solsprack wrote:
I will assume the OP isn't a troll, but I might be wrong.
I recommend the OP considers finding another place to go. California is a very hostile place to live these days unless you are making over $100,000 a year, or you have a sizable nest egg. Someone living out of a van might have made it there before 2008, but now, you will just end up a victim by street punks, or the target of police aggression.
Here is a fact that you may not know: A number of states have made a deal with private prisons to keep all beds at 90% full or else pay fines on a daily basis. This means that police, DAs, and judges are forced to toss people in the clink or their job is at risk. The true mentally ill are not wanted in jail, because they cost too much. A vandweller whom is trying to eke out an honest living, and who plays by the rules is their perfect target, because they can keep arresting them, and they "store quietly". Plus, the van and the belongings inside will sell at auction for good money once it gets seized and impounded.
It sucks, but seriously consider leaving California. There are better places in the US to go. Arizona is a decent state. Texas is a state that has jobs virtually everywhere. With a PhD, you can find work -somewhere-. Even New York state is having a boom.
End of lecture, apologies for the digression. However, I know people who tried vandwelling in the Bay Area or any coastal part of CA, and invariably it doesn't turn out well.
solsprack: no you weren't lecturing, and I appreciate your points. Thank you for your advice. You are good hearted.
I agree with you that California is crappy in many ways. I grew up most of my life on the east coast: in Pennsylvania, upstate New York, and Maine. Things are definitely cheaper there, and maybe even job prospects. Plus it rains there and everything is green in the spring and summer, which I like (as opposed to California, where everything is brown year round!).
At the same time though, California is very liberal, very LGBT friendly, especially in the Bay Area where I live now; and I love that. Re the police here, from all I have seen, they are more professional and respectful than out east. I haven't had a problem living in my minivan because the rear compartment is completely blacked out for privacy, and I only use it to sleep in areas where a lot of people park for the night. In the day, I am busy, working out, doing errands, going to the library, etc. I stay in nice suburban areas. No one actually knows I am homeless, in fact. They would be shocked if they knew.
Also, with AB 109 in California here, they are trying to reduce the size of prisons/jails and letting criminals back onto the street, so I am not too worried about being jailed.
I also can't stand the heat, so I park near cooler areas of the Bay Area to sleep, so, unfortunately, Texas and Arizona would be out of the picture, at least in the summer.
And I can get a free public community college education here (I posted this same statement in another forum a few months ago and was accused of trolling because of this by an ignorant member. they did not know there is a fee waiver program here for state community colleges for people who are low income. someone came later on and backed me up on this). Yes, I do already have a B.A., but it's not in a marketable field, and I have decided to switch to a STEM area (science, technology, engineering, math) to increase my job prospects (the average starting salary for a biologist or chemist with a Ph.D. in a non-governmental job is $70,000-$80,000 a year or more). Plus, not having worked or been to school as an undergraduate for 20 years now, I need to have those community college professors as references for when I apply to graduate school.
You don't actually need an undergraduate major in the sciences to go to a graduate program in those areas; you just have to have an equivalent knowledge, which I will get on my own in just a few years. Sound bizarre? Maybe, but not for me. Not bragging (I just don't want to be accused of trolling when I'm not), but I graduated Phi Beta Kappa and
summa cum laude and was smart enough to get into a top-ranked law school and an Ivy League Ph.D. program. So yes, I can do it. I can do anything academically. I thrive in academe. I didn't finish law school or the Ph.D. program I was in because of personal/social reasons, not because of academic deficiency. But I am working on this now and am older, more mature. We'll see... I think I will be successful this time.
