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Speaker 1: Previously on Weedian House and I'm a citizen, a kid

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Speaker 1: with something. Let it not be conditioned because I don't

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Speaker 1: know about you guys.

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Speaker 2: I'm a grown ass woman.

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Speaker 1: I don't like being told, well, why can you talk

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Speaker 1: to me?

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Speaker 2: Why can you have over?

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Speaker 1: What are socialize? Who can I can be with?

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Speaker 3: Well, we continue linking our struggles. Earlier, I was talking

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Speaker 3: to a professor of history and she said, I have

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Speaker 3: never seen a movement in my life that consolidates so

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Speaker 3: many different demands under one banner. To even begin envisioning liberation,

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Speaker 3: you need to have virtual framework that allows you to

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Speaker 3: envision if you have these type of freedom dreams.

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Speaker 1: Welcome back to Weedian House. I'm your host, Leo Henderson,

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Speaker 1: and today's episode is going to be informative, start provoking,

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Speaker 1: and inspire you to action. But first, on House News,

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Speaker 1: our top story Sunset Sound and Camp has swept. On

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Speaker 1: Friday May thirty one, twenty twenty four, the unhoused community

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Speaker 1: were swept outside of Sunset Sound. Business owner Paul Camatra

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Speaker 1: complain about unhoused people blocking entrances of the studio. Paul

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Speaker 1: Camatra used hostile architectures such as large planters to prevent

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Speaker 1: the un housed from blocking a gate. Karen Bass promised

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Speaker 1: him the tents will not be back. According to the

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Speaker 1: LA Mayor's Office of Community Engagement, Council member Hugo Soto

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Speaker 1: Martinez collaborated with the suite. Our next story when we

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Speaker 1: become invested in our own oppression and it goes wrong.

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Speaker 1: Kenn F Crump, aged forty five, finished a five week

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Speaker 1: program called Links to Law Enforcement and was arrested at

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Speaker 1: his graduation ceremony by law enforcement. Sergeant Amar Gandhi stated

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Speaker 1: that they cannot ignore a fellony warrant. Sergeant Gandhi also states,

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Speaker 1: I don't feel any sympathy for him when I say

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Speaker 1: being invested in your own oppression. There are some in

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Speaker 1: the unhoused community members who trust the cops and align

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Speaker 1: with law enforcement against other unhoused people, but in the

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Speaker 1: final analysis, that is a delusion. Moving on to New York,

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Speaker 1: eviction times loom large for some unhoused resident Within thirty

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Speaker 1: days and sixty days for your younger adults, about two

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Speaker 1: hundred and fifty new arrivals will be evicted if they

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Speaker 1: don't meet the city's list of requirements or extensions. Two

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Speaker 1: hundred thousand displaced people have arrived in New York. Since

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty two, Republican Governor of Texas Greg Abbott began

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Speaker 1: dumping displaced residents to Democratic cities. Single adults and adult

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Speaker 1: families without children will have to leave the shelter in

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Speaker 1: thirty days. The obvious question is where will these residents

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Speaker 1: go and how will they survive. Our last story is

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Speaker 1: back in Los Angeles. This Grace Council member Kevin de

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Speaker 1: Leone organized a sweep with added public relations signage to

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Speaker 1: displace the young housed in Elfueblo, Little Tokyo, and parts

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Speaker 1: of downtown LA. Dozens of sanitation trucks and dozens of

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Speaker 1: LAPD descended on the unhoused community. De Leone says that

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Speaker 1: he reached out to the unhoused community to alert them

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Speaker 1: that they were coming. And that's on House News. When

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Speaker 1: we come back, we're going to have a titillating discussion

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Speaker 1: with Fred Wadskin, author of Anything Is Good, and his

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Speaker 1: friend Ralph Silverman. But first a quick break. Welcome back

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Speaker 1: to Weedy and House. Our first guest today is writer

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Speaker 1: Fred Wadskin. He has been known for his memoir called

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Speaker 1: Searching for Bobby Fitcher. It was made into a motion

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Speaker 1: picture back in nineteen ninety three, and another, The Last Marlin,

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Speaker 1: which was the New York Times Best Book of the

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Speaker 1: Year in two thousand and one. In his new book,

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Speaker 1: his seventh, two Bronx Boys take radically different paths. Ralph Silverman,

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Speaker 1: the son of a wealthy Borough businessman with shady associates,

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Speaker 1: was a boy genius who routinely communicated with the greatest

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Speaker 1: philosophers of his day. But his world was unhinged by

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Speaker 1: the discovery that his father had a secret second family

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Speaker 1: and was bankrupt. As Ralph begins to take over the

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Speaker 1: story from the narrator, we find him unhoused in Florida,

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Speaker 1: with a broken pair of glasses, no money, and no shoes.

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Speaker 1: Ralph was, in real life, the author's childhood friend, and

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Speaker 1: Anything Is Good is inspired by events that actually happened

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Speaker 1: to him, including the years he spent living in the

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Speaker 1: streets of Miami, eating from restaurant dumpsters, and sleeping beneath

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Speaker 1: the pier. Today, I want to speak to both the

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Speaker 1: author and his child's friend, Ralph, about their friendship and

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Speaker 1: where their paths diverge. I one insight from Ralph about

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Speaker 1: his experience being housed in Miami and how that went

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Speaker 1: on to inform his childhood's friend's work, also comparing notes

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Speaker 1: on what it was like to be on hous in

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Speaker 1: Florida for Ralph versus my own experiences in Los Angeles.

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Speaker 1: Here is the first part of our conversation. Good morning, Ralph,

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Speaker 1: Good morning. How are you doing? Okay, you guys are

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Speaker 1: our past high noon. We're just starting our day. So

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Speaker 1: I am starting to get the cowboys out my head.

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Speaker 4: Matt, I got similar problems. I had two things to

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Speaker 4: do this born again. I felt like I was dead,

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Speaker 4: But now it's steel a lot more awake and ready

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Speaker 4: to go.

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Speaker 2: You know.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, this is gonna be a long day for me,

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Speaker 1: so I'm trying to pace myself.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, let me ask you. You do all this stuff

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Speaker 4: and you're homeless now.

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Speaker 1: Also I'm recently housed. But I started my podcast living

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Speaker 1: on the Street, oh man. And actually I was the

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Speaker 1: only podcast that was created literally on the street. I

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Speaker 1: would do an episode and I would sleep back and

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Speaker 1: go to bed and living in the park or squatting

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Speaker 1: and buildings. And I started interviewing my friends first before

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Speaker 1: I got you know, they didn't notice that I got,

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Speaker 1: but I would start which who were on house as well.

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Speaker 1: And then I started going to other places, other encampments

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Speaker 1: in Los Angeles, and the pandemic happened. Then I started

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Speaker 1: going to other places because other unhoused people, not in

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Speaker 1: Los Angeles but other places were listening to which motivated

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Speaker 1: me to go out and speak with other unhoused people

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Speaker 1: and other places in the States. So eventually got I

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Speaker 1: got my following, and then I got very fortunate to

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Speaker 1: partner with iHeartMedia and this is where I'm at today.

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Speaker 4: Well, God bless you, man. I think that's wonderful story.

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Speaker 4: You know. I was always when I lived on the streets,

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Speaker 4: I was always about, you know, I'm going to get

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Speaker 4: off the streets someday, and I kind of try to

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Speaker 4: help other people get off the streets, you know. And

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Speaker 4: then when there was some guy that he was like,

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Speaker 4: I had a chance to get off the streets, and

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Speaker 4: he said, and I said to him, you know, the

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Speaker 4: most thing that you can do for me, the most

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Speaker 4: you can do for me you get off the streets,

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Speaker 4: is stay up the streets. I don't want you coming

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Speaker 4: back here, man, you know like that, because really you

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Speaker 4: can't really give me a hand and say where you are.

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Speaker 4: You know, you go and reach down to people to

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Speaker 4: pull them off the streets when you have a place,

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Speaker 4: and if that's going to pull yourself back on the

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Speaker 4: streets at least that was my philosophy at the time,

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Speaker 4: you know. And I just admire everything you're doing, man,

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Speaker 4: you know, I just say, I think it's great that

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Speaker 4: you're actually reaching out to people and providing things, you know,

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Speaker 4: when trying to pro write things such a hopeless situation

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Speaker 4: being there unless unless you get a break of something.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely, and I was very fortunate to have people reach

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Speaker 1: out to me and help me. And that's why I

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Speaker 1: do the show to give voice for people that need

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Speaker 1: this hand to reach out and help people get out

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Speaker 1: of the situation or let people know. And like I said,

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Speaker 1: I have gotten so many responses. I have people reach

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Speaker 1: out for me from the Netherlands talking about the in

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Speaker 1: house situation over there, and I had someone that was

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Speaker 1: in house in the UK talking about how hard it

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Speaker 1: was and how the show impacted them. Because again, this

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Speaker 1: show like that. You know, you always see people that

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Speaker 1: are making the news about how homeless or houseless people

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Speaker 1: that are housed, but it's really different when you're talking

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Speaker 1: to in house people to know what it's like, Like

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Speaker 1: I ate out of garbage can how where I squatted?

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Speaker 4: I didn't you? I mean, I mean that I'm sure

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Speaker 4: I was, and like I'm not a really athletic guy,

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Speaker 4: but I hooked up with a guy once. It was

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Speaker 4: like he could like levitate into one of those tall

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Speaker 4: dumpsters and just like levitating. But I don't know how

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Speaker 4: we did it, because we used to go, like when

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Speaker 4: it was dark, and like he'd be in it before,

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Speaker 4: and then it's like his hands were like eyes and

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Speaker 4: he could tell what he was handling, you know, and

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Speaker 4: then he would I'd like stand outside there with a box, right,

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Speaker 4: and he would put the stuff in the box and

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Speaker 4: then he'd levitate out of the thing and we'd go

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Speaker 4: and eat. I remember that, and it's amazing that now

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Speaker 4: I don't I don't need I have. It's a long

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Speaker 4: long time since I've done any of that stuff, but

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Speaker 4: it's amazing how vivid it is in my mind.

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Speaker 1: You know, you'll never forget it.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, it's always it's always there, right, Yes.

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Speaker 1: I also always ask to people that have lived on

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Speaker 1: the street their experience the first night, because I'll never

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Speaker 1: forget the first night when I became on the house

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Speaker 1: and I was living here, how exhausted I was. I'm

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Speaker 1: walked at least twenty miles because late night the trains

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Speaker 1: and buses stopped running, and I was just trying to

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Speaker 1: find a place to sleep. But I was so exhausted.

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Speaker 1: I was walking trying to find a corner. I was

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Speaker 1: trying to find an I was trying to find somewhere

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Speaker 1: where at one I could feel like I was safe.

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Speaker 1: Two wasn't so many lights around, and three that I

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Speaker 1: wasn't noticed. And it was like every time I turned around,

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Speaker 1: there was something like either a car was coming by,

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Speaker 1: or some lights were flashing, or lights were stationary, or

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Speaker 1: the cops were rolling around. So I was so exhausted.

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Speaker 1: I walked past this hospital and I went into the

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Speaker 1: hospital and I just sat there and just basically slept,

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Speaker 1: sitting up until like six o'clock until because they knew,

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Speaker 1: you know, like I was there, so they were giving

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Speaker 1: me the heads up that the day it started that

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Speaker 1: you got to get out. So I just basically just

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Speaker 1: rolled off. But that was the first night when I

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Speaker 1: was in house and didn't know all of the resources

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Speaker 1: or how to utilize the resources here in Los Angeles

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Speaker 1: or how to even even navigate even where to go

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Speaker 1: get food and things like that, and that plays a

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Speaker 1: part in my mind. Ralph, do you remember the first

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Speaker 1: time when you were unhoused?

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Speaker 4: Well, you see, the thing is with me, it was

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Speaker 4: sort of a stuttering experience because I like was unhoused

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Speaker 4: and then I kind of desperately would try this, and

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Speaker 4: that's where we tried that, and I would get back

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Speaker 4: in for a while that i'd be out again, and

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Speaker 4: so like the first time that they sort of blend together.

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Speaker 4: But I don't, yeah, I remember like like what was

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Speaker 4: really the first time that I really had no place

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Speaker 4: to go. I didn't even have shoes on, you know,

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Speaker 4: Like I don't know why I didn't have shoes on.

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Speaker 4: I would just wandered off. And also I need glasses.

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Speaker 4: See I'm very nearsighted, so my glasses were also prap.

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Speaker 4: So it was really pathetic, you know. And then I

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Speaker 4: found like a place where there were trees, and I

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Speaker 4: would go by instinctive stuff, you know what I mean,

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Speaker 4: Like I was right field by street feel and stuff.

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Speaker 4: I went into this place and it was like a

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Speaker 4: bunch of trees. As he was in Miami, beach.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 4: I was in Miami Beach. I sink and I moved

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Speaker 4: into there and they were like a bunch of apossums,

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Speaker 4: you know, you know, like possums like what they are,

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Speaker 4: like they're more soupials and but I couldn't see too well.

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Speaker 4: I thought there were rats, you know what I mean.

