Homelessness is something that is often overlooked. As of recent, homelessness has become something that I ponder whenever I witness it. Essentially, I have been experiencing the Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon. Signs such as “No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service” in restaurants and “Panhandling Is Illegal” on the window of a business in downtown Redlands, I have become to notice wherever I go. Not that I haven’t seen these signs before, only that they seem to have become noticeably more common. As I sit in the passenger seat riding down highways, I am now quick to spot tarps under bridges and sleeping bags.

It is easy to turn a blind eye to homelessness when one has never experienced it or witnessed it. However, when I see it every time I walk out of the grocery store, it becomes something I try to understand. It is no longer as simple as reaching into my pants in hope of finding shiny circles or apologizing when I only discover a receipt in my pocket. I wonder where they have been and where they are going. I wonder what their story is. I wonder if they think I’m lying when I just spent my last five dollars on tortillas and instant noodles and have nothing in my pockets. I wonder what the lady walking behind me witnessing the whole thing thinks. I always think of how close and how far we are from each other.

Linda Tirado’s “This Is Why Poor People’s Bad Decisions Make Perfect Sense” is what resonates with me in association with homelessness. As I struggle to make it from month to month, Tirado brings my idea of poverty into perspective.

“It is not worth it to me to live a bleak life devoid of small pleasures so that one day I can make a single large purchase….There’s a certain pull to live what bits of life you can while there’s money in your pocket, because no matter how responsible you are you will be broke in three days anyway.”

As I am in a constant financial struggle, I am reminded every time I go to the grocery store that my situation is only temporary.