upon me. so im home. and im still tired, but now i can take a nap. so that is how i changed from my old habits and lifestyles, and became a better person. im not angry anymore, and i dont believe someone owes me anymore. i live in peace, which overall is what i really wanted! contest time!!! true facts!! i have a 2006 far side calendar, still in the wrapper!!! be the 1st one to tell me the year i started hitchhiking, and you are a winner!! i will send you the far side calendar, free!!! this has been a screen gems/ filmways presentation! note: shear-madness and hissandtell got it right, at the same time, shear got my age, 11 and hissandtell got the year, 1969. so, what i will do, since shear got my age right, and hiss got the year, hiss will get the far side calendar, and i will send shear a scotsman calendar! so i hope that will settle that!! thanks!!!
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