As I may have mentioned before my complex is a congregating ground for homeless people. Apparently there is a VACANCY sign posted in the local homeless chapter break room with the little pieces of paper hanging from the bottom of the posting with the address for the carports along my complex drive. And the other day I was able to have a brief conversation with a once homeless man who had incidentally found a place to live and was coming back to claim his belongings.
Let me set the scene for you. I was walking out of my house to my carport with the intention of driving out to LA to hang with a friend for the weekend. As I walk to the end of our little grassy knoll I see that there is a little white car blocking the exit of my carport and this is where the story begins:
“Hey do you think you could move your car a bit so I can get my car out of the carport?” The lady driving the vehicle just stares at me slightly slack jaw as if I just asked her if she was wearing underwear.
Enter the short man in the black t-shirt, “Oh, hey. Well see I have my stuff stored here and I live in Lancaster now and I came back to get my stuff and see I had all my things here in your cupboards but now they’re all spread out”
“Yep…….well……….there is a lot of people that are going through these cupboards so they probably took some stuff and moved it.”
“Yeah, see I had it all in one spot. I had all my baby pictures and stuff and I found some of my things in this cupboard and the one next to it and the one at the end. I had this duffle bag full of clothes that still had the tags on them and everything.”
Now let’s pause one second here. When I hear this man’s plight of strewn out belongings I think to myself (so you’re telling me you had brand new clothes but you didn’t have a place to live? Hmmm, interesting. I guess new cargo shorts are more important than a bed to sleep in.) Let’s continue.
“Yeah, I’m not really sure what to tell you. I see people walking around these carports all the time so they probably took your stuff.”
“Well you know, I tried to put it all in one spot and I even put screws on the doors to keep them closed but you know someone opened them I guess.”
“Yeah………….so is there something you need? Do you need help with something?”
“Oh no I just need to get into your cupboard and get the rest of my stuff……you know.”
“Ok……..well if you move your car I can get out of your way because I’m leaving anyway.”
“Oh, ok. Well thanks for letting me use your space.”
“You’re fine man, I don’t use it anyway”
Now I was on the phone with my friend for the very beginning of this conversation and out of courtesy I told her I would call her back because I had a feeling it was going to be longer than a 30sec interlude. When I called her back she tells me, “That sounded like the beginning of an SNL skit.” And now that I think about it………..I’m pretty sure a series of skits could be made from the homeless scenarios that have played out in my complex. I could possibly even write a book with short memoirs called “Happenings of the Homeless: Real life carport living” I’d sell a million copies, do signings in bookstores and then have copyrights to the SNL skits that would follow. Not sure if a movie could be made from the book ………………..maybe one for TV. I could even put “Based on Real Life Events” to make it more legit. Maybe in my hours of spare time I’ll start the scripts for the skits.
But in other news mark this on our calendars: Belly Laugh Day Jan 24th, careful not to pee while laughing.
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