I didn’t expect to publish this post at a moment when homelessness is national headline news, as today the Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson. The case challenges a ruling of the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which upheld a district court decision that people without permanent shelter cannot be punished for sleeping in public places when they have no alternative.
I expected to publish this post three weeks ago, but homelessness is a complex topic nationally and no less complex at the micro level of one unhoused man and his family. This is my attempt to tell a small part of his story, which, for reasons I hope to clarify, he cannot tell himself.
I arrive in Tucson, Arizona, shortly before noon on a Thursday, my body feeling the effects of a full day’s travel from the East Coast. I pick up my rental car and follow my GPS to the address where I’m to meet my brother. It’s a small, plain building set back and in between industrial buildings along the broad street. I walk in and ask for David, and the person in charge tells me that this is a safe house and actually no one except the clients is supposed to come there. But he sends me across a short breezeway to another small building, where a few people sit at tables and eat sloppy joes. The person serving lunch goes to a back room to fetch David while I go outside to wait.
After several minutes my brother comes out. He’s wearing jeans, a brown jacket, and a worn backpack, magenta in color and printed with the smiling faces of three Disney animated heroines. I don’t notice which characters they are because I’m too busy assessing my brother, whom I’m seeing for the first time in 13 months.
He carries a black plastic trash bag in one hand and a Styrofoam cup of coffee in the other. His thinning gray hair hangs in stringy locks to his collar and down over his eyebrows; his white beard grows thick and bushy to his collarbone and the mustache curls over his upper lip. None of this surprises me, as I have a photocopy of the California ID card he got last summer, to replace his lost Maryland ID card. What is surprising is that his upper torso is completely bent over, parallel to the ground. A year ago, his neck and shoulders were only slightly hunched. He turns his face upward and stares at me with unsmiling, hazel eyes.
We get into my car and drive toward the motel where he has found an inexpensive room that I’ve agreed to rent for him for the week. The money I’m paying isn’t mine. David receives a monthly Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefit, a much smaller amount than the Social Security retirement benefit, for which he’s not eligible because he lived all of his working years in South Korea. The Social Security Administration appoints a representative payee for anyone incapable of managing their funds.
While we’re checking him in at the motel, something I do or say angers him and he yells at me. The motel manager, a kind, no-nonsense woman who rents rooms by the month to university students, calmly tells David he can’t behave that way.
David doesn’t have much of a filter for his emotional reactions. Generally he talks and acts out whatever he feels, positive or negative. However, he does comply with boundaries as long as complying serves his own interests.
We find his room. I try his patience with questions about how he plans to keep track of the key card to his room, then leave him for the rest of the day.
David has a long history of losing things—anything and everything. When he lived in a nursing home near me, he would lose his phone charger, for example, and be absolutely sure another resident had stolen it. Later, he would find it under the bed or buried in the bedclothes. When he left the nursing home, in February of last year, and started traveling on his own, the consequences of losing track of things became more serious.
Within the first few days he lost his cell phone when he left it charging in a bus station while he went to the ticket counter. By the time he returned it was gone. Another one was stolen (or maybe dropped) while he slept on a bus. I’ve lost track of the number of cell phones he’s had, and when I arrived in Tucson he didn’t have one.
The next morning I return to the motel. A man I haven’t met comes out of David’s room and tells me that he’ll be ready shortly. After a few minutes David emerges and introduces me to Eddie. Later he’ll tell me that Eddie was living in his girlfriend’s apartment until last night, when she kicked him out. Eddie, who is probably in his sixties, had a stroke some months ago, and much of his talk is unintelligible. He follows a conversation and responds in friendly and appropriate ways; I just can’t understand his words.
Later, I wonder at the difference. How is it that I sense two-way communication with Eddie, via eye contact and his responses, while David speaks prolifically but seems to be following only his own story line?
The three of us head out in the car to look for breakfast. David thinks there’s a Dennys restaurant nearby. I follow his directions but we don’t find it, and my GPS indicates no Dennys in this area. After the first of many arguments we will have about David’s directions vs. my GPS, we stop at a Burger King. My skills at avoiding arguments with him have grown rusty.
After breakfast we leave Eddie at a bus stop and head for the first of several government offices on our agenda. Again, David’s directions are different from what my GPS tells me. But now that I’ve been reminded that arguing is counterproductive, I let him rant and make no response.
