I was in NYC yes­ter­day, as I often am. As I was walk­ing to the hotel to vis­it a friend that was in town, I saw sev­er­al home­less peo­ple as I usu­al­ly do near Port Author­i­ty. Today, how­ev­er, I took par­tic­u­lar atten­tion to them, not­ed what they were wear­ing, how they were car­ry­ing their gear, etc. A cou­ple of them had bags that they fash­ioned into back­packs, some of them had a cou­ple of bags they were car­ry­ing with their belong­ings, and oth­ers had bags of their belong­ings, etc. What struck me, is that how much “stuff” some of them seemed to have, and how lit­tle stuff oth­ers had with them. I thought about how they might find food, shel­ter, stay warm, etc. It prompt­ed me to do a Google search for “Home­less as sur­vival­ists.” You would be sur­prised how much con­tent is out there on the sub­ject. Every­thing from for­ag­ing to dump­ster div­ing, to shel­ter in urban and rur­al areas, why they may wear mul­ti­ple lay­ers of cloth­ing, etc. It was an inter­est­ing search. It also struck me that these are peo­ple who are intel­li­gent, dynam­ic, resource­ful, cun­ning, and ulti­mate­ly dri­ven to sur­vive (even if it is just sur­vival on the street).

That said, I came across a com­pelling and rather infor­ma­tive sto­ry of a man who was home­less for about a year in 1992. I want­ed to share it with every­one because it epit­o­mizes both wilder­ness, rur­al, and urban sur­vival. It gives detail about how this man hunt­ed in an alley with a home made rab­bit stick, built traps to catch rac­coons, birds, etc. just to have a meal. It was an inter­est­ing read, and I hope you enjoy it and learn some­thing from it as well. I know I did.

It is called “The Joy (?) of Being Home­less:”  http://www.donrearic.com/homeless.htm

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