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Speaker 4: But it took me a while. And what happened was

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Speaker 4: they introduced themselves to me, like the little baby apostlems

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Speaker 4: climbed on me and sort of like you know, played

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Speaker 4: games that kind of like dare you to jump on him?

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Speaker 4: And jump off? They were like playing like kids, right,

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Speaker 4: And I started sharing the food that I was able

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Speaker 4: to get with them, and I made friends with the

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Speaker 4: apossums and they would like sing in the trees all night,

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Speaker 4: you know, they make little clicking sounds and like almost

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Speaker 4: whistling sounds, and they were like talking, creating like a

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Speaker 4: sonic environment around you, right, and if something is coming

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Speaker 4: or something's going wronger there's somebody invading the area, they

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Speaker 4: start making alarm sounds right about alarm stands, and that

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Speaker 4: wakes you up. So they're like become an environment that

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Speaker 4: you live in, you know. And that happened to be

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Speaker 4: a number of places where I lived, where I had

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Speaker 4: like raccoons. Okay, I don't know like Los Angeles, you

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Speaker 4: have so much. It used to be much more here anyway,

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Speaker 4: like that. There were animals all over there. They had

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Speaker 4: these beautiful white heroings with the warm legs, you know,

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Speaker 4: that kind of storks. It was like it had like

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Speaker 4: in a community of these creatures, right, And it's very

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Speaker 4: It gives you a sense of not really being alone,

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Speaker 4: but you know, part of like nature, you know what

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Speaker 4: I mean. I don't know what it's like. And they're

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Speaker 4: probably not so much of that in Los Angeles. I

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Speaker 4: think it's much more built up. I don't know, you know.

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Speaker 4: And I was on Los Angeles a very long time ago,

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Speaker 4: and I was a kid, and I'm sure it's not

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Speaker 4: the same. And I wouldn't know anything about Los Angeles,

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Speaker 4: but I mean, you think of Los Angeles being a

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Speaker 4: slick place because of Hollywood and everything, you know, and

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Speaker 4: I know that it's it's not all the slick place.

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Speaker 4: And they said people think the same thing about like

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Speaker 4: Paul Litvie, it's not all the slick place. There are

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Speaker 4: encampments of homeless people all up and down the coast, here,

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Speaker 4: you know, and it's a whole intricate society. It's not

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Speaker 4: just extensive, but it's intricate. Also people traveled two like

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Speaker 4: Oregon and places like that and lived there and then

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Speaker 4: sometimes sad them coming back. But it's a fascinating experience

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Speaker 4: of entering this very sophisticated world. Right, It's very complex

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Speaker 4: because you know, I mean, I've dealt with lots of

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Speaker 4: difficult issues and problems. I've found from time to time

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Speaker 4: that from my experience of being homeless that the situations

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Speaker 4: I was in required my total full attention and comprehension

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Speaker 4: to just try to understand what was going on around me,

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Speaker 4: you know what I mean. And I'm sure you had

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Speaker 4: experiences like that too, because I imagine homeless people the homeless

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Speaker 4: society as you talked about everything camp, it's very complex

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Speaker 4: around Los Angeles side of manage and is that true?

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Speaker 1: Indeed, it has their own character and personality and it

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Speaker 1: is a layered conversation and even even taking it even further,

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Speaker 1: but that it's even when going out of Los Angeles

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Speaker 1: and going to other unhoused communities. I was just surprised

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Speaker 1: at the different type of communities that they had, like

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Speaker 1: the there house people that want to be called hobos.

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Speaker 1: They're un house people that are what is it right wing?

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Speaker 1: And I it's it's it's it's every it's every facet

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Speaker 1: of house society. But you're just outside.

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Speaker 4: Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah that.

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Speaker 1: Was like okay, this really is open in my eyes.

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Speaker 1: Then you know there's the sex worker community that or

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Speaker 1: the transgendered community, the lgbtt I a community. There is

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Speaker 1: so many different layers of communities and they have their

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Speaker 1: own personality, they have their own focus, and they have

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Speaker 1: their own sense of commun unity. That really drives him

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Speaker 1: for self protection, you know, survival, as well as basically

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Speaker 1: being there for each other when they need to be.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, that being there things. See, that's the thing

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Speaker 4: that's hard to do and so important is that. Like

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Speaker 4: if you're in a situation where like it's easy for

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Speaker 4: someone to do something for you, but hard for you

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Speaker 4: to do it for yourself, Like you can't do it

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Speaker 4: for yourself, and so like you say, like would you

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Speaker 4: do this for me, like look after my big where

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Speaker 4: I go to the store and I'll be back in

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Speaker 4: like forty minutes, okay, And then you do it for

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Speaker 4: the guy. The guy does it for you when you

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Speaker 4: do it for the other guy. And generally speaking, you've

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Speaker 4: got to lead off and be the guy who starts

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Speaker 4: it does, start doing things for other people and just

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Speaker 4: hope that they're going to do things for you too,

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Speaker 4: you know. And then as people get you see the

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Speaker 4: idea that they can depend on each other, the small

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Speaker 4: things that you build a community like that, you know

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Speaker 4: what I mean. And that's that's kind of how it works.

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Speaker 1: Well, it's in essence what mutual aid is, because mutual

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Speaker 1: aid doesn't have to be the same idea as what

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Speaker 1: people usually associate. Mutual aid is lack with charity. What

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Speaker 1: mutual aid is like it was a community. I did

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Speaker 1: a show on where there was a serial killer that

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Speaker 1: was stalking unhoused women and killing them and actually unhouse

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Speaker 1: people yet and I yeah, and the one that they

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Speaker 1: murdered was one of the unhoused encampment leaders who used

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Speaker 1: to feed. They used to call her mom. I believe

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Speaker 1: she would feed the inhouse community. You know, she was

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Speaker 1: known as that. And the community was shaken behind the

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Speaker 1: cavalier way that the police just basically just did not

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Speaker 1: really put in the effort to really find this nut,

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Speaker 1: you know, And and the unhoused community, you know, and

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Speaker 1: because I remember they were very on edge. They were,

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Speaker 1: you know, trying to do their own detective work. Well

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Speaker 1: maybe this is someone we knew or you know, they

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Speaker 1: were trying to eliminate people in their own community's you know,

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Speaker 1: trying to find out you know. And it was really

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Speaker 1: a conversation that I really opened my eyes, Like, how,

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Speaker 1: like you say later, the conversation is, but also how

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Speaker 1: they have to depend on themselves because of the antipathic

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Speaker 1: that's going on about houselessness, and because they may not

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Speaker 1: fit societal expectations or approval if they're doing things differently

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Speaker 1: in order, like I said, they have their own economy,

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Speaker 1: they have to have their own barter system, and they

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Speaker 1: have to do things that you know, and house people

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Speaker 1: have the luxury to dumb their nose or look down

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Speaker 1: on but they are doing it for survival reasons or

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Speaker 1: doing it for reasons to stay together. So that's one

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Speaker 1: of the one of the episodes that really stayed with

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Speaker 1: me when I did that.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, really, of course I want to try an idea

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Speaker 4: on you guys, yours regents we had and see if

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Speaker 4: you agree. I say, like, when people are homeless, you

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Speaker 4: like prefer a house the parents. I'm not used to

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Speaker 4: using that word, say homeless, but I'll say okay, okay.

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Speaker 4: When people are homeless, they lose the structure of their

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Speaker 4: social interactions. Like you and I are now interacting because

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Speaker 4: you're making a podcast and I'm one of your guests, okay,

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Speaker 4: and we that's the structure of how we're interacting, right.

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Speaker 4: Or when I go to the store like them, maybe

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Speaker 4: you're the clerk and I'm the customer, right, or like

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Speaker 4: you know, you're into relating to other people. Just recently,

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Speaker 4: a guy came to inspect my apartment for like second

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Speaker 4: eight okay, and it was a reinspection. I was terrified

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Speaker 4: if he fails me again, I got a real problem, right,

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Speaker 4: But but he passed me. Okay. So he's the inspector

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Speaker 4: and I'm the tenant. Okay. But when you're homeless, and

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Speaker 4: you're in a homeless community of any kind, they're homeless

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Speaker 4: interactions with any kind. There are no roles, okay, and

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Speaker 4: so people just related by their personality, you see what

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Speaker 4: I mean. It's like the roles are gone that you

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Speaker 4: normally use to associate with each other, right, And what

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Speaker 4: you're dealing with the other person as a personality in

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Speaker 4: a war sort of way. You're dealing with them is

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Speaker 4: who they are. Do you understand that is making any sense?

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Speaker 1: It does, because I think correct me if I'm wrong.

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Speaker 1: I think one of the things of it is is

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Speaker 1: that because we have all of these expectations and how

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Speaker 1: we operate in a house order and things like you say,

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Speaker 1: like going through the store stort clerk and you're the customer.

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Speaker 1: You're so used to that, but when you are living

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Speaker 1: in a fluid that's just the only word I can

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Speaker 1: think of. When I was in house, things can change

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Speaker 1: at a moment's notice. For example, I could be standing

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Speaker 1: in this spot and someone sees me and call the

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Speaker 1: police and tells me to move all of my stuff.

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Speaker 1: So I have got to now change how I stay

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Speaker 1: at this place the community that I knew, and how

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Speaker 1: to move to somewhere else or how to find somewhere

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Speaker 1: and then have to go through the same different process

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Speaker 1: of trying to establish my non threatening kind of presence

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Speaker 1: find out where the resources are. So it's it's a

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Speaker 1: very different format and it's a different focus that you

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Speaker 1: have to have. And in that sense of that, like

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Speaker 1: a lot of the kind of conversations or interactions break

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Speaker 1: down from with house people because the only people that

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Speaker 1: can speak your language that understand, like for example you

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Speaker 1: mentioned earlier, like he says, hey, listen, I got to

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Speaker 1: go to the doctor. It's going to be making me

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Speaker 1: fifteen twenty minutes. I got to get pick up my medicine.

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Speaker 1: Can you watch my stuff. I'll be right back. I'm

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Speaker 1: right across the street. La da da da da. And

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Speaker 1: you don't. You don't have to go through a whole

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Speaker 1: long speech with another unhouse. Yeah, okay, got you, fifteen minutes,

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Speaker 1: got you. We'll watch your stuff. We'll put your stuff

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Speaker 1: near by me and I'll watch it to make sure

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Speaker 1: that doesn't get thrown away or you or you report

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Speaker 1: when someone comes in. Hey man, this guy's going into

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Speaker 1: your tent at night and he's taking your socks or whatever,

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Speaker 1: and we know we had to run him off or

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Speaker 1: you know, or we didn't know if he was from

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Speaker 1: another community. We didn't know if we even knew this guy,

398
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Speaker 1: and you know, those kind of things, or basically going

399
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Speaker 1: for like worth food, like you know, we're going scavenging

400
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Speaker 1: and says, listen, I can't leave my tent. Can you

401
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Speaker 1: go when you're going to the suit kitchen to get

402
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Speaker 1: me extra food, or can you see if you can

403
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Speaker 1: get an extra you know, those kind of conversational or

404
00:23:28,240 --> 00:23:31,480
Speaker 1: the needs that you need. It doesn't have to have

405
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Speaker 1: a long, you know word for those kind of explanation,

406
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Speaker 1: but for our person, you got to go have to

407
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Speaker 1: break it down. Listen, I need this, I need that,

408
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Speaker 1: or I need to get da da da da da

409
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Speaker 1: or oh my god. And then you know, because sometimes

410
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Speaker 1: they're innocriously operating in that system of trying to logically

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Speaker 1: explain your life away, they put up resistance or they

412
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Speaker 1: make it sound like the request that you have is

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Speaker 1: so out out of a box, why do you need this?

414
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Speaker 1: Or you know and you gotta so it's it's it's

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Speaker 1: a delicate balance between house and unhoused communication and interactions.

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Speaker 4: So you're correct, don't you find it like when you're

417
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Speaker 4: dealing with unhoused people and you're all sort of like

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Speaker 4: they're together and everybody knows everybody's on housing, they all

419
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Speaker 4: kind of do. It's like, all of a sudden, we

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Speaker 4: have like equivalent social status, no matter how we came from,

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Speaker 4: no matter who we are and what our education level,

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Speaker 4: is now we're all kind of the same, right right,

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Speaker 4: And now when you're dealing with the other people, they

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Speaker 4: don't have a social role except for being another homeless

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Speaker 4: guy like you or a homeless girl. And the thing

426
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Speaker 4: is that it's sort of like the kind of these

427
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Speaker 4: social roles sort of disappear or they go into the background,

428
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Speaker 4: and you're just dealing with another person like as a

429
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Speaker 4: raw personality, as who you are, and that that interaction

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Speaker 4: is totally different way house people interact, you know.

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Speaker 1: What I mean, absolutely, who's going to be the king

432
00:25:04,520 --> 00:25:06,000
Speaker 1: of the hill out here on the street with the

433
00:25:06,040 --> 00:25:09,520
Speaker 1: garbage down it washes away. It's like, you know, if

434
00:25:09,560 --> 00:25:11,480
Speaker 1: you don't like the person on house person, you can

435
00:25:11,560 --> 00:25:14,119
Speaker 1: just go to another encampment or you none of you

436
00:25:14,240 --> 00:25:17,359
Speaker 1: just get right exactly, you know, just you know, you

437
00:25:17,359 --> 00:25:18,239
Speaker 1: don't deal with them.