He tells me my GPS is not infallible and that I’m not going to find that office.
“Believe me,” he says, peevishly. “I’ve been there several times.” Then, angrily: “Do you think I’m demented? Just because I’m over 70?”
He voiced the same demanding question yesterday, and now I think that maybe other people have suggested this to him, or maybe it’s his own worry.
After a short silence he complains, “You don’t seem to have any trust in other people, not even your own brother. You never used to be like this, Elizabeth. I think maybe you’re demented.”
Finally we arrive at the Department of Economic Security, where David will ask about replacements for his EBT card (aka food stamps) and his Arizona Medicaid card, both of which he’s lost. The agent behind the window doesn’t need his ID; he has the records and quickly produces a new EBT card loaded with the funds remaining from the last deposit. Then he gives David a phone number to call about replacing the Medicaid card.
Our next stop is the DMV because David wants to apply for an Arizona ID. I wonder aloud why, given that he’s told me he plans to return to California two weeks from now. He doesn’t answer, and it doesn’t matter because the DMV needs to see his birth certificate.
In the afternoon we get David a haircut. He’s agreed to this because, he tells me, he likes to get his hair cut and his beard trimmed every four months. We search for the barbershop he remembers, not from having had a haircut, but he once walked in and saw a calendar featuring pictures of cats that he liked. So we drive around, this time following David’s directions as he looks for landmarks. Eventually we arrive at Presidio Hair, where two stylists, a man and a woman, are working.
We enter, and David walks toward the work area. “Let’s sit,” I suggest, and he retorts, “You’re treating me like a child.” He’s right, so I back off. It’s more effective to let others set the limits if necessary.
Presidio Hair is actually a salon, but the woman tells us that the man is a very experienced barber. David asks about the cat calendar but they’ve never seen it.
I go outside to make a few phones calls, and when I return the barber is finishing David’s haircut. He takes photos and tells me that he’ll post before-and-after pictures on the salon’s Facebook page. I agree that he’s done an excellent job. Even David, who dislikes haircuts, is impressed. Later he tells me that the barber has 46 years of experience.
During his manic episodes David turns religious. He’s attracted to an evangelical, almost Pentecostal style of worship, a taste that I think might have developed during his years in South Korea. The church our family attended in the 1960s was evangelical but subdued. In Tucson David attends two churches: a majority Black, Seventh Day Adventist church on Saturdays and a majority White, Assembly of God church on Sundays.
The people at both churches know him as “Elijah D. Devon” because that’s the name he’s told them. He likes to play with name changes. When his only mailing address was my house, he was receiving monthly appeals from a certain charity in triplicate, addressed to three different versions of his name, until I finally wrote to the charity and asked them to cancel the mailings.
The Seventh Day Adventist minister invites people to give a “testimony,” briefly sharing anything on their minds. David volunteers, “I’m moving to Los Angeles on April 11th. I actually like Tucson better, but I miss my Korean family.” I’ve already heard about this planned move, and I’ll hear much more. Part of the story is that his friend Oscar, who lives in South Korea, will come to L.A. in July and the two of them will travel by bus all over the country.
He has done this sort of travel planning throughout the past year. Usually his plans come to nothing; he simply abandons them and concocts new ones. Sometimes he follows through, and then he might end up where he intended to go, or not, and nearly always loses his belongings on the way.
After the church service there’s a free lunch provided by church members, a baked potato and sweet potato bar with a variety of delicious vegetarian and vegan toppings including two chilies, one of beans in a spicy tomato sauce, the other of vegan-creamed tofu; steamed broccoli, and sautéed red and green peppers and onions.
David tells me that Tucson’s bi-annual Fourth Avenue Street Fair is happening, with hundreds of booths of artisans and venders, food and entertainment. As we drive toward downtown he talks continually, a characteristic of the manic phase of bipolar disorder, according to the official criteria (DSM-5-TR): rapid speech, euphoria, and racing thoughts.
I’m working to follow his confusing directions and keep a calm exterior despite my frustration as he’s also telling me a story about looking for a motel last February when there was big street show of gems and most of the motels were either full or too expensive.
“You don’t have your GPS turned on?” he asks.
“No. I’m following your directions because I don’t know where I’m going.”
