This article was requested of me to write about my day as a homeless person. They eventually decided not to use it, so I am posting it on my blog. I think in the end, they didn’t believe I was really homeless.
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Today I woke up with the warm, morning sun at 7:30AM. I laid flat in my driver’s seat and looked up at the vision board I created on the inside roof of my car aka my home. It’s dozens of post-it sized bright colored paper with positive words and phrases like, “MOTIVATED”, “STRIVE”, “STAY PASSIONATE”, “MOM” and many more. It’s a great reminder and an inspiration to wake up to each morning.
It’s Monday, and usually Mondays are my favorite days. As I always say, Entrepreneurs Love Mondays. But today was a jewish holiday, so I think a lot of people took the day off and relaxed with friends and family to celebrate. So my friends and I decided to run some errands which included going to Hollywood to check my PO Box to check my mail and send out some items as well.
Before I headed out to Hollywood, I went to pick up my friend Pauly at his girlfriend’s house. He’s been staying there often the past couple months because he doesn’t have central air conditioning in his apartment, and during this ridiculously long heat wave, he’s been unable to sleep in his own bed. So why not chill at the wife’s? Free food, free companionship and free AC! So at about 11AM I pick up Pauly and we head to his apartment where we pick up some items to mail out and pick up his roommate Mark. Now we’re ready to roll.
On our way I decided to stop at a client’s to help him with some computer stuff and his website. One of my businesses is a website and branding company called Inspired Design & Development where I manage 70+ client projects in 5 countries on 3 continents. Today, I stopped at Scott’s bartending school near Hollywood. I developed his company website, his son’s bartending supplies website and soon I’ll build Scott’s entertainment company website. I was referred to Scott by Pauly, so while I was there working, Pauly and Scott got to chit-chat about filmmaking since they’re both in the business.
After about an hour or two of working on Scott’s computer, Pauly, Mark and I left to finally reach the post office in Hollywood. Now because I am homeless, I use a post office box to receive my mail. I share the box with my friend Pauly because he’s an actor and has used it to receive his mail for years. And with a Hollywood address, it’s easy to remember for our friends, family and clientele.
If you’d like to send Mooch anything whether it’s a gift card or hallmark card, please send to Mooch at PO Box 322, Hollywood, CA 90028. Thank you in advance!
Just after leaving Scott’s school, I stopped at the corner gas station to fill up. Before we were about to leave the station we were approached by a woman who was possibly homeless. She introduced herself as Mina and asked us for some change because she had lost her wallet. Mina was a middle aged woman with an accent that may have been spanish. Because she was so dirty and distraught looking I couldn’t determine if she was hispanic, black or other. She was also wearing black windbreaker pants, a heavy black leather jacket and rolling around a black bag with an upright handle, like the ones you see at airports – all this in 100 degree Los Angeles weather. In my experience, I would say she’s living on the streets. Pauly and I did speak with Mina for a couple minutes and gave her all the change I had in my car which maybe amounted to $4. She thanked us, said God Bless and we wished her a safe afternoon.
We actually video recorded our interaction with Mina, but I later determined it wasn’t right to upload the video online; (1) I didn’t ask her permission, and (2) I am implying she is homeless, but she could have honestly lost her wallet and was acting irrational simply because she was stressed about the situation. Uploading the video could have hurt her career, concerned family members, who knows.
Finally, we reached the post office at about 2pm. Here I sent out a thank you letter with some free business card samples to a potential client and Pauly emptied our post office box. After he sent out a DVD of his latest film to a friend, we left.
Before lunