New Look

In the last posting I talked about the site upgrade I'm in the process of getting done. Well as of today I have officially gone LIVE with the new blog / web site. You can find the new site at homelessinftworth.mzzhost.com. Please click on the link and then bookmark the new pages.

Thanks and enjoy the new Homeless in Ft Worth.

A New Look

As some of you may know, I've been spending time working on a couple of projects. The first project has actually been helping me earn a few dollars each month. That is, of course a street newspaper called "The Journey". If you hadn't already heard, I write a regular column for the paper and do some staff work. What helps me earn some cash is selling copies of the paper. My personal subscriber list is beginning to grow with most people purchasing 10 to 20 copies of the paper at a time to take to work or church or just give away to friends and neighbors. This is the concept behind the paper. It is written about homelessness and it gives a poor or homeless person an opportunity to earn a few dollars with each issue. I you are interested in purchasing copies for yourself or become part of my regular customer list just send an email to me at gkirksr@gmail.com.

On another front, the other project that I have been working on is a complete change in the style and format of this blog as well as it's associated web site. Actually I am combining the two and moving them to another server. I've been working on this particular project for almost two months writing the code that makes the site run, straining my eyes looking at this small screen and loving every minute of it no matter how frustrating it gets when something doesn't work right. For those who are curious go to homelessinftworth.mzzhost.com and take a sneak peak. There is not much content there and I am still testing some things. As soon as my budget will allow, I intend to purchase my own domain name for the new site to make finding it easier.

While all of this is going on I will continue to post articles, commentary and my general ramblings here as usual. When it is time to move to the new site I will make sure everyone knows. Lastly, I'm still on the lookout for a replacement laptop. As many of you know, my Dell laptop with it's high speed dual core processor finally bit the dust. Currently I am using a borrowed netbook and mostly need something with a bit more power to handle my programming, testing and editing chores. Let me know if anything comes up.

This year is turning out to be a very good year for me. I have met a lot of people and I am developing new friends. My thanks and prayers go out to all of you who have shown me your love, concern and even friendship.

Ending the Homeless Lifestyle

That’s exactly what homelessness is for most people on the street, a lifestyle. Much like any other lifestyle, the homeless lifestyle has a negative aspect that can and in most cases, does entangle people. In some of those cases, for a very long time. In a way, the homeless lifestyle can be considered an addiction. Like all addictions, whether mental or physical, the homeless lifestyle is not broken nor left behind without a lot of effort and pain.

One common misconception is that if you take the homeless person out of the homeless environment and place them in an environment that is closer to what is considered “normal” then the problem or addiction will solve itself. Just like trying to keep alcohol away from an alcoholic does not cure alcoholism, keeping a homeless person away from the streets does not cure that person’s homelessness.

Each homeless person is homeless for a reason. Financial problems, problems with family, problems with keeping a job, addictions and other issues contribute to that person becoming and embracing the homeless lifestyle.

Personally, I like using the addiction example because in order to eliminate an active addiction one must eliminate or at least have an active plan to fix the underlying problems that the addiction is covering up.

I fought alcoholism and failed many times before I really knew that I had to address all my issues. I’d fought my homelessness with the same lack of success. An alcoholic cannot just stop, nor can a homeless person just stop being homeless. There’s much more to a persons homeless problems than just getting them off the street and into housing or just giving them some sort of income and expect them to fix themselves. That is the path to failure.

In my case, I had to deal with alcoholism, drug abuse and a whole host of personal issues that were preventing me from dealing with any of my deeper issues. These were the very same issues that were either directly or indirectly keeping me homeless. Which meant that I had to deal with them all and not just a few of the easier issues before I could even consider making whatever changes necessary to get me out of this camp and my homeless situation. Not an easy proposition, nor something that would be accomplished overnight. I’ve been at it for more than 5 years and only just now can I see any daylight at the end of the tunnel. That’s not to say that I am completely ready to leave my homeless lifestyle but if I had the opportunity to make the change today I would have a better, if fact almost certain, chance to succeed.

The reason I bring this up is that by getting a homeless person into a home or apartment, by providing them with an income either from a job or some sort of assistance, will not break that person’s homeless cycle. It is almost a certainty that without dealing with the underlying issues that caused that person to adopt the homeless lifestyle in the first place, he or she will certainly fail and return to the street.

We are all unique, complex individuals and there is no one size fits all solution to our homelessness problem. My solution will not work for anybody else. The only thing we have in common is that it takes time. A lot of time. All of us require something different in the way of treatment, help or education to eliminate our personal addiction to homelessness before the housing and income issues can be addressed.