438
00:25:18,280 --> 00:25:18,479
Speaker 4: You know.

439
00:25:18,720 --> 00:25:22,800
Speaker 1: It's it's it's definitely there. But there are exceptions that

440
00:25:22,880 --> 00:25:25,159
Speaker 1: I would want to throw out too, like if you

441
00:25:25,240 --> 00:25:28,920
Speaker 1: have like encampment leaders, for example, some places here they

442
00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:33,160
Speaker 1: have like I was mentioning too, places that are specific

443
00:25:33,960 --> 00:25:38,120
Speaker 1: to what unhoused people visions are. For example, some unhoused

444
00:25:38,160 --> 00:25:42,160
Speaker 1: people are under the grip of substances, and they have

445
00:25:42,320 --> 00:25:45,200
Speaker 1: friends or people that look after them to make sure

446
00:25:45,200 --> 00:25:47,919
Speaker 1: that they're an od they have the narcan, they have

447
00:25:48,040 --> 00:25:52,360
Speaker 1: these kind of things, but they cannot go into an

448
00:25:52,520 --> 00:25:56,359
Speaker 1: encampment or a community that doesn't like people that use

449
00:25:56,400 --> 00:26:00,160
Speaker 1: substances or they don't so, you know, like I said,

450
00:26:00,200 --> 00:26:03,600
Speaker 1: the flavor is different so that you find your own community.

451
00:26:03,680 --> 00:26:07,000
Speaker 4: Sometimes that is like you if you like a very

452
00:26:07,040 --> 00:26:10,959
Speaker 4: atomic person just so to yourself, you meet other people

453
00:26:11,040 --> 00:26:13,480
Speaker 4: and you sort of form a community. But generally they're

454
00:26:13,560 --> 00:26:16,239
Speaker 4: very small community people that you actually can get along with.

455
00:26:16,280 --> 00:26:19,000
Speaker 4: And I don't know exactly what happens. It's kind of

456
00:26:19,119 --> 00:26:21,080
Speaker 4: like you see the guy again and you talk again

457
00:26:21,119 --> 00:26:24,320
Speaker 4: and stuff like that. But I mean, when I like

458
00:26:25,520 --> 00:26:30,199
Speaker 4: settle down in a sort of homeless community finally, that

459
00:26:30,640 --> 00:26:33,320
Speaker 4: was like one where I stay, it was like there

460
00:26:33,359 --> 00:26:36,320
Speaker 4: were leaders of the community, and I was I figured

461
00:26:36,320 --> 00:26:38,560
Speaker 4: that they're like tribes, you know what I mean, And

462
00:26:38,600 --> 00:26:41,000
Speaker 4: you've got like three, don't. I don't know if this

463
00:26:41,080 --> 00:26:43,080
Speaker 4: is going to be politically correct when I say you've

464
00:26:43,119 --> 00:26:49,480
Speaker 4: got like warriors, squaws, and elders. The top warrior will

465
00:26:49,520 --> 00:26:52,000
Speaker 4: be the head of the way, the head of the community,

466
00:26:52,480 --> 00:26:56,000
Speaker 4: but his girlfriend like is going to be the moral

467
00:26:56,119 --> 00:26:58,240
Speaker 4: arbiter of the community, Like she's one of going to

468
00:26:58,240 --> 00:27:01,560
Speaker 4: decide who stays and who goes, and this guy with

469
00:27:01,760 --> 00:27:05,720
Speaker 4: his like warriors or thugs will decide, you know, make

470
00:27:05,800 --> 00:27:08,119
Speaker 4: sure that like keeping it. You know who's going to

471
00:27:08,200 --> 00:27:10,399
Speaker 4: say who's going to go in there? Who like because

472
00:27:10,440 --> 00:27:13,320
Speaker 4: of their behavior and so on. Right, did you experience

473
00:27:13,359 --> 00:27:14,240
Speaker 4: things like that too?

474
00:27:14,840 --> 00:27:19,600
Speaker 1: I've been to several communities that had that kind of imprint,

475
00:27:19,880 --> 00:27:22,920
Speaker 1: that had that like that protective thing. Which is why

476
00:27:22,960 --> 00:27:26,040
Speaker 1: I point out too, is that it was essential because

477
00:27:26,080 --> 00:27:28,960
Speaker 1: not every encampment is the same because you have nothing

478
00:27:29,000 --> 00:27:34,000
Speaker 1: but senior elderly community that have their own communities, or

479
00:27:34,080 --> 00:27:36,359
Speaker 1: you have like I mentioned again, like where there was

480
00:27:36,400 --> 00:27:39,280
Speaker 1: a community not too far from where I'm at that

481
00:27:39,400 --> 00:27:42,840
Speaker 1: I have people that are using substances and it is

482
00:27:42,920 --> 00:27:46,040
Speaker 1: like which is a noise in a way and annoys

483
00:27:46,119 --> 00:27:50,480
Speaker 1: them because sometimes people that are not substances they tend

484
00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:54,000
Speaker 1: to make things more difficult because they already have a community,

485
00:27:54,720 --> 00:27:58,200
Speaker 1: so they are trying to judge or trying to separate

486
00:27:58,240 --> 00:28:01,679
Speaker 1: themselves and thinking like again, we have some people that

487
00:28:01,720 --> 00:28:04,720
Speaker 1: are invested in their own oppression. They believe because they're

488
00:28:04,720 --> 00:28:07,160
Speaker 1: in house and they don't do substances or the don't

489
00:28:07,160 --> 00:28:10,800
Speaker 1: know't have mental health health issues that they should get

490
00:28:10,840 --> 00:28:15,720
Speaker 1: better treatment from society or better or quicker services. And

491
00:28:16,680 --> 00:28:19,840
Speaker 1: to that end, they are more happy to work with

492
00:28:19,920 --> 00:28:23,520
Speaker 1: the law enforcements and other place other people that don't

493
00:28:23,600 --> 00:28:26,680
Speaker 1: like on house people, thinking that they are the exception

494
00:28:26,960 --> 00:28:29,520
Speaker 1: and people are going to fall over and help them,

495
00:28:29,880 --> 00:28:34,040
Speaker 1: which unfortunately doesn't. It doesn't happen that way because I

496
00:28:34,080 --> 00:28:36,680
Speaker 1: always remind them, like they don't like you either. They

497
00:28:36,760 --> 00:28:40,760
Speaker 1: just use you as the jump off point to get

498
00:28:40,840 --> 00:28:43,560
Speaker 1: rid of a slice of unhoused people. But when it's

499
00:28:43,600 --> 00:28:46,760
Speaker 1: time for you, you look at these laws doesn't have

500
00:28:46,960 --> 00:28:48,200
Speaker 1: the exception? Is your name?

501
00:28:49,000 --> 00:28:49,479
Speaker 4: Yeah? Right?

502
00:28:49,880 --> 00:28:53,720
Speaker 1: These laws like forty eighteen here is for everybody. It's

503
00:28:53,800 --> 00:28:56,520
Speaker 1: for everybody. They don't care. It's great. They pat you

504
00:28:56,560 --> 00:28:58,239
Speaker 1: on the head that you ran out somebody that may

505
00:28:58,280 --> 00:29:00,960
Speaker 1: have a mental health breakdown. But they're gonna get rid

506
00:29:00,960 --> 00:29:03,120
Speaker 1: of you too because they're gonna, you know, because you're

507
00:29:03,120 --> 00:29:05,920
Speaker 1: on house. And it's like it's very difficult for them

508
00:29:06,000 --> 00:29:10,200
Speaker 1: to even comprehend that. They just believe that they're on

509
00:29:10,280 --> 00:29:13,920
Speaker 1: this different wavelength and it's really it's sad to see.

510
00:29:14,120 --> 00:29:18,000
Speaker 1: And sometimes it's infuriating and it's disgusting because they're like, okay,

511
00:29:18,320 --> 00:29:21,320
Speaker 1: you know, if you can't help a person. It's one

512
00:29:21,320 --> 00:29:24,160
Speaker 1: of the things about most unhoused people believe we can't

513
00:29:24,200 --> 00:29:27,280
Speaker 1: help an unhoused person. We don't hurt them, you know,

514
00:29:27,320 --> 00:29:29,360
Speaker 1: we're just like, you know what, you just save my bag,

515
00:29:29,480 --> 00:29:32,000
Speaker 1: you know, you just think your community just just just

516
00:29:32,080 --> 00:29:35,600
Speaker 1: move along, keep a push, right, you know, don't you know,

517
00:29:35,880 --> 00:29:37,840
Speaker 1: we're not trying to call cops and we ain't trying

518
00:29:37,880 --> 00:29:39,600
Speaker 1: to blow up the spot, and you know, all that

519
00:29:39,680 --> 00:29:42,240
Speaker 1: kind of thing. So they will usually try to do

520
00:29:42,280 --> 00:29:46,360
Speaker 1: exact what the exception, Like, there are unhoused membies that

521
00:29:46,840 --> 00:29:49,560
Speaker 1: have that delusion that they're different or better and all

522
00:29:49,600 --> 00:29:52,280
Speaker 1: of this and right, and unfortunately most of the unhoused

523
00:29:52,280 --> 00:29:55,040
Speaker 1: people try to give them a wide berth too, because

524
00:29:55,120 --> 00:29:58,000
Speaker 1: like you can't trust that. But again, like I said,

525
00:29:58,000 --> 00:30:01,200
Speaker 1: this is a layered conversation. Point is say this is

526
00:30:01,240 --> 00:30:08,280
Speaker 1: what is needed. When we come back, we'll continue our

527
00:30:08,320 --> 00:30:18,120
Speaker 1: conversation with Ralph and Fred. Welcome back to Weedy and House.

528
00:30:18,760 --> 00:30:21,360
Speaker 1: Here's the second part of my interview with Fred Weiskin

529
00:30:21,760 --> 00:30:27,080
Speaker 1: and Ralph Silver. Fred, you wrote a book. I did.

530
00:30:27,280 --> 00:30:29,040
Speaker 1: I did, So tell me a little bit about it.

531
00:30:29,240 --> 00:30:31,680
Speaker 2: Well, you know, Ralph was Ralph was my best friend

532
00:30:31,680 --> 00:30:34,840
Speaker 2: in high school, okay, and we were attracted to one

533
00:30:34,840 --> 00:30:37,760
Speaker 2: another as friends, although we were very different kinds of people.

534
00:30:37,920 --> 00:30:41,560
Speaker 2: I mean, Ralph was more intellectual than I was. You know,

535
00:30:41,600 --> 00:30:44,160
Speaker 2: he was a deep reader. He was already studying philosophy.

536
00:30:44,400 --> 00:30:46,320
Speaker 2: You could probably tell from your conversation that he has

537
00:30:46,360 --> 00:30:48,440
Speaker 2: the mind of a philosopher. Yes, and I was a

538
00:30:48,440 --> 00:30:50,520
Speaker 2: sports guy. I love literature.

539
00:30:50,560 --> 00:30:53,000
Speaker 1: Ah, if I may interrupt, who is your favorite writer?

540
00:30:53,920 --> 00:30:55,880
Speaker 2: Jack? Jack Curlewreck and Ernest Hemingway.

541
00:30:56,320 --> 00:30:59,320
Speaker 1: Oh him in Ways. I've read a few of Human Ways,

542
00:30:59,560 --> 00:31:02,840
Speaker 1: the son Rises. I believe it's a great one. Yeah.

543
00:31:03,000 --> 00:31:05,120
Speaker 1: He had just like a very forward writing style. But

544
00:31:05,240 --> 00:31:07,760
Speaker 1: I'm sorry I interrupted you, but go ahead please.

545
00:31:07,480 --> 00:31:12,360
Speaker 2: That's fine anyway. You know, ironically, I was attracted to

546
00:31:12,440 --> 00:31:15,480
Speaker 2: Kerwak when I was sixteen or seventeen years old, about

547
00:31:15,480 --> 00:31:19,200
Speaker 2: the time I met Ralph, and Kerrowak was writing about

548
00:31:19,200 --> 00:31:21,040
Speaker 2: the homeless life. And you might not think of it

549
00:31:21,080 --> 00:31:22,960
Speaker 2: that way because I mean, you know, he was such

550
00:31:22,960 --> 00:31:25,640
Speaker 2: a deep thinker, and he wrote so poetically, and some

551
00:31:25,680 --> 00:31:28,400
Speaker 2: of his pro style was so complicated. But he was

552
00:31:29,040 --> 00:31:31,400
Speaker 2: a homeless guy. He was often living on the street,

553
00:31:31,680 --> 00:31:33,920
Speaker 2: he was living in railroad cars. You know, he was

554
00:31:33,960 --> 00:31:36,640
Speaker 2: living on the mountains to California, listening to the Pacific.

