Waitin' on the world to change...

Did I ever tell you there are 90,000 homeless people in Los Angeles County? Well, there are, and I'd say the majority of them are within a 10 block radius of my office building. We know each other, and sometimes are cordial. However, there is the occasional 'freak-out', where something has set someone off, and they scream at the top of their lungs, using the most profane words you've ever heard, over and over and over again, not directed at any particular person, flailing violently in every direction, and all you can do is stay out of their path. Ok, so maybe this is more like a daily occurance.

Today, a young lady (who I remember from the very first week she hit the streets, probably a year ago) was upset because one of her buddies had run off with her dog. Well, she went crazy. So crazy, in fact, that she stopped traffic (probably because she was standing in the middle of the street) and she was yelling to the sky, hands raised and crying. She was such a cute girl when this all started, and I used to think maybe her parents had dropped her off to go to the mall or something, and little did they know that she was scamming for money on the streetcorners. But for some time now, she has slowly digressed into the scraggly, malnourished, head-always-down, dog-in-lap person that is black from filth, with sores all over her young body.

I think if I lived on the streets, I'd probably rob a bank. If I got away with it, then I wouldn't have to live on the streets anymore, and if I got caught, then I'd go to jail, and I wouldn't have to live on the streets anymore. Win/win.

I guess I bring this up because I feel like I've become so numb to the whole situation. On our way back from lunch today, my co-workers and I passed a couple of cops who had pulled up in their squad car to where a man was laying (as he usually is), and they were on their radios like they needed back-up or an ambulance possibly. It shocked us a little because in my experience, I've never seen the cops get involved with the homeless population, that's usually left up to the Purple Patrol. Meanwhile, he's just laying there, passed out presumably, and my friend turns to me and says, "do you think he died?".

This was exactly what I was thinking, but I wasn't so worried because I distinctly remembered him moving when we had passed by him 40 or so minutes earlier. I guess my point is that we didn't even break our stride, we just kept walking. My conscience is what's causing me to write this post, but it is quite disheartening to feel so helpless with such an out-of-control problem on our hands.

Update: So it's the next morning (Wednesday), and I saw the young girl I spoke of earlier in this post. She was sitting in her usual spot with her head down, but no dog on her lap. Very sad.