The West Coast Front
One of the legacies of the Industrial Revolution is the neurotic strain it put on everyone. The stress upon the nervous system in the resulting era of commercialism has produced a feverish unrest which, while affecting society generally, has visited its misery upon a few souls with special intensity. I remember when a transient pushing a shopping cart down the street was ironic, and an almost ludicrous, sight. Today, it is so common as to be disturbing.
Shopping cart men have need of few personal items. Home is where the cart is. It's more baggage than a vagabond needs. He wants nothing that doesn't fit into a backpack. He's got no ticket, no money, not even ID. He's not sure who he is, himself. The road is his home. Perhaps he's a fugitive. Perhaps he failed to enter a shelter before it closed for the night. He may yet reach his destination. But it's the shopping cart men with a lot of baggage that make my heart ache. They look determined.
A brute concrete aesthetic void is the reality of homelessness. Any uncontested stop spot is home to the homeless. The stairs go up and down, leading to nowhere. A frequent sight on subway platforms in Winter is the bag man with nowhere else to go, half-asleep on a bench. It is almost unimaginable to be so exhausted from wandering aimlessly as to have to take shelter in the underground.
"This is L.A." So goes the chirpy pop song. Make that San Pedro Street, in L.A., that is, the famous skid row of the stars. First time I spent time in Los Angeles somebody took me to see it. "It's a must-see," he said. What it is, is the attraction of the seamy side of life, and for free. It is proof there is life beyond the comforts and reassurance of conventionality—not that any sane person would go there.
I recoiled in disgust, at first, but gradually realized the possibilities for art. It is real. It shocks the bourgeoisie. We've come so far from the recent excesses of abstract American art that Tent City a scenic destination. Old buildings, in an old part of town, colorful peasants, quaint customs, even local cuisine—it's got it all. It gets respect just because it's been there so long. There are more disgraceful landmarks we would sooner forget.
My buddy was a veteran. He claimed he was AWOL. I said nothing. I supposed he was putting me on. I suspected he feared becoming homeless. For some reason veterans fall into the bottomless pit of homelessness. I didn't know what PTSD was, at the time, or I would not have brushed-off his twisted attraction to skid row. It's an uncompromising environment. To survive means being on never-ending red alert. Maybe it looks like a tactical move. As they say in the Army, "He's where he wants to be."
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