555
00:31:37,400 --> 00:31:41,560
Speaker 2: And I found the life that he was leading incredibly attractive.

556
00:31:42,240 --> 00:31:45,160
Speaker 2: And you know, when I went to college, and by

557
00:31:45,160 --> 00:31:47,400
Speaker 2: that point I thought I'd be a writer. I kind

558
00:31:47,440 --> 00:31:50,200
Speaker 2: of thought that writing about being a homeless guy would

559
00:31:50,200 --> 00:31:52,400
Speaker 2: be a cool thing to do. And when I was

560
00:31:52,400 --> 00:31:55,360
Speaker 2: in graduate school, I was going to NYU, which was

561
00:31:55,440 --> 00:31:58,080
Speaker 2: right near Washington Square Park, and a couple of nights,

562
00:31:58,160 --> 00:31:59,560
Speaker 2: or more than a couple of nights, i'd go down

563
00:31:59,600 --> 00:32:01,640
Speaker 2: to the park and I'd lay it, lay out on

564
00:32:01,680 --> 00:32:04,680
Speaker 2: a bench and pretend I was a homeless guy. But

565
00:32:04,760 --> 00:32:07,240
Speaker 2: I was scared to death. I kept thinking I'd be

566
00:32:07,360 --> 00:32:12,160
Speaker 2: knife to death. I ran home to my fancy apartment,

567
00:32:12,200 --> 00:32:14,760
Speaker 2: not really a fancy apartment, but a nice, comfortable apartment,

568
00:32:15,320 --> 00:32:17,760
Speaker 2: and wrote. I wrote pages as if I was a

569
00:32:17,760 --> 00:32:22,080
Speaker 2: homeless guy. It was completely ridiculous and pretentious. Now, Ralph, meanwhile,

570
00:32:22,360 --> 00:32:25,840
Speaker 2: after college, was an academic star. I mean, he was

571
00:32:25,880 --> 00:32:28,440
Speaker 2: a well known philosopher. He was dealing with some of

572
00:32:28,440 --> 00:32:31,360
Speaker 2: the great philosophers in the world, and tough stuff happened

573
00:32:31,360 --> 00:32:33,880
Speaker 2: in his family, which I won't tell. It's in the book,

574
00:32:33,920 --> 00:32:36,720
Speaker 2: but it's a great story in itself, and he could

575
00:32:36,720 --> 00:32:39,200
Speaker 2: no longer support his way of life, and he found

576
00:32:39,280 --> 00:32:42,680
Speaker 2: himself thrust on the street. Ironically, he was living it

577
00:32:42,720 --> 00:32:45,040
Speaker 2: for a time in a park which is pretty much

578
00:32:45,120 --> 00:32:47,800
Speaker 2: right across the street from the Fountain Blue Hotel in

579
00:32:48,160 --> 00:32:50,640
Speaker 2: Fort Lauderdale, which is the place that my dad used

580
00:32:50,680 --> 00:32:54,280
Speaker 2: to take me for vacations. So Ralph, as a homeless guy,

581
00:32:54,640 --> 00:32:57,880
Speaker 2: used to call me up on the phone collect from

582
00:32:57,920 --> 00:33:02,320
Speaker 2: the park. He'd be talking about his homeless life. And

583
00:33:02,400 --> 00:33:04,920
Speaker 2: I was pissed off because I was thinking about Ralph

584
00:33:04,920 --> 00:33:07,440
Speaker 2: as an intellectual, a writer and a philosopher, and I

585
00:33:07,480 --> 00:33:10,600
Speaker 2: thought he was ripping off my terrain. He was ripping

586
00:33:10,640 --> 00:33:12,640
Speaker 2: off the stuff that I was going to write about,

587
00:33:12,640 --> 00:33:16,840
Speaker 2: which is ridiculous, but that's what I thought. And eventually,

588
00:33:17,160 --> 00:33:19,440
Speaker 2: you know, at this point, I was writing magazine or

589
00:33:19,520 --> 00:33:21,960
Speaker 2: articles for a lot of magazines, and I did write

590
00:33:21,960 --> 00:33:25,560
Speaker 2: a piece about Ralph living in the park, and I

591
00:33:25,560 --> 00:33:27,640
Speaker 2: think it was published in nineteen eighty seven or nineteen

592
00:33:27,720 --> 00:33:30,680
Speaker 2: ninety call When all the Stars Are Gone, And I

593
00:33:30,680 --> 00:33:32,520
Speaker 2: wrote about Ralph in the park and we talked about

594
00:33:32,520 --> 00:33:34,880
Speaker 2: the possums and stuff like that. But really I was

595
00:33:35,000 --> 00:33:36,560
Speaker 2: scared to death of him. I mean, you know, like

596
00:33:36,800 --> 00:33:39,080
Speaker 2: it was the knife thrust into a tree, and I

597
00:33:39,120 --> 00:33:41,120
Speaker 2: was worried I was going to get killed. I really

598
00:33:41,200 --> 00:33:45,840
Speaker 2: wasn't open to the homeless experience. And then decades passed, right,

599
00:33:45,920 --> 00:33:48,640
Speaker 2: and we're both older guys, and I called him up

600
00:33:48,640 --> 00:33:51,040
Speaker 2: on the phone one day and I said to Ralph,

601
00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:53,440
Speaker 2: what do you think about telling me about your life?

602
00:33:54,280 --> 00:33:56,440
Speaker 2: And he said to me, I don't really think I

603
00:33:56,440 --> 00:33:58,720
Speaker 2: can remember. It was a long time ago. I said

604
00:33:58,720 --> 00:34:01,720
Speaker 2: to him, give it a shot, Ralph, and we started

605
00:34:01,720 --> 00:34:04,240
Speaker 2: to talk. And you can tell how expressive he is.

606
00:34:04,240 --> 00:34:08,319
Speaker 2: He's a fantastic storyteller. And he said to me, for

607
00:34:08,400 --> 00:34:10,160
Speaker 2: a day or two, I can't remember, and then all

608
00:34:10,200 --> 00:34:12,400
Speaker 2: of a sudden, it was like biblical. It was like

609
00:34:12,560 --> 00:34:16,319
Speaker 2: the oceans parted and he remembered everything, and he told

610
00:34:16,320 --> 00:34:19,359
Speaker 2: me everything. The other thing I have to tell you about,

611
00:34:19,360 --> 00:34:22,080
Speaker 2: which is important to understand, is that, like a lot

612
00:34:22,080 --> 00:34:24,480
Speaker 2: of New Yorkers, you know, middle class guy, I live

613
00:34:24,520 --> 00:34:26,520
Speaker 2: in a decent apartment. I raised my kids in the city,

614
00:34:27,280 --> 00:34:29,319
Speaker 2: and I didn't know anything about homeless people I thought

615
00:34:29,360 --> 00:34:31,200
Speaker 2: I did when I was a kid, because I read

616
00:34:31,239 --> 00:34:33,920
Speaker 2: about Jack Krrowac. But I didn't know anything about homeless people.

617
00:34:34,320 --> 00:34:36,759
Speaker 2: And like other people in New York, you know, I'd

618
00:34:36,760 --> 00:34:39,120
Speaker 2: walked the streets. I see guys sleeping on the sidewalks,

619
00:34:39,840 --> 00:34:42,040
Speaker 2: and I didn't think of them. It was fully formed

620
00:34:42,560 --> 00:34:46,520
Speaker 2: people with sadness and morosity in their lives and depression

621
00:34:46,560 --> 00:34:49,600
Speaker 2: and ecstasy and intelligence. I thought of them as street furniture,

622
00:34:50,440 --> 00:34:52,920
Speaker 2: you know, they were just part of the street. So

623
00:34:52,960 --> 00:34:55,680
Speaker 2: I started to talk to Ralph, and he opened this

624
00:34:55,760 --> 00:34:58,759
Speaker 2: world to me, and I came to understand some of

625
00:34:58,800 --> 00:35:01,160
Speaker 2: the stuff that you and and we're talking about before,

626
00:35:01,520 --> 00:35:04,440
Speaker 2: you know, the gradations of society in the street life.

627
00:35:04,640 --> 00:35:07,319
Speaker 2: And he would describe people that he knew that he'd

628
00:35:07,360 --> 00:35:10,080
Speaker 2: met in part. I mean, like, he described a friend

629
00:35:10,080 --> 00:35:11,640
Speaker 2: of his in this park that he was living in

630
00:35:11,960 --> 00:35:14,880
Speaker 2: up in the Fort Lauderill area, Popanha Beach, and she

631
00:35:15,040 --> 00:35:18,080
Speaker 2: was a computer programmer before she became homeless, and Ralph

632
00:35:18,200 --> 00:35:20,640
Speaker 2: used to build his own computers. Ralph was a sort

633
00:35:20,640 --> 00:35:23,640
Speaker 2: of minor computer genius as well as a philosopher. But

634
00:35:23,640 --> 00:35:26,120
Speaker 2: he told me that this girl understood computer science better

635
00:35:26,160 --> 00:35:29,279
Speaker 2: than he did. That blew my mind. A girl that

636
00:35:29,400 --> 00:35:32,480
Speaker 2: lives in the park understood computer science better than Ralph did,

637
00:35:32,960 --> 00:35:35,759
Speaker 2: and so he opened this world to me where it

638
00:35:35,840 --> 00:35:38,359
Speaker 2: was almost like there was an underworld society that none

639
00:35:38,360 --> 00:35:41,720
Speaker 2: of us really know about, with very smart people, people

640
00:35:41,760 --> 00:35:44,880
Speaker 2: not so smart, people that are violent, people that are creative.

641
00:35:45,200 --> 00:35:47,680
Speaker 2: And I said, holy cow. I mean, in my other books,

642
00:35:47,719 --> 00:35:50,160
Speaker 2: I've written about subjects I was an expert about, but

643
00:35:50,239 --> 00:35:52,600
Speaker 2: I learned about them so I could open them up

644
00:35:52,640 --> 00:35:54,319
Speaker 2: for other people. I wrote a book. I wrote a

645
00:35:54,320 --> 00:35:57,160
Speaker 2: book about the chess World Champion, for example, and I

646
00:35:57,200 --> 00:35:58,880
Speaker 2: don't know anything about chess, but I learned how to

647
00:35:58,880 --> 00:36:01,240
Speaker 2: write about it in such a way that a regular

648
00:36:01,280 --> 00:36:03,920
Speaker 2: guy could feel what the players were doing, even if

649
00:36:03,920 --> 00:36:06,680
Speaker 2: they didn't know the moves. And that's what I did

650
00:36:06,680 --> 00:36:09,840
Speaker 2: with Ralph. I mean, I took a language you and

651
00:36:10,000 --> 00:36:13,560
Speaker 2: hurt him because you guys relate to each other beautifully.

652
00:36:13,600 --> 00:36:15,319
Speaker 2: I mean, you guys want to talk for the next

653
00:36:15,360 --> 00:36:17,680
Speaker 2: two weeks. You know, you talk the same language. I

654
00:36:17,719 --> 00:36:21,000
Speaker 2: don't talk the same language. But I learned how to

655
00:36:21,040 --> 00:36:25,160
Speaker 2: express Ralph's ideas in a way that people that aren't

656
00:36:25,160 --> 00:36:28,720
Speaker 2: homeless could take them in. And it was fantastically exciting

657
00:36:28,719 --> 00:36:31,680
Speaker 2: for me. It was just a you know, it was

658
00:36:31,719 --> 00:36:33,560
Speaker 2: a great new world that he introduced to me.

659
00:36:34,600 --> 00:36:37,600
Speaker 1: You brought something to mine that I was thinking about

660
00:36:37,880 --> 00:36:39,960
Speaker 1: when I started the show. Is one of the things

661
00:36:40,000 --> 00:36:44,680
Speaker 1: that I remember about doing it, and I did. I

662
00:36:44,719 --> 00:36:48,440
Speaker 1: literally started this show. Were using recording the interviews on

663
00:36:48,480 --> 00:36:51,839
Speaker 1: my phone and it was a broken that phone. Oh

664
00:36:51,880 --> 00:36:53,640
Speaker 1: my god, I just have to tell you this story.

665
00:36:53,680 --> 00:36:56,080
Speaker 1: It was like one of the things that I noticed.