“Well, you didn’t know where we were going yesterday, either, and I kept trying to direct you and you believed your GPS and not me.”
“Well, now I’m believing you.”
“You must have had a good night’s sleep,” he says. “The numbered streets go from north to south.” (Later I will learn that numbered avenues run east and west.) “Remember yesterday,” he continues, “the Social Security office was on 38th Street and 6th Avenue, which is the meridian of Tucson. Oh, speaking of the Social Security office, on Monday we could either go there or we could just call, because I want to give them my change of address. I found out the address of the Econo Lodge.” That’s where he’s staying now.
Instantly I assess the statement, decide how to be involved, or not, in his plan, and reply, “You can take care of that.”
“OK, and I plan to stay two more weeks before I go to Los Angeles. So, if you’ll give me four hundred dollars before you leave, …”
“No.”
“No? Well, where am I supposed to come up with the money?”
“What do you want it for?”
“They charge four hundred dollars a week.”
“Oh. … No,” I repeat. My voice is still calm and soft. His is rising in frustration.
“What am I supposed to do?”
“What did you do before you moved in there?”
“Slept on the street. Now …”
“You don’t have enough money to stay in the motel for that long.”
“What about all the money that you’re keeping for me?”
“At four hundred dollars a week, it would go really fast, and you might need … ”
“It’s only two more weeks. How much money are you keeping from me? At least five thousand dollars?” I am silent. “Well, you don’t have to tell me, but of course I’ll need a bank account for you to send me that money, right?”
“You need to figure out things like ID to get a bank account.”
“Yes, okay. Oh! On Monday I will go to the library, go on the computer, find the number of the Los Angeles DMV and then I will call them.”
“Okay.”
“Now, hopefully, it won’t take too long to send … when I first applied for my ID, they said it would take up to sixty days. It was more than sixty days. I did not get the card until after I moved here.”
“So, you’re going to have them send you something here, but you’re leaving in two weeks?”
“Yes, and that’s why I want to inform the Social Security office of my change of address. I could probably just call them.”
“What mail do you think is going to get here in two weeks?”
[Sighs in exasperation] “My Social Security card!”
“You think so?”
“That’s what we went to the Social Security office yesterday for, remember?”
“And how long did it take for your California ID to get to you?”
“Well, that took more than sixty days, but the Social Security card took just two weeks. So I daresay it will get here before I leave. Now, the reason I want to change my address is that at the safe house, they only deliver mail about once a week.”
“You’ll have to figure out an address, then.”
He shouts, “My address is at the Econo Lodge!!”
“I’m not paying for another week there.”
“Well, how about if I call the other motel, which costs only two hundred a week.”
“I’m paying for your motel stay while I’m here.”
“Then, as of next Thursday I’ll have to go back on the street.”
“Well, you seem to be happy that way. Is that true?”
“I’m happier in the motel. How much money are you holding for me? You owe it to me, right? It’s my money, not yours.”
Hanging on to my patience by a thread, I answer, “I am the steward of your money.”
“What?”
“I’m your representative payee. Complain to Social Security.”
“I’m also going to tell Social Security that I no longer want you as my representative payee. I don’t need you as my representative payee.”
“Fine. Have them call me.”
“I am perfectly capable of handling my own affairs.”
Then I make a mistake. I bring up a problem that has been troubling me in the background, which I’ve told David about: a $500 bill for his Medicare premium, which I had received a week ago for the first time and which will continue monthly until I figure out how to navigate the Chamber of Secrets of Medicare and Social Security and find out what the hell is going on.
“Listen to me!!” David yells.
“No!!!” I yell back, louder.
“Oh, just stop the car, I’m getting out. You go back to your motel. I think you should see a psychiatrist because I think you’re showing signs of early dementia.”
This last statement, oddly, brings me back to calm. “Do you want me to pick you up at 9:00 tomorrow?” I ask.
“Yes.” He also is calm now.
“Okay, I will.”
I’ve pulled over to the curb but it’s a narrow street and the driver behind me honks.
“Goodbye,” I say, “I have to move.”
He shouts again, “You have changed, Elizabeth!”
Again, I out-shout him. “Goodbye, I have to move the car!!”
“I will get out at my own pace, since you’re yelling at me.”
After another honk from behind, David gets out.
