A Place To Call Home

There is one thing that I have realized over the last year - nomadic people and, for that matter, homeless people in general, have no standing as a real person to the government. There are so many things that we take for granted about having an address. For instance, Katy and I tried to get a PO Box for the month that we stayed with our pastors. We were told that we could only get a PO Box if we had a form of identification that had a valid address on it. The whole reason we needed a PO Box was that we had no valid address. Do you know how difficult it was to apply for jobs in MN but have a temporary mailing address in WI? In general, major institutions don't understand the man-in-transition. Of course, the man will really stick it to us when we have to file taxes having lived in different states.

It's amazing that no matter how much philosophizing you can do about self-identity, society is able to give or take away your public identity based upon something as simple as having or not having a "permanent address." Not to downplay their plight, but homeless people have a lot more going against them than not having a house. How can a homeless person get a job to be able to provide a house for themselves when having an address seems to be a prerequisite to getting a job?