666
00:36:56,320 --> 00:36:58,799
Speaker 1: I had to keep, you know, hold on because the

667
00:36:58,880 --> 00:37:02,080
Speaker 1: batteries was getting I was running out of storage space,

668
00:37:02,160 --> 00:37:04,600
Speaker 1: so I had to cut and cut and pace and

669
00:37:04,640 --> 00:37:07,600
Speaker 1: send it somewhere and then come back. But one of

670
00:37:07,640 --> 00:37:11,680
Speaker 1: the things that I knew noticed that was so different

671
00:37:11,680 --> 00:37:14,479
Speaker 1: than when I used to watch when Unhoused people would

672
00:37:14,480 --> 00:37:18,759
Speaker 1: be interviewed by house reporters and news and when they

673
00:37:18,840 --> 00:37:20,920
Speaker 1: seen that they do I was in house because it

674
00:37:20,960 --> 00:37:23,319
Speaker 1: was you know, they see me there and I'm telling

675
00:37:23,360 --> 00:37:25,719
Speaker 1: them I'm having a podcast, and they were they were

676
00:37:25,760 --> 00:37:28,879
Speaker 1: really receptive of it. But it was like coming through

677
00:37:28,920 --> 00:37:32,280
Speaker 1: their interviews was a sigh of relief that they finally

678
00:37:32,320 --> 00:37:35,800
Speaker 1: can get their story and they know it won't be twisted,

679
00:37:36,080 --> 00:37:40,600
Speaker 1: it won't be misunderstood. It will be told in their words,

680
00:37:40,640 --> 00:37:43,440
Speaker 1: and they know that when they started listening to me,

681
00:37:44,120 --> 00:37:47,440
Speaker 1: I have a place where I could feel like I

682
00:37:47,480 --> 00:37:52,000
Speaker 1: am the expert, or I am the person that is

683
00:37:52,000 --> 00:37:54,960
Speaker 1: the expert to my own experience, my own lived experience.

684
00:37:55,280 --> 00:37:57,359
Speaker 1: That's one of the things that's so interesting about when

685
00:37:57,360 --> 00:37:59,399
Speaker 1: I was talking with you guys, It's like, this book

686
00:37:59,719 --> 00:38:02,960
Speaker 1: Sounds is going to be very, very impactful because you

687
00:38:03,000 --> 00:38:07,759
Speaker 1: guys have cataloged you guys life's experiences, well both of

688
00:38:07,760 --> 00:38:12,240
Speaker 1: you guys life experiences, but most importantly your life experience

689
00:38:12,280 --> 00:38:17,680
Speaker 1: about understanding the challenges of people that don't understand about

690
00:38:17,719 --> 00:38:20,080
Speaker 1: the life and house people. And I think that's something

691
00:38:20,120 --> 00:38:20,960
Speaker 1: to be commended.

692
00:38:21,760 --> 00:38:24,439
Speaker 2: Well, one other poem that I want to mention Ralph.

693
00:38:24,480 --> 00:38:26,600
Speaker 2: I'll just give me one second. You know, one of

694
00:38:26,680 --> 00:38:28,920
Speaker 2: the ways in which I structured the book is that

695
00:38:29,120 --> 00:38:31,560
Speaker 2: part of the book is in my voice, but most

696
00:38:31,560 --> 00:38:34,920
Speaker 2: of the book is in Ralph's voice. And the character

697
00:38:35,040 --> 00:38:37,480
Speaker 2: Fred in the book is the embodiment of the guy

698
00:38:37,520 --> 00:38:39,560
Speaker 2: that I was talking about a few minutes ago with you.

699
00:38:39,800 --> 00:38:42,840
Speaker 2: In otherwords, the guy that doesn't understand homeless people, the

700
00:38:42,880 --> 00:38:46,080
Speaker 2: guy that lives in the city, oblivious to homeless people,

701
00:38:46,440 --> 00:38:50,719
Speaker 2: oblivious to the soulfulness of homeless people, the talent and

702
00:38:50,760 --> 00:38:53,800
Speaker 2: intelligence of homeless people. And so when you read the book,

703
00:38:53,880 --> 00:38:56,440
Speaker 2: you get that from Fred and at the same time

704
00:38:56,800 --> 00:39:00,000
Speaker 2: you get theo from Ralph, you know. And I think

705
00:39:00,080 --> 00:39:03,479
Speaker 2: that that's one of the unusual things about about the book, Ralf.

706
00:39:03,480 --> 00:39:05,279
Speaker 2: I didn't mean to interrupt, you manage your head.

707
00:39:06,120 --> 00:39:08,080
Speaker 4: I was going to say that there is a scene

708
00:39:08,120 --> 00:39:10,520
Speaker 4: that Fred's write to the book each other early in

709
00:39:10,600 --> 00:39:15,120
Speaker 4: it where he's going to come down to stay to

710
00:39:15,160 --> 00:39:17,919
Speaker 4: stay in my in Miami Beach around there. I don't

711
00:39:17,920 --> 00:39:20,080
Speaker 4: know exactly where he was staying at the time, but

712
00:39:20,080 --> 00:39:22,000
Speaker 4: it was the same place where he used to hang

713
00:39:22,040 --> 00:39:25,440
Speaker 4: out with his father, in the same area where his

714
00:39:25,560 --> 00:39:31,640
Speaker 4: father was a salesman who was a great like you know,

715
00:39:32,239 --> 00:39:36,680
Speaker 4: salesman in the construction business in New York and and

716
00:39:36,760 --> 00:39:40,400
Speaker 4: fredus used to stay there with his father at the

717
00:39:40,440 --> 00:39:43,120
Speaker 4: front and blow hotel and his father would, you know,

718
00:39:43,200 --> 00:39:45,560
Speaker 4: go around like he was a big a big deal,

719
00:39:45,640 --> 00:39:47,680
Speaker 4: you know, and kind of take pay to the fancy

720
00:39:47,680 --> 00:39:50,799
Speaker 4: restaurant or the show or whatever. And Fred was like,

721
00:39:50,920 --> 00:39:53,400
Speaker 4: you know, there with all the avait people, you know,

722
00:39:53,480 --> 00:39:56,719
Speaker 4: and the fancy wealthy people and maybe they're actually a

723
00:39:56,719 --> 00:39:59,400
Speaker 4: lot of them, a kind of like mobster people, you know.

724
00:39:59,760 --> 00:40:02,560
Speaker 4: And he and he was hanging around in the planet. Well,

725
00:40:02,560 --> 00:40:04,880
Speaker 4: and he thought of his being kind of like, you know,

726
00:40:06,120 --> 00:40:08,719
Speaker 4: like Viva Las Vegas, right. You know what I mean

727
00:40:08,880 --> 00:40:11,480
Speaker 4: is the a weit kind of rich, kind of like

728
00:40:11,640 --> 00:40:15,120
Speaker 4: extravagant people who you know, have in the inside track

729
00:40:15,200 --> 00:40:18,160
Speaker 4: of everything. And when he comes down to that part

730
00:40:18,200 --> 00:40:21,120
Speaker 4: of the world, like I was living on the streets.

731
00:40:21,520 --> 00:40:24,719
Speaker 4: I was actually living in a wooded area like a

732
00:40:24,719 --> 00:40:29,440
Speaker 4: little bit remote like okay. And and and he he

733
00:40:29,440 --> 00:40:31,680
Speaker 4: he has all that stuff going on in his mind

734
00:40:31,680 --> 00:40:34,640
Speaker 4: about his recollections about living around in that area and

735
00:40:34,680 --> 00:40:38,120
Speaker 4: being with all these fancy people, right, and he's coming

736
00:40:38,160 --> 00:40:41,520
Speaker 4: to interview me, and I'm sleeping on the ground and

737
00:40:41,680 --> 00:40:45,200
Speaker 4: talking to a possums, right, And it's like he writes

738
00:40:45,239 --> 00:40:48,040
Speaker 4: this thing, right, it's like, I mean, a really weird

739
00:40:48,120 --> 00:40:51,160
Speaker 4: collision of two guys who know each other and what's

740
00:40:51,200 --> 00:40:53,239
Speaker 4: going on in friend's mind and what's going on in

741
00:40:53,239 --> 00:40:57,520
Speaker 4: my mind right of like you know, different planets. Okay, Well, anyway,

742
00:40:57,719 --> 00:41:00,799
Speaker 4: that's that's an interesting part of the good Let.

743
00:41:00,800 --> 00:41:02,840
Speaker 2: Me let me just jump into what Ralph was describing

744
00:41:02,880 --> 00:41:05,800
Speaker 2: about because it was it was a very interesting moment

745
00:41:05,840 --> 00:41:08,360
Speaker 2: in my life. You know, I was down there and

746
00:41:08,400 --> 00:41:11,600
Speaker 2: I'd had this discussion with Ralph in this area that

747
00:41:11,640 --> 00:41:14,560
Speaker 2: he lived that I was completely disconcerted by I mentioned before,

748
00:41:14,600 --> 00:41:16,400
Speaker 2: with a knife in the trees, and I thought we

749
00:41:16,400 --> 00:41:17,760
Speaker 2: were going I thought we were going to be attacked.

750
00:41:17,760 --> 00:41:19,719
Speaker 2: I mean, I was just I was absurd when I

751
00:41:19,719 --> 00:41:21,920
Speaker 2: think about it today, and I said, what am I

752
00:41:21,920 --> 00:41:23,759
Speaker 2: going to do with my friend ralphill I'll do it.

753
00:41:23,800 --> 00:41:26,040
Speaker 2: I know what I'll do. I'll take him to a restaurant,

754
00:41:26,680 --> 00:41:28,680
Speaker 2: just like the kind of restaurant my dad took me to.

755
00:41:29,719 --> 00:41:32,920
Speaker 2: So I took him, took him to a fancy speak restaurant,

756
00:41:33,840 --> 00:41:37,120
Speaker 2: and and we was sitting in the restaurant, and you know,

757
00:41:37,239 --> 00:41:39,239
Speaker 2: he didn't look too good and he didn't smell too good,

758
00:41:39,960 --> 00:41:43,440
Speaker 2: and but I was determined, for some reason that I

759
00:41:43,440 --> 00:41:45,879
Speaker 2: didn't understand at the time, to take him there as

760
00:41:45,920 --> 00:41:48,319
Speaker 2: if I could sort of drag him back into a

761
00:41:48,360 --> 00:41:51,440
Speaker 2: sensibility that he wasn't living in. And we had a

762
00:41:51,520 --> 00:41:55,440
Speaker 2: very awkward dinner. I mean, the conversation was not beautiful.

763
00:41:55,840 --> 00:41:58,239
Speaker 2: We neither of us knew exactly what what to say.

764
00:41:59,040 --> 00:42:01,480
Speaker 2: And then we got back in my car and I

765
00:42:01,880 --> 00:42:04,000
Speaker 2: drove him to the place that he was living. I

766
00:42:04,080 --> 00:42:07,160
Speaker 2: think it was up up at that particular point near

767
00:42:07,200 --> 00:42:08,200
Speaker 2: Pompino Beach.

768
00:42:08,920 --> 00:42:09,000
Speaker 4: And.

769
00:42:10,719 --> 00:42:13,880
Speaker 2: It was a torrential rainstorm. I mean it was it

770
00:42:13,920 --> 00:42:15,839
Speaker 2: was like a mini hurricane. It wasn't a hurt. It

771
00:42:15,840 --> 00:42:19,719
Speaker 2: was like a gale blowing forty miles an hour. And

772
00:42:20,120 --> 00:42:22,480
Speaker 2: I said, Ralph, it was great to see you. And

773
00:42:23,600 --> 00:42:25,920
Speaker 2: he opened the door of the car and he was

774
00:42:25,960 --> 00:42:29,480
Speaker 2: immediately drenched, drenched, and he started to walk away from

775
00:42:29,520 --> 00:42:31,520
Speaker 2: the car, and I rolled down the window on my

776
00:42:31,680 --> 00:42:34,279
Speaker 2: side of the car, and what I wanted to say

777
00:42:34,520 --> 00:42:37,839
Speaker 2: was what I wanted to say was Ralph, get back

778
00:42:37,840 --> 00:42:40,440
Speaker 2: in the car and let's go to my motel and

779
00:42:40,480 --> 00:42:44,840
Speaker 2: spend the night. But I didn't say it. I didn't

780
00:42:44,880 --> 00:42:48,759
Speaker 2: do it. Of course, I felt terribly guilty about it,

781
00:42:48,840 --> 00:42:50,880
Speaker 2: not doing it, but I kind of it kind of

782
00:42:50,920 --> 00:42:54,440
Speaker 2: constellates the fact that we were best friends. I think

783
00:42:54,440 --> 00:42:57,080
Speaker 2: we're best friends again now, but we were best friends

784
00:42:57,360 --> 00:42:59,480
Speaker 2: and then all of a sudden, a whole world intervened

785
00:42:59,480 --> 00:43:02,400
Speaker 2: between the two of us. Does that make sense to you, guys?

786
00:43:02,520 --> 00:43:06,080
Speaker 1: Absolutely, Look, I totally.

787
00:43:05,440 --> 00:43:07,920
Speaker 4: He's probably had similar experience.

788
00:43:08,440 --> 00:43:11,239
Speaker 1: About when you were saying that, I totally like there

789
00:43:11,360 --> 00:43:14,000
Speaker 1: was like the cold like for example, here when we

790
00:43:14,040 --> 00:43:16,799
Speaker 1: have these cold snaps and things that people will send

791
00:43:16,840 --> 00:43:20,200
Speaker 1: me to launcher or dinner and then they go home

792
00:43:20,360 --> 00:43:23,400
Speaker 1: and then I have to navigate trying to survive and

793
00:43:23,480 --> 00:43:26,000
Speaker 1: the cold snap or and I had, you know, I

794
00:43:26,320 --> 00:43:30,800
Speaker 1: also had surprisingly a person come to me and says,

795
00:43:31,360 --> 00:43:33,560
Speaker 1: it's going to be very difficult for you to survive

796
00:43:33,640 --> 00:43:35,400
Speaker 1: out here because we've got this cold snap, and I

797
00:43:35,640 --> 00:43:38,360
Speaker 1: have other health issues going on, like when I was

798
00:43:38,400 --> 00:43:41,440
Speaker 1: living out I was stabbed out here when I was

799
00:43:41,440 --> 00:43:44,440
Speaker 1: in the street. I have didities, and I have other

800
00:43:44,960 --> 00:43:48,560
Speaker 1: issues going on. So it was it was going to

801
00:43:48,600 --> 00:43:51,160
Speaker 1: be very difficult to try to navigate trying to take

802
00:43:51,200 --> 00:43:55,960
Speaker 1: the medicine and trying to you know, to basically survive.

