{"id":21797,"date":"2018-10-03T17:33:16","date_gmt":"2018-10-03T21:33:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=21797"},"modified":"2018-10-03T17:33:16","modified_gmt":"2018-10-03T21:33:16","slug":"homeless-but-happy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/homeless-but-happy\/","title":{"rendered":"Homeless But Happy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Special to The Auroran<\/strong><\/p>\n

I wandered around town this morning camera in hand taking in architectural sights of historic homes, bricks eroding in alleyways, graffiti signatures defiling walls, cracks in sidewalks, and watching colourful fall leaves falling.
\nI needed the sun to awaken my broken spirit, warm my heart and fill me with a passion and purpose again.
\nMy life today is a photographic journey of being homeless but happy. It started out as a shocking reality: everything in time comes to an end.
\nDisappointments of my recent future goals squished like a bug slowly trail blazing under my well-worn feet from walking everywhere. No home now to call my own again, no bed with the crisp designer sheets and pillows to lay my head on, no work to be productive, no car to take me anywhere for life\u2019s needs, and, of course, no money.
\nI was, however precisely absorbed in this moment with a heart full of hope with no idea of what I would be doing in the next hour or day.
\nYou could, if you looked at me passing by, see this revelation in my face with eyes that look endless in search towards a new purpose and new beginning. I would still smile, say good morning or afternoon keeping in mind manners are still important to me.
\nI was looking for work yesterday and today like many others.
\nMy lifestyle that I was living with a roof over my head before was now a piece of past history demolished. I have minimalized, of course, my conflicting emotions out of this experience and refreshed my mind to move forward, I still have a long life to live.
\nI walked further and attended the lovely church luncheon. I ate well there, tasting the bounty of harvest soups and homemade sandwiches and cakes, thinking I wanted to go back to my childhood to my grandmother\u2019s home and have these same nourishing foods that she used to make.
\nI wandered into the park breathing the clean air, drinking water from the water fountain which splashed against my face, refreshing me as a baptised soul once again. I sat on the cold steel bench discussing life with another kindred spirit, as I would call him, only to find out like me we were both homeless but happy.
\nFrom our discussion he sleeps in his car. I envied him at that moment. I thought \u201cwell, you can go places see more of the world, watch the sunsets,\u201d forgetting for a second how much of a romantic I was until it hit me that I could still see all this myself.
\nI have taken the rest of the afternoon to enjoy our public library and write these thoughts. Perhaps there is someone willing to allow me to work for them. I would appreciate that even if it\u2019s just a few days a week, that\u2019s a start for me. Today as well as tomorrow I am homeless but happy.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Special to The Auroran I wandered around town this morning camera in hand taking in architectural sights of historic homes, bricks eroding in alleyways, graffiti signatures defiling walls, cracks in sidewalks, and watching colourful fall leaves falling. I needed the sun to awaken my broken spirit, warm my heart and fill me with a passion […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-5Fz","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-06 07:31:45","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21797\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}