Understanding homelessness in Portland

blackgnat

Active Member
That's where my Difficult Child was headed, before he decided to go to Rhode Island and then gave the $300 bus ticket to his "friend".
 

dstc_99

Well-Known Member
Having visited Portland many times it is definitely one of the places to go to be homeless. The weather isn't horrible other than the rain. They have beauty all around them. The people are welcoming and accomodating they don't even seem to notice if your homeless or not. In fact since we have so many "hippie" types here in the PNW it is hard to tell who is a CEO and who is a homeless guy. Other than the amount of stuff homeless people tend to have to carry around I don't know how you would tell the difference.
 

witzend

Well-Known Member
In fact since we have so many "hippie" types here in the PNW it is hard to tell who is a CEO and who is a homeless guy. Other than the amount of stuff homeless people tend to have to carry around I don't know how you would tell the difference.

It's the aroma. I'm not saying that to be mean, I say that from experience. I worked 8 years at a large grocery store on W 20th & Burnside, where to the near West are the most wealthy in the city, and everywhere around is people sleeping under a bush or an overpass - entire families sometimes. You know the smell of homelessness when you encounter it. In the winter it's infused with campfire. In the summer it's just damp and sweat. It's often accompanied by a fair amount of vomit and urine and worse.

People have to live, people have to sleep, and people have to go to the bathroom. When we turn our backs on them because they're losing the battle, they do those things in our yards, parks, and in our streets. It's not pretty, it's just the "home" that we have made for them.
 

dstc_99

Well-Known Member
It's the aroma. I'm not saying that to be mean, I say that from experience. I worked 8 years at a large grocery store on W 20th & Burnside, where to the near West are the most wealthy in the city, and everywhere around is people sleeping under a bush or an overpass - entire families sometimes. You know the smell of homelessness when you encounter it. In the winter it's infused with campfire. In the summer it's just damp and sweat. It's often accompanied by a fair amount of vomit and urine and worse.

People have to live, people have to sleep, and people have to go to the bathroom. When we turn our backs on them because they're losing the battle, they do those things in our yards, parks, and in our streets. It's not pretty, it's just the "home" that we have made for them.

In Portland that's only true for some. They have so many places for the homeless to groom and sleep it's not unusual for them to be pretty clean. Also in the PNW it's not unusual for the CEO hippie to stink because he's using organic deodorant and body cleNsers
 

witzend

Well-Known Member
In Portland that's only true for some. They have so many places for the homeless to groom and sleep it's not unusual for them to be pretty clean. Also in the PNW it's not unusual for the CEO hippie to stink because he's using organic deodorant and body cleNsers
I'm pretty sure I know what I'm talking about for the Portland Homeless. I lived and worked with them at least six days a week for nearly a decade, and only left Portland a couple of years ago. Things haven't changed that much.
 

witzend

Well-Known Member
I'm pretty sure I know what I'm talking about for the Portland Homeless. I lived and worked with them at least six days a week for nearly a decade, and only left Portland a couple of years ago. Things haven't changed that much.
PS - Those people who stand on the off ramps with signs in Portland aren't homeless, they get dropped off in shifts by a middle aged woman in a white van. No homeless person DARE try to vie for those spots.
 
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