803
00:43:56,280 --> 00:43:59,760
Speaker 1: And this particular time, and they invited me to their house,

804
00:44:00,280 --> 00:44:03,920
Speaker 1: which surprised me because most people don't. People that I

805
00:44:03,960 --> 00:44:05,960
Speaker 1: did know they ain't inviting you to the house. They

806
00:44:05,960 --> 00:44:07,720
Speaker 1: will give you some food, they'll give you a blanket,

807
00:44:08,160 --> 00:44:11,799
Speaker 1: you know, and even my closest friends wouldn't do that.

808
00:44:11,840 --> 00:44:15,160
Speaker 1: They just it's just it wasn't done. And so I

809
00:44:16,400 --> 00:44:20,480
Speaker 1: can definitely relate to that story, the chasm that we have,

810
00:44:20,719 --> 00:44:23,960
Speaker 1: the belief systems that are put there by our society

811
00:44:24,520 --> 00:44:28,960
Speaker 1: that believes that if you do extend kindness done house people,

812
00:44:29,239 --> 00:44:32,879
Speaker 1: it's going to backfire. It's going to end up being

813
00:44:32,880 --> 00:44:36,440
Speaker 1: a situation that you're going to regret. So yes, I

814
00:44:36,520 --> 00:44:38,960
Speaker 1: definitely have have some stories to tell about that.

815
00:44:40,200 --> 00:44:42,800
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's very real. It's very real. To

816
00:44:43,480 --> 00:44:47,000
Speaker 4: spread the distance the custom as you say, it's very real.

817
00:44:47,040 --> 00:44:52,839
Speaker 1: Indeed, right, we're going to take a break and we

818
00:44:52,880 --> 00:44:54,040
Speaker 1: will be right back.

819
00:45:02,600 --> 00:45:03,080
Speaker 3: You're back.

820
00:45:06,880 --> 00:45:09,600
Speaker 4: Well, I'm using to have such a sensitivity for the

821
00:45:09,600 --> 00:45:13,719
Speaker 4: complexity of the society of homeless people. And it's been look,

822
00:45:13,800 --> 00:45:16,520
Speaker 4: you know, it's been going on forever. I mean, I'm

823
00:45:16,600 --> 00:45:20,760
Speaker 4: into like American folk music, and there's this whole history

824
00:45:20,800 --> 00:45:25,439
Speaker 4: of folk music about hobos, right, which are homeless people. Yeah,

825
00:45:25,440 --> 00:45:28,080
Speaker 4: and the hobos and like there's a song called the

826
00:45:28,120 --> 00:45:32,680
Speaker 4: Warbash Cannonball, like where you know, different different singers will

827
00:45:32,800 --> 00:45:35,359
Speaker 4: kind of presented differently and some will invent their own

828
00:45:35,440 --> 00:45:38,359
Speaker 4: lyrics or change around the episodes or whatever they do.

829
00:45:38,400 --> 00:45:40,640
Speaker 4: You know, they they all kind of play with it,

830
00:45:40,760 --> 00:45:43,279
Speaker 4: you know, in terms of there was a sort of

831
00:45:43,280 --> 00:45:47,600
Speaker 4: canonical version of the Cannonball that was written that was published,

832
00:45:47,600 --> 00:45:50,120
Speaker 4: but there was it was probably almost certainly a folks

833
00:45:50,120 --> 00:45:53,960
Speaker 4: songs before that was published, and people put in different lyrics.

834
00:45:54,200 --> 00:45:57,680
Speaker 4: The whole history of American folk music is tremendously interesting.

835
00:45:58,200 --> 00:46:01,520
Speaker 4: But the thing is that the mythology, you see, there's

836
00:46:01,560 --> 00:46:07,560
Speaker 4: a mythology in the Cannonball, which is like a basic

837
00:46:07,680 --> 00:46:11,239
Speaker 4: mythology of like train songs, you know, which are which

838
00:46:11,280 --> 00:46:15,240
Speaker 4: are like, you know, very fundamental in the American musical

839
00:46:15,280 --> 00:46:17,520
Speaker 4: tradition all the way kind of you know, all the

840
00:46:17,560 --> 00:46:21,160
Speaker 4: way from like the Warbash canniball, so you know, don't

841
00:46:21,200 --> 00:46:24,880
Speaker 4: stop believing and stuff like that, you know. And now

842
00:46:25,960 --> 00:46:29,920
Speaker 4: the thing about the Cannonball is it's like also a

843
00:46:30,000 --> 00:46:33,200
Speaker 4: song about hoboes, you know, because they say they have

844
00:46:33,320 --> 00:46:35,959
Speaker 4: something to do with this particular train, which it comes

845
00:46:36,040 --> 00:46:40,200
Speaker 4: up in lyrics a lot, you know, and it's like,

846
00:46:40,280 --> 00:46:43,680
Speaker 4: you know, Americans have a fascination with hobos and a

847
00:46:43,760 --> 00:46:46,680
Speaker 4: love hate relationship with hoboes. But there is a sort

848
00:46:46,680 --> 00:46:50,960
Speaker 4: of official doctrine which you can see and like the

849
00:46:51,320 --> 00:46:56,080
Speaker 4: American music, like the official document is and it comes

850
00:46:56,160 --> 00:46:59,520
Speaker 4: in probably sometime like the nineteen twenties, and it started

851
00:46:59,560 --> 00:47:03,120
Speaker 4: to get very strong after the after the Second World War.

852
00:47:03,120 --> 00:47:06,600
Speaker 4: And the idea is like this, Hobos don't have fun,

853
00:47:07,200 --> 00:47:12,400
Speaker 4: Hobos aren't romantic, Hobos aren't cool. Hobos are you know,

854
00:47:12,560 --> 00:47:17,400
Speaker 4: depressing kind of people who live very shortened, depressed lives.

855
00:47:17,640 --> 00:47:20,120
Speaker 4: And there's nothing good about it. Right, And when you're

856
00:47:20,120 --> 00:47:24,359
Speaker 4: writing popular music or folk music, that's how you're going

857
00:47:24,400 --> 00:47:28,279
Speaker 4: to represent hobos, right, that's the end of the story, right,

858
00:47:28,760 --> 00:47:31,879
Speaker 4: And anybody who doesn't because there was this singer about

859
00:47:32,000 --> 00:47:36,480
Speaker 4: romanticizing the hobo's like in some some version of the

860
00:47:36,520 --> 00:47:39,760
Speaker 4: Cannonball is like that, you know, the hobos are singing

861
00:47:40,120 --> 00:47:42,319
Speaker 4: and the and the train is dancing and.

862
00:47:42,960 --> 00:47:44,280
Speaker 1: Some Disney kind of production.

863
00:47:45,360 --> 00:47:48,839
Speaker 4: Yeah right, but well yeah, but it's like it's not

864
00:47:49,000 --> 00:47:52,120
Speaker 4: like kind of having like the life sucked out of

865
00:47:52,160 --> 00:47:55,760
Speaker 4: it and like a kind of harmless sort of like trope.

866
00:47:56,120 --> 00:47:58,520
Speaker 4: It's it's like a pretty it's a deep thing about

867
00:47:58,640 --> 00:48:02,080
Speaker 4: like how society really works works, right, And and the

868
00:48:02,120 --> 00:48:06,400
Speaker 4: Cannonball is like this monstrous, powerful training, right and and

869
00:48:06,600 --> 00:48:09,160
Speaker 4: like the going and Hank Snow sings that he says,

870
00:48:09,560 --> 00:48:12,080
Speaker 4: you know in his song, you know, the train is

871
00:48:12,200 --> 00:48:15,360
Speaker 4: dancing and the hoboes are singing, you know, and the

872
00:48:15,440 --> 00:48:18,239
Speaker 4: thing is that that's no good, you see, that's not

873
00:48:18,400 --> 00:48:20,680
Speaker 4: how you're supposed to do it. And like then you

874
00:48:20,719 --> 00:48:23,000
Speaker 4: wind up with a with a song, a train song

875
00:48:23,080 --> 00:48:27,399
Speaker 4: called Big Railroad Blues that like faithful Dad sing it right,

876
00:48:27,800 --> 00:48:30,080
Speaker 4: and the lyrics are all about being depressed and I

877
00:48:30,200 --> 00:48:32,120
Speaker 4: should listened to what my mother said, and I wouldn't

878
00:48:32,400 --> 00:48:34,799
Speaker 4: he wouldn't be sleeping in this cold steel bed right

879
00:48:34,880 --> 00:48:40,040
Speaker 4: like that, you know, and and uh and the and

880
00:48:40,120 --> 00:48:43,759
Speaker 4: the music is all this kind of like joyous, right,

881
00:48:44,200 --> 00:48:46,399
Speaker 4: and so the thing the thing is that what they're

882
00:48:46,400 --> 00:48:49,120
Speaker 4: going to do is they're going to take and project

883
00:48:49,800 --> 00:48:53,840
Speaker 4: the positive message into the music where it is not

884
00:48:54,120 --> 00:48:56,719
Speaker 4: like you know, verbal, you know, but it's just a

885
00:48:56,760 --> 00:48:59,520
Speaker 4: feeling of how the performance and the drumming and everything.

886
00:48:59,800 --> 00:49:01,959
Speaker 4: And then the lyrics themselves will be like the music

887
00:49:02,000 --> 00:49:04,800
Speaker 4: are called like Big Railroad Blues right in the music

888
00:49:04,880 --> 00:49:08,800
Speaker 4: the song is the lyrics are the blues, but the

889
00:49:08,920 --> 00:49:11,960
Speaker 4: music is like, you know, very upbeat and joyous, right.

890
00:49:12,200 --> 00:49:14,160
Speaker 4: And so in a way the musicians are trying to

891
00:49:14,200 --> 00:49:17,920
Speaker 4: get something a course like that. But you can experience

892
00:49:18,000 --> 00:49:23,160
Speaker 4: that too, right, moments of like unaccountably joyous moments among

893
00:49:23,280 --> 00:49:25,759
Speaker 4: homeless people from very rarely maybe of.

894
00:49:25,719 --> 00:49:29,800
Speaker 1: Course we well on house people. If we had lived

895
00:49:29,920 --> 00:49:35,200
Speaker 1: into a consistent misery of the situation, many of us

896
00:49:35,280 --> 00:49:38,840
Speaker 1: would be off to our rocker or we have taken

897
00:49:39,880 --> 00:49:43,920
Speaker 1: leave of this earthly realm. We have joy, we have sadness,

898
00:49:44,000 --> 00:49:47,920
Speaker 1: we have all of the spectrum of emotions, and we

899
00:49:48,000 --> 00:49:52,279
Speaker 1: need that in order to survive the vagaries of houselessness,

900
00:49:52,280 --> 00:49:54,480
Speaker 1: because you know, you know, it could. Like I said,

901
00:49:54,480 --> 00:50:00,480
Speaker 1: you know, I was very beneficial. I was very really

902
00:50:01,080 --> 00:50:05,040
Speaker 1: connected to a community down here in Los Angeles where

903
00:50:05,080 --> 00:50:07,719
Speaker 1: even it got to the point where it's senior citizens

904
00:50:07,800 --> 00:50:12,680
Speaker 1: and the children really liked me and respected me. And

905
00:50:12,760 --> 00:50:15,880
Speaker 1: there were nimbis that didn't like that, and they worked

906
00:50:16,000 --> 00:50:19,600
Speaker 1: very hard to try to make my stay very unpleasant.

907
00:50:19,840 --> 00:50:22,960
Speaker 1: You know, they try to make sure that that line

908
00:50:23,239 --> 00:50:27,800
Speaker 1: or that wall stays there and you can't cross that wall.

909
00:50:28,120 --> 00:50:32,359
Speaker 1: Because if you find the humanity in unhoused people, then

910
00:50:32,400 --> 00:50:36,000
Speaker 1: it changes the dynamic. Then you understand that it can

911
00:50:36,040 --> 00:50:38,480
Speaker 1: happen to anybody. That's one of the things that I

912
00:50:38,520 --> 00:50:42,760
Speaker 1: walked away with learning about how human nature is house

913
00:50:42,800 --> 00:50:48,080
Speaker 1: and unhoused, unfortunately, but mostly how how people react to

914
00:50:48,880 --> 00:50:52,000
Speaker 1: unhoused people that they are not in a cookie cutter

915
00:50:52,120 --> 00:50:55,719
Speaker 1: kind of fashion, because I defied all odds. I was

916
00:50:55,760 --> 00:50:59,479
Speaker 1: college educated, I was a teacher before I got ill,

917
00:51:01,000 --> 00:51:04,600
Speaker 1: and I didn't do substances. I wasn't mentally, I didn't

918
00:51:04,640 --> 00:51:09,200
Speaker 1: have any mental defects, and it really just it became, well,

919
00:51:09,480 --> 00:51:12,080
Speaker 1: you're able to work, you just don't want to work.

