My name\u2019s Douggie. I\u2019ve been homeless, off and on, for 17 years. I was a juvenile run away as a teen\u00a0trying to escape myself. Mentally ill, c-c-can\u2019t talk r-r-right, big and goofy looking and rejected by peers\u00a0growing up to now, life handed me apples and forced me to make peanut butter with them. Struggle\u00a0and survival have been my M.O. for, well, 17 years. My story will take you to hell and back more than\u00a0once. I not only wrecked my life, I wreaked havoc and hell on my parent\u2019s and brother\u2019s lives as well.
\nMy folks and I talk still and they help me out tremendously to this day. My brother, because of me, has\u00a0written me off going on 8\/9 years now. I\u2019ve made a butt-load of stupid decisions, choices, and actions\u00a0throughout my life, and being stubborn and bull-headed DOES NOT help–less you consider redundant\u00a0and repetitiveness of the same b.s. helpful.
\nInsanity: Repeating same action over and over again and expecting different results.
\nI\u2019ve been homeless in D.C. during a blizzard with enough layers on to barely block out frost bite. \u00a0Sleeping in this condition is impossible; you have to force yourself to keep moving until a fast food joint\u00a0opens–this means absolutely nothing if the manager sees you, knows what you are and throws you out,\u00a0regardless if it\u2019s in the low double digits to the single digits. I\u2019ve also been homeless when the nights\u00a0are 95+ degrees and the night breeze drops the temp to 90, maybe 85–if you\u2019re lucky. Sleeping in this\u00a0weather ain\u2019t no bed of roses (without their thorns) either. Sleep, a necessity, isn\u2019t only robbed from\u00a0you by the weather, it\u2019s also robbed from you by cops who, I feel, like kicking you awake and making you\u00a0move for the fun of it.
\nAside from sleepless nights you have humans to deal with during the day. I\u2019m not going to be a\u00a0complete *ss, but out of every dozen humans you might get eight or nine, sometimes ten or eleven\u00a0who\u2019ll treat you worse than animal dung and yell bigot stupidity at you for their own childish humor.
\nHowever, at least with my \u201cluck,\u201d those one to three out of every twelve who help you you get this\u00a0overwhelming gratitude and a bad day becomes alright and not a total loss. When you don\u2019t feel like\u00a0messing with humans and their hierarchy-like attitudes, you have churches who\u2019ll feed, bathe and clothe\u00a0you; some\u2019ll even give you a few bus tokens, do your laundry and even hang out with you–company\u00a0from spiritual individuals is comforting and rids you of loneliness for a short time.
\nI, like any homeless person, can fill dictionaries with stories about street life. This isn\u2019t my last article,\u00a0but this one is coming to an end. I got more tales to tell and hope to have \u2018em read as well. Until next\u00a0time, remember, the homeless are people too. Help us a little. We need it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
My name\u2019s Douggie. I\u2019ve been homeless, off and on, for 17 years. I was a juvenile run away as a teen\u00a0trying to escape myself. Mentally ill, c-c-can\u2019t talk<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1669,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[99],"class_list":["post-1668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog-stories","tag-douggies-corner"],"yoast_head":"\n