As soon as he leaves the doubting, fearful thoughts crowd in on me, followed by feelings of guilt. I let myself get hooked by the fear of yet another encounter with the Federal government. Should I have said yes to a second week in the motel? Definitely I should have paused and taken a moment to breathe and calm down. Why can I never remember that pause when I need it most?
Like David, I’m no paragon of emotional regulation. When I’m stressed and in situations I don’t want to be in, I will reach a breaking point eventually.
By the time I return to his motel at 9:00 Sunday morning I’ve decided to let him stay there another week, mainly because I can’t stand the thought of his returning to the street on my watch.
After I left David on Saturday, he acquired a free cell phone from a woman at the city bus transit center who offered it to him. Sunday morning after church we go to Walmart and get him headphones, for listening to music on his phone, and socks and underwear to replace those items that were in a bag he left at the library.
He packs the new things into his magenta backpack. By Monday morning the backpack is gone. David explains that while riding a bus he put the backpack under his seat. “Then, when I got off the bus, it was so far under the seat that I didn’t see it.”
Soaring home and rent prices have eaten into incomes and priced some people out of the market. The situation has been compounded by sunsetting COVID relief programs; an ongoing mental health and drug abuse crisis; and an aging population without retirement savings. — Devin Dwyer and Sarah Herndon, ABC News, April 18, 2024
In the case before the Supreme Court, which has broad implications for cities and states far beyond the small city of Grants Pass, Oregon, the initial legal complaint, filed in 2018 on behalf of three plaintiffs, said the city unconstitutionally punished them “based on their status of being involuntarily homeless.”
Last year David left an adequate nursing home residence voluntarily and against medical advice. But what does “voluntary” really mean? Did he consider the choices—to stay in the nursing home with a bed and regular meals, or leave and be homeless? I don’t believe that sequence of thoughts ever went through his mind.
David’s only reference point is the present moment. Although he talks nonstop about wildly optimistic plans for future travel and detailed memories (mostly accurate) of distant past events, there’s no learning from the past to inform the future. If in this moment he has a phone, he can’t imagine it’s ever being lost or stolen. He knows that has happened before, but it won’t happen again, and he gets angry at any suggestion that planning for the possibility would be a good idea.
Definitions of “mental illness” and beliefs about its treatment are controversial. Numerous books and articles detail the problems, including this recent article in The Guardian, helpfully shared by
last week.David does not want a diagnosis; he forcefully refuses it. A friend of his once told me that he hates the stigma of mental illness. Occasionally he has been coerced into receiving psychiatric treatment when his behavior became intolerable to people around him. One such occasion was when he was staying with our elderly parents and became so angry at their compliance with the American medical system that he collected all of their many bottles of pills, dumped them into the outdoor trash bin, and set them on fire. As far as I know, that is the most dangerous act David has ever committed.
Perhaps rationality is better defined in terms of the brain’s most important job: body budgeting—managing all the water, salt, glucose, and other bodily resources we use every day. … What we call mental illnesses, then, may be rational body-budgeting for the short term that’s out of sync with the immediate environment, the needs of other people, or your own best interests down the road. — Lisa Feldman Barrett, 7 1/2 Lessons About the Brain, pp. 26-27
David has grown quite adept at living in the streets of Tucson. He knows the price of coffee at every convenience store and fast-food restaurant and which ones will give him free coffee. In his manic phase he’s outgoing, friendly, and often entertaining. He has no problem asking people on the street for money, and he’s a bit scornful of beggars who simply hold up a sign.
Near my home in a Washington, D.C., suburb, there’s a homeless man who hangs out along the sidewalk where I pass by on my errand route Saturday mornings. As I nod and smile at him, he calls out, “Hey Granny!” and I bristle, feeling insulted and intruded upon and thinking, “No way am I giving you anything.”
On the Saturday following my return from Tucson I walked by, greeted the man with my usual smile and nod, got the usual response. Only this time I thought, “Right. This would be my brother.”
This is a powerful piece of writing on one actual person's life as a homeless person with mental illness. We should read more accounts like this rather than just statistics and accounts of attempts that are expected to be quick fixes for a problem that, of course, has none. Thank you, Elizabeth.
Wow, what a heart-wrenching story, Elizabeth. I appreciate you sharing it with such authenticity and care, where there are no easy or good solutions. With caring, K