920
00:51:12,200 --> 00:51:16,919
Speaker 1: And then it's like educating them about the invisible disabilities

921
00:51:16,920 --> 00:51:19,560
Speaker 1: that I had, Like you don't know these things because

922
00:51:19,600 --> 00:51:21,440
Speaker 1: I don't walk up and tap you on the shoulder

923
00:51:21,480 --> 00:51:23,560
Speaker 1: to let you know, hey, I got dismissing in my

924
00:51:23,560 --> 00:51:25,560
Speaker 1: bad Da da da dah, I can't do this, or

925
00:51:26,360 --> 00:51:29,839
Speaker 1: and it becomes that kind of conversation, trying to get

926
00:51:29,880 --> 00:51:34,279
Speaker 1: that layered conversation, pushing back against the understanding like there

927
00:51:34,400 --> 00:51:36,880
Speaker 1: is like there was here in Los Angeles there was

928
00:51:36,960 --> 00:51:41,440
Speaker 1: a Yale graduate that was unhoused. There's like unhoused people

929
00:51:41,480 --> 00:51:43,799
Speaker 1: that I met that our doctor. There were doctors and

930
00:51:43,840 --> 00:51:48,480
Speaker 1: they had a debilitating situation happened to them, or or

931
00:51:48,600 --> 00:51:51,319
Speaker 1: families that they had put all their life savings in,

932
00:51:51,560 --> 00:51:54,879
Speaker 1: Like the gentleman that was working and his wife got

933
00:51:55,000 --> 00:51:55,760
Speaker 1: terminal cancer.

934
00:51:55,920 --> 00:51:59,160
Speaker 4: That happens I've seen that exact same thing happened with

935
00:51:59,320 --> 00:52:00,200
Speaker 4: another guard.

936
00:52:00,080 --> 00:52:02,160
Speaker 1: And he put all of his money in trying to

937
00:52:02,200 --> 00:52:05,600
Speaker 1: save her life. She ends up passing away. Right, they

938
00:52:05,640 --> 00:52:08,320
Speaker 1: get their houses taking he's out on the street.

939
00:52:08,440 --> 00:52:10,960
Speaker 4: I know, I knew one guy did that for his

940
00:52:11,080 --> 00:52:13,200
Speaker 4: wife and one guy did that for his order and

941
00:52:13,680 --> 00:52:14,120
Speaker 4: his life.

942
00:52:14,160 --> 00:52:16,560
Speaker 2: That was exactly you know, you guys. I think this

943
00:52:16,640 --> 00:52:19,440
Speaker 2: conversation you're having is really amazing. I think that you

944
00:52:19,440 --> 00:52:22,320
Speaker 2: could speak to you know, ninety nine of one hundred

945
00:52:22,320 --> 00:52:24,920
Speaker 2: people that live in the city in my city, for sure,

946
00:52:25,320 --> 00:52:28,279
Speaker 2: really wonderful people. I mean people that are educated and

947
00:52:28,400 --> 00:52:32,040
Speaker 2: caring and empathic, and they don't have a sense for

948
00:52:32,080 --> 00:52:36,160
Speaker 2: the complexity in the unhoused world. They just don't think

949
00:52:36,200 --> 00:52:39,200
Speaker 2: that people talk about the kinds of issues that you're

950
00:52:39,200 --> 00:52:42,239
Speaker 2: talking about with Ralph. It's such a complexity of concerns

951
00:52:42,239 --> 00:52:44,560
Speaker 2: and so many stories. One of the things that happened

952
00:52:44,560 --> 00:52:46,600
Speaker 2: to Ralph, I mean, he's such a smart guy that

953
00:52:46,719 --> 00:52:48,799
Speaker 2: after he was in house for a long time, he

954
00:52:48,880 --> 00:52:52,120
Speaker 2: became a kind of lay psychologist, and a lot of

955
00:52:52,160 --> 00:52:54,680
Speaker 2: the people in the various communities that he lived in

956
00:52:54,880 --> 00:52:57,520
Speaker 2: would come to him to talk to them about their lives.

957
00:52:57,760 --> 00:53:00,319
Speaker 2: If he was a therapist. He didn't actually have a

958
00:53:00,360 --> 00:53:03,000
Speaker 2: formal background in therapy, but he functioned that way and

959
00:53:03,000 --> 00:53:05,399
Speaker 2: he saw hundreds of people over the course of time

960
00:53:05,800 --> 00:53:10,040
Speaker 2: and he's very very helpful to them. But again, people

961
00:53:10,120 --> 00:53:12,800
Speaker 2: don't get it from the outside world. They think about

962
00:53:12,800 --> 00:53:15,880
Speaker 2: the fact that the parks smell bad. You know, that

963
00:53:15,960 --> 00:53:17,799
Speaker 2: the people that are living in the park smell bad,

964
00:53:18,480 --> 00:53:22,520
Speaker 2: that they're not like everyone else. And I think that's

965
00:53:22,560 --> 00:53:25,200
Speaker 2: a really love I love the show you have. I mean,

966
00:53:25,200 --> 00:53:27,680
Speaker 2: I've never I didn't know it existed up until a

967
00:53:27,680 --> 00:53:29,080
Speaker 2: couple of weeks ago, but I think it's such a

968
00:53:29,120 --> 00:53:32,719
Speaker 2: service in terms of humanizing what's a life course for

969
00:53:32,760 --> 00:53:36,520
Speaker 2: you and what everybody should should know should know about.

970
00:53:37,400 --> 00:53:40,200
Speaker 2: You know, Ralph told me this one story that I

971
00:53:40,200 --> 00:53:42,719
Speaker 2: hadn't realized wasn't a story so much, it was a reality.

972
00:53:43,160 --> 00:53:44,760
Speaker 2: He said that when he lived in all these parks

973
00:53:44,760 --> 00:53:48,960
Speaker 2: for a number of years, what he noticed almost invariably

974
00:53:49,760 --> 00:53:52,879
Speaker 2: is that guys from the outside world would come into

975
00:53:52,920 --> 00:53:56,400
Speaker 2: the park to want to have a conversation with certain

976
00:53:56,400 --> 00:53:58,799
Speaker 2: homeless people that were living in the park for years,

977
00:53:59,440 --> 00:54:01,520
Speaker 2: as if they sense I'm talking about the guys from

978
00:54:01,520 --> 00:54:04,960
Speaker 2: outside or a given person like Ralph, for example. But

979
00:54:05,000 --> 00:54:08,280
Speaker 2: a given person who lived in the park had suffered

980
00:54:08,320 --> 00:54:11,839
Speaker 2: so much that a lot of the bullshit was gone

981
00:54:12,840 --> 00:54:16,280
Speaker 2: and what remained was true and a lot of people

982
00:54:16,280 --> 00:54:18,120
Speaker 2: and people would come to the park because they wanted

983
00:54:18,160 --> 00:54:20,760
Speaker 2: to learn about life in a way that a homeless

984
00:54:20,760 --> 00:54:25,040
Speaker 2: person could teach you but a regular person might not. Jeff,

985
00:54:25,040 --> 00:54:28,080
Speaker 2: you want to talk about that some mind blowing.

986
00:54:27,840 --> 00:54:31,800
Speaker 4: Lines count directly cut directly the thing that I said before,

987
00:54:31,880 --> 00:54:37,880
Speaker 4: that like, you don't have the masks you wear like

988
00:54:38,040 --> 00:54:42,040
Speaker 4: I'm a customer, you're you're a cark okay, or I'm

989
00:54:42,560 --> 00:54:46,479
Speaker 4: a depositor, you're a bank teller, or I'm a you're

990
00:54:46,520 --> 00:54:49,600
Speaker 4: a student, you're a teacher. Right, you don't have those masks,

991
00:54:49,640 --> 00:54:52,800
Speaker 4: You're just I'm a person, you're a person. We're both homeless,

992
00:54:53,239 --> 00:54:56,640
Speaker 4: and so it doesn't matter anymore, right, And the thing

993
00:54:56,840 --> 00:54:59,680
Speaker 4: is that you start dealing with other people in terms

994
00:54:59,719 --> 00:55:03,440
Speaker 4: of their personalities without regard to their backgrounds or their

995
00:55:03,520 --> 00:55:07,040
Speaker 4: social status, because you're all down there together, right, and

996
00:55:07,680 --> 00:55:12,000
Speaker 4: that reality that makes people much more real, right, and

997
00:55:12,200 --> 00:55:16,160
Speaker 4: outsiders notice this, especially, there are some people on know

998
00:55:16,239 --> 00:55:20,160
Speaker 4: It's like apparently sees CEO is a very kind of

999
00:55:20,440 --> 00:55:23,439
Speaker 4: like sensitive guy who relates to other people a lot

1000
00:55:23,520 --> 00:55:26,240
Speaker 4: more broadly than he did when he was a teacher.

1001
00:55:26,280 --> 00:55:30,360
Speaker 4: I'm sure, because when he was a teacher, he was

1002
00:55:30,480 --> 00:55:33,239
Speaker 4: had the same kind of mental skills he does now,

1003
00:55:33,320 --> 00:55:36,239
Speaker 4: but they're much probably much more now to the mort experience.

1004
00:55:36,800 --> 00:55:40,399
Speaker 4: But he was tracked into making a living and being

1005
00:55:40,400 --> 00:55:43,440
Speaker 4: a regular person. Then when he's homeless, he just takes

1006
00:55:43,480 --> 00:55:46,200
Speaker 4: the same mental skills that he developed as a teacher,

1007
00:55:46,239 --> 00:55:49,240
Speaker 4: which are good and important skills for dealing with other people,

1008
00:55:49,760 --> 00:55:53,120
Speaker 4: and generalizes them to dealing with homeless people, which is

1009
00:55:53,160 --> 00:55:55,920
Speaker 4: going to be much much more of a total type

1010
00:55:55,920 --> 00:55:59,200
Speaker 4: of engagement, because you know, you're dealing with them as

1011
00:55:59,239 --> 00:56:01,759
Speaker 4: who they are and not as you know, what their

1012
00:56:01,840 --> 00:56:05,279
Speaker 4: role is, right, And I think that, and I think

1013
00:56:05,320 --> 00:56:07,640
Speaker 4: that when people come in off the streets it's Fred

1014
00:56:07,719 --> 00:56:10,800
Speaker 4: rais a question and try to talk to you. Is

1015
00:56:10,800 --> 00:56:13,200
Speaker 4: because they since they're a different kind of person than

1016
00:56:13,200 --> 00:56:16,480
Speaker 4: they are in that regard. I mean, as Fred said,

1017
00:56:16,480 --> 00:56:18,040
Speaker 4: you kind out all the crap or it was like

1018
00:56:18,120 --> 00:56:20,759
Speaker 4: the social nest and things, and you're just dealing with

1019
00:56:20,800 --> 00:56:23,960
Speaker 4: someone who has their own ideas and experience, right, I mean,

1020
00:56:24,040 --> 00:56:26,759
Speaker 4: in other words, the people who really kind of absorb

1021
00:56:27,440 --> 00:56:29,840
Speaker 4: the wisdom that they can pick up on the streets.

1022
00:56:29,880 --> 00:56:32,600
Speaker 4: Are very very impressive people right there.

