A Documented Experience With Homelessness in NYC
The first night I slept in my car didn’t feel real.
I'd stayed with a friend the night before to make sense of everything. I parked and "set up shop" on a side street near some bars in Bushwick, and it felt safe enough. I think most people couldn’t tell that I was in the car. One guy looked in, but I hid my face under the blanket.
The gym was where I showered, usually. I brushed my teeth inside of the car more than I did in public bathrooms; I was afraid that bacteria from the bathrooms would get on my toothbrush. I let my soap, face wash and other wet items sit in the passenger seat to air-dry.
I developed the courage to hit the men’s shelter in midtown after a full week living in my car. I had already known about this shelter after donating a few bags of old clothes some months ago. I cleared the metal detectors, spoke with the front desk staff, and sat in the waiting area for a minute. They gave me some fruit, juice, carrots.
They were nice; I felt less shame.
Intake took a while, but I ended up getting my own room for the night. I spoke with a social worker a few hours prior – that was the main goal. She let me know some of my options. But there weren’t many.
My room number was 53. The bed was cold, and the blanket was as thin as my t-shirt. I walked the hall and headed to the bathroom to wash my face. I thought about showering, but heard another guy coming that way, so I just went back to my room. My backpack was my pillow for the night. We couldn’t lock our doors.
When I left in the morning, the staff gave me an intake form with my bed assignment for the next few nights at a shelter in Brooklyn. I slept in my car a few more nights before going to the Brooklyn shelter, and I arrived to about ten guys waiting in the courtyard at picnic tables. The guards were stricter here. It felt like prison.
This time, I wasn’t gifted a private room. I walked into a waiting area that sat at least a dozen men. We waited for a while. I felt defeated. I took a few portraits in the bathroom, went back to my car, crawled in my back seat, and went to sleep.
I couldn’t do the shelter again.
Some nights in the car were easier than others. I spent most of my nights sleeping in either Lower Manhattan or East New York. For the majority of those nights, I would walk around for hours just to make time go by faster. It felt like irresponsible, but in a good way. I never did stuff like this back home.
I didn’t cry as much as I thought I would. Actually, I became kind of proud of myself as the weeks went on. When depression crept in, I’d go out with some folks to celebrate life and temporarily get my mind off things. Though still, I spent most days alone. I just didn’t want to ask anyone for help.
I’m getting older. I thought I’d be married by now. Instead, I’ve gotten a few gray hairs; a new asthma diagnosis; a lot of knee pain. The worst part of sleeping in a small car is the little bit of leg room. My legs were so bunched up at night. I woke up often in the middle of the night needing to stretch. Though, I had to do it lightly, as I didn’t want anyone to walk past and see movement inside.
Most mornings, the sun was my alarm clock. The nights would get really cold. Sometimes, the cold itself would wake me up. If not, the heat on the warmer days would. And usually, I was the first person at work, so if I missed washing up at the gym, I could just do so in the bathroom. I felt musty most days.
Life didn’t look anything like this last year, or ever, really. I feel like I’m battling what feels best for me versus what I’ve been conditioned to believe is best. I’ve gotten a lot better at stepping away from tradition. Sometimes my pre-programmed POV still haunts me, but for the most part, I do see progress.
Some days are confusing, but I’m getting closer to what feels like peace, even if that peace looks like living in my car, instead of paying nearly two thousand dollars for a basement apartment where mold, bugs, flooding, and landlords that would rather evict me than tend to these issues so common admist the NYC housing crisis were my parallels.
Did it have to happen this way? Probably not. But I’m creating my own happiness. That’s all that really matters.
