Homelessness

God I hate these queues. Endless. Absolutely endless. and I always
somehow pick the longest one. I walk in, I see a queue and then I see
another one - instant mistake. Inveitably, the one I didn't choose,
will move incredibly quickly, whilst the one I am in, will crawl like a
snail going to the dentist.

And it's the same old faces every time. We all know each other by sight
now, nodding our weary heads, thinking the same bored thoughts sharing
the same dismay at the wait ahead.

I've been coming here for nearly three months now. I queue up, every
morning with the rest of the homeless, hoping to have been found a
home, but each time that I finally reach the front, after the seemingly
endless, tiring wait, "I am sorry. Not today" I am told.

They give us some food though - to be said in their favour. They give
us shelter and we can keep safe and warm, but one day, I want my own
home, my place to sleep alone.

Some of the group have turned to crime in the past. Leaving the centre
and stealing homes from others. Killing for them, fighting over them,
squatting in them illegally. I have resisted the temptation, thgough
strong it has been on occassion. Homelessness has brought out an
agression in me, that I never thought existed. It shown me a deep
strength and yearning for privacy, for somewhere to be safe, to be able
to shut the door from the world and be truly alone and secure. Without
a home, is to feel naked and stripped, vulnerable and tossed from place
to place without feeling that I belong anywhere.

So I wait in the queue, again. They'll have a shell for me soon. I'm on
the donor queue - waiting for one to come vacant, and then I can move
in, and move to a solitary place where I can be a proper hermit
crab.