1023
00:56:33,360 --> 00:56:36,719
Speaker 1: I agree. I agree, I was thinking too, like similarly

1024
00:56:37,239 --> 00:56:42,200
Speaker 1: a conversation, like for example, you notice, like someone that

1025
00:56:42,280 --> 00:56:45,719
Speaker 1: had left and been into the military and they have

1026
00:56:45,880 --> 00:56:48,240
Speaker 1: seen action. I'm not talking about you know, doing paper

1027
00:56:48,239 --> 00:56:50,839
Speaker 1: cuts or talking about you know that they've come back

1028
00:56:51,280 --> 00:56:56,200
Speaker 1: and they have that undefinable wisdom and you can tell

1029
00:56:56,400 --> 00:56:59,920
Speaker 1: that not you know, we always all of the trauma

1030
00:57:00,040 --> 00:57:04,280
Speaker 1: that they've gone through, but they have an indefinable kind

1031
00:57:04,400 --> 00:57:09,520
Speaker 1: of wisdom, knowledge that gravitates other people wanting to get

1032
00:57:09,560 --> 00:57:13,640
Speaker 1: what they learned about, seeing a facet of life that

1033
00:57:13,760 --> 00:57:18,080
Speaker 1: normal people will never know about or understand. To live

1034
00:57:18,440 --> 00:57:21,720
Speaker 1: in that kind of survival mode because even though it's

1035
00:57:21,760 --> 00:57:25,400
Speaker 1: a different in some respects different in way like war,

1036
00:57:25,600 --> 00:57:28,760
Speaker 1: but it's still a survival mode and it's still a

1037
00:57:28,840 --> 00:57:33,960
Speaker 1: skill set that average people don't have, or a empathy

1038
00:57:34,120 --> 00:57:38,040
Speaker 1: yet built in. So they want to hear the stories

1039
00:57:38,160 --> 00:57:41,760
Speaker 1: or understand the story. I remember there was a on

1040
00:57:41,840 --> 00:57:46,600
Speaker 1: Instagram there was this group is called story Core, and

1041
00:57:46,720 --> 00:57:50,600
Speaker 1: this daughter was kept asking her father, who was a

1042
00:57:50,640 --> 00:57:55,360
Speaker 1: survivor of the Holocaust, about his experience, and he kept

1043
00:57:55,360 --> 00:57:57,200
Speaker 1: making it up like it was just some kind of

1044
00:57:57,200 --> 00:57:59,920
Speaker 1: Disney production. He did not want to tell his daughter

1045
00:58:00,080 --> 00:58:03,760
Speaker 1: what it was. And she read it, I'm missing help

1046
00:58:04,640 --> 00:58:07,840
Speaker 1: Elise Weasel's book Night If you ever read it, it's

1047
00:58:07,880 --> 00:58:12,280
Speaker 1: a very very moving book and very powerful book. Yeah,

1048
00:58:12,320 --> 00:58:15,840
Speaker 1: And so she reads this book and she tries to

1049
00:58:15,920 --> 00:58:18,280
Speaker 1: line up what her father said because it's the same

1050
00:58:19,760 --> 00:58:22,920
Speaker 1: place where he's from. And she said, this doesn't sound

1051
00:58:23,240 --> 00:58:26,040
Speaker 1: like anything like he's saying. It's like, this sounds like

1052
00:58:26,080 --> 00:58:28,200
Speaker 1: he's making it up like this. They were just out

1053
00:58:28,240 --> 00:58:31,480
Speaker 1: there dancing and you know, everything was great. So she

1054
00:58:31,680 --> 00:58:34,320
Speaker 1: finally pressed him on it, and he finally says, well,

1055
00:58:35,040 --> 00:58:37,000
Speaker 1: why do you want to know something that you would

1056
00:58:37,040 --> 00:58:38,960
Speaker 1: never be able to come out to this door? If

1057
00:58:39,000 --> 00:58:42,120
Speaker 1: I send you into this room, you're never going to

1058
00:58:42,120 --> 00:58:45,040
Speaker 1: get out. And he gave her the opportunity to, you know, like,

1059
00:58:45,120 --> 00:58:48,320
Speaker 1: I give you one last chance. Do you really want

1060
00:58:48,360 --> 00:58:51,600
Speaker 1: to know what's going on? What really happened there? And

1061
00:58:51,640 --> 00:58:54,160
Speaker 1: because he lost his family, his parents and things like that,

1062
00:58:54,720 --> 00:58:59,640
Speaker 1: and she says yes, And so he drops the pretense

1063
00:58:59,800 --> 00:59:03,600
Speaker 1: of what society or how you know, to to not

1064
00:59:04,160 --> 00:59:08,840
Speaker 1: traumatize her about those real experiences, and she was like then,

1065
00:59:09,560 --> 00:59:11,360
Speaker 1: you know, in some part of her probably just like

1066
00:59:11,400 --> 00:59:14,080
Speaker 1: I regret saying this, but just like she said, this

1067
00:59:14,160 --> 00:59:16,160
Speaker 1: was it was a horrible story. And you know he

1068
00:59:16,640 --> 00:59:19,320
Speaker 1: you know, she was crying and and and very moved

1069
00:59:19,320 --> 00:59:21,680
Speaker 1: by that. And what you're going to I think that's

1070
00:59:21,680 --> 00:59:24,320
Speaker 1: one of the things too. I can equate it to

1071
00:59:24,560 --> 00:59:27,960
Speaker 1: like that, when you know, when you see that relative

1072
00:59:28,000 --> 00:59:34,200
Speaker 1: that has insight, wisdom, experience that is completely different than

1073
00:59:34,360 --> 00:59:38,680
Speaker 1: how we navigate our life and uses that and you

1074
00:59:38,880 --> 00:59:42,640
Speaker 1: seize him over the years, and you know, they don't

1075
00:59:42,680 --> 00:59:45,400
Speaker 1: say too much about it, but they know about it,

1076
00:59:45,440 --> 00:59:49,560
Speaker 1: and then you know, you're inexplicably gravitated toward the conversation

1077
00:59:49,960 --> 00:59:52,440
Speaker 1: or the person and trying to get them to open

1078
00:59:52,560 --> 00:59:55,640
Speaker 1: up or to talk about those experiences. And you know

1079
00:59:55,720 --> 00:59:58,560
Speaker 1: how sometimes it could be a hit or miss. Sometimes

1080
00:59:58,600 --> 01:00:02,440
Speaker 1: they share it and sometimes they but it is the effort.

1081
01:00:02,480 --> 01:00:04,840
Speaker 1: I think our society, like when they're dealing with young

1082
01:00:04,880 --> 01:00:07,680
Speaker 1: house This is like a war on poverty. This is

1083
01:00:07,720 --> 01:00:11,200
Speaker 1: a war on your humanity and spirit. And when you

1084
01:00:11,400 --> 01:00:15,040
Speaker 1: do have that, that's becomes your war, and that's becomes

1085
01:00:15,200 --> 01:00:17,560
Speaker 1: where you get your experiences and your skill set from

1086
01:00:18,000 --> 01:00:22,040
Speaker 1: I love this conversation, and if it's okay to invite

1087
01:00:22,080 --> 01:00:24,240
Speaker 1: you guys back, because I think it is, like this

1088
01:00:24,360 --> 01:00:26,640
Speaker 1: is so beneficial. Please could you please say that the

1089
01:00:26,720 --> 01:00:27,959
Speaker 1: editor book on there as well.

1090
01:00:28,280 --> 01:00:31,120
Speaker 2: The title of the book is anything is Good. Anything

1091
01:00:31,200 --> 01:00:34,760
Speaker 2: is Good. And you know it's a certain paradox involved there,

1092
01:00:35,080 --> 01:00:40,400
Speaker 2: because things that might seem bad, obviously bad, can sometimes

1093
01:00:40,440 --> 01:00:42,800
Speaker 2: be very good when you look at them deeply. And

1094
01:00:42,840 --> 01:00:45,560
Speaker 2: I think that idea sort of characterizes a lot, a

1095
01:00:45,560 --> 01:00:47,240
Speaker 2: lot that we've been talking about for the last hour

1096
01:00:47,280 --> 01:00:50,439
Speaker 2: and fifteen minutes. Absolutely, I just want to repeat something

1097
01:00:50,440 --> 01:00:53,720
Speaker 2: that maybe I got at before. I mean, I'm kind

1098
01:00:53,720 --> 01:00:55,840
Speaker 2: of mind blown by this program because I think it's

1099
01:00:56,280 --> 01:00:59,120
Speaker 2: it's such a big truth of what you're getting at.

1100
01:00:59,200 --> 01:01:01,240
Speaker 2: And like my experiences living in New York, I mean,

1101
01:01:01,280 --> 01:01:05,080
Speaker 2: like I live in this very nice neighborhood and they're

1102
01:01:05,080 --> 01:01:07,600
Speaker 2: homeless guys that live in park right across from my house.

1103
01:01:07,960 --> 01:01:10,280
Speaker 2: And I see friends of mine that I've been friends

1104
01:01:10,320 --> 01:01:15,080
Speaker 2: for thirty or forty years, caring people, empathic people, wonderful people,

1105
01:01:15,320 --> 01:01:17,680
Speaker 2: and they're angry about the people living in the park

1106
01:01:17,880 --> 01:01:21,520
Speaker 2: because they don't smell well and they ruin the look

1107
01:01:21,520 --> 01:01:26,200
Speaker 2: of the park and it's astonishing the way people are

1108
01:01:26,240 --> 01:01:31,240
Speaker 2: so easily dismissed without any sense that that humanity exists,

1109
01:01:31,280 --> 01:01:33,680
Speaker 2: that the potential for the person is there, maybe a

1110
01:01:33,720 --> 01:01:35,800
Speaker 2: little bit of hidden, you know, in the trappings of

1111
01:01:35,840 --> 01:01:39,800
Speaker 2: being homeless, but people miss it. And I think that

1112
01:01:40,920 --> 01:01:43,480
Speaker 2: what you do is just is a gift. It's a

1113
01:01:43,600 --> 01:01:44,280
Speaker 2: really great thing.

1114
01:01:44,320 --> 01:01:44,520
Speaker 1: Man.

1115
01:01:45,000 --> 01:01:49,040
Speaker 4: Your show, yeah, Cio is very as rare and incredibly

1116
01:01:49,120 --> 01:01:51,920
Speaker 4: great part if they all really does get it, you know.

1117
01:01:52,760 --> 01:01:55,919
Speaker 1: Thank you guys for your kind words, and I hope

1118
01:01:55,960 --> 01:01:57,600
Speaker 1: to have you guys back on my show again.

1119
01:01:58,000 --> 01:01:58,200
Speaker 4: Sure.

1120
01:01:58,280 --> 01:01:58,880
Speaker 2: Thank you.

1121
01:01:59,160 --> 01:01:59,720
Speaker 4: That was great.

1122
01:02:00,080 --> 01:02:00,840
Speaker 1: Thank you very much.

1123
01:02:01,040 --> 01:02:02,120
Speaker 2: Great visit and reading, Matt.

1124
01:02:11,600 --> 01:02:13,840
Speaker 1: Thank you so much to Fred and Ralph for your

1125
01:02:13,880 --> 01:02:18,680
Speaker 1: time and the vivacious conversation. Frit's book Anything Is Good

1126
01:02:18,920 --> 01:02:24,440
Speaker 1: comes out June twenty fifth, twenty twenty four. Out of

1127
01:02:24,480 --> 01:02:27,640
Speaker 1: this conversation, I hope the listeners gain the sense of

1128
01:02:27,720 --> 01:02:31,280
Speaker 1: call to action to examine their prejudice against the un

1129
01:02:31,280 --> 01:02:35,240
Speaker 1: house and also their willingness to do the work to

1130
01:02:35,400 --> 01:02:39,280
Speaker 1: truly get to know the unhoused community and work hard

1131
01:02:39,720 --> 01:02:44,000
Speaker 1: toward a dignified solution instead of a karser one. If

1132
01:02:44,040 --> 01:02:47,840
Speaker 1: there are mutual aid organizations in your area, please do

1133
01:02:47,880 --> 01:02:51,720
Speaker 1: your research and join them. In Los Angeles, we have

1134
01:02:51,760 --> 01:02:55,440
Speaker 1: a mutual aid organization that meets every Saturday called Jaytown

1135
01:02:55,520 --> 01:03:00,240
Speaker 1: Action and Solidarity, and other places that meet regularly. I

1136
01:03:00,280 --> 01:03:03,800
Speaker 1: want to shout out artists like Amanda Nicholson, who graciously

1137
01:03:03,920 --> 01:03:07,160
Speaker 1: dedicated her experience of being young house and mine as

1138
01:03:07,200 --> 01:03:11,920
Speaker 1: well and an art exhibition in Situal. Look for her

1139
01:03:11,960 --> 01:03:15,240
Speaker 1: interview where I take a deep dive into each aspect

1140
01:03:15,240 --> 01:03:20,480
Speaker 1: of houselessness that she explored in a future episode coming

1141
01:03:20,560 --> 01:03:24,840
Speaker 1: soon on Wedian House. Episodes from the Reclaimers, from the Press,

1142
01:03:24,920 --> 01:03:32,160
Speaker 1: Rally Care not Cage's Conference. This wraps up this episode

1143
01:03:32,160 --> 01:03:36,960
Speaker 1: for widian House. Please like and subscribe, and if you

1144
01:03:36,960 --> 01:03:39,680
Speaker 1: would like to share your story on median House, please

1145
01:03:39,680 --> 01:03:43,440
Speaker 1: reach out to me at Wedianhouse dot com, at Weedianhouse

1146
01:03:43,520 --> 01:03:48,200
Speaker 1: on Instagram, or email me at Weidianhouse at gmail dot com.

1147
01:03:49,160 --> 01:03:52,680
Speaker 1: Thank you again for listening and may we again meet

1148
01:03:52,800 --> 01:03:59,560
Speaker 1: in the light of understanding. Weedian House is a production

1149
01:03:59,600 --> 01:04:04,200
Speaker 1: of radio. It is written, hosted, and created by me

1150
01:04:04,400 --> 01:04:09,680
Speaker 1: Theo Henderson, Our producers Jbie Loftus, Kailee Fager, Katie Fischal,

1151
01:04:10,040 --> 01:04:14,040
Speaker 1: and Lyra Smith. Our editor is Adam Wand and our

1152
01:04:14,120 --> 01:04:17,440
Speaker 1: local art is also by Katie Ficial. Thanks for listening.