Homeless Obsession

Homeless Obsession

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Anyone who knows me knows that I obsess over something for a short period of time with the upmost passion only to completely drop it two months later. My current obsession is homeless people. You see, I’m taking this class called “Gender and Environmental Philosophy,” and it’s amazing. It’s mostly about ecofeminism and the various forms. One of the neatest things I think is the “integrated oppression perspective.” You basically draw connections between how humans treat other humans and how humans treat non-human animals. The one I noticed the other day was the way The Bus here in Honolulu deals with vermin and how they deal with homeless people. The Bus will put spikes on the edges of some bus stops to prevent birds from sitting there and pooping all over the place. They have also now started to put divider bars on some of the benches, making it very uncomfortable to lay on. Some people find that very offensive – the way a group will treat another group of humans as if they were diseased rats or something.

So, basically I’ve been noticing homeless people more often as I go around town, as my final project for this course is going to be about the parallels between how a city deals with vermin and how they deal with homeless people, etc. Yesterday morning I walked into Jamba Juice, and as I did, I heard the tail end of the employee yelling at mall security escorting a homeless person out of the store, “HOMELESS PEOPLE ARE PEOPLE TOO YOU ASSHOLE! TREAT HIM WITH RESPECT!” Security: “HE’S A FUCKING ANNOYANCE.” Yeah – tense moments at 6:30 AM in Jamba Juice. Anyway, so I look to the employee and said, “Right on,” and then continued to tell her about my whole homelessness obsession. We chatted about that for a bit, and then I walked down to my bus stop. Now, I cannot remember the last time a homeless person randomly walked up to me and started a conversation, but I shit you not, this old man pushing a grocery cart full of stuff walks up, stands next to me and we talked for about ten minutes while I waited for the bus. Completely random conversations about the education system in Hawai`i, the pollution problems in Denver, and how good trade winds feel on a hot day. The bus came, we shook hands, I wished him a good day, he did the same to me, and I got on the bus and he walked (I’m assuming) aimlessly into a parking lot.

The strangest things like this always seem to happen to me. My friend this morning said, “Due to the law of attraction, you bring these things into your life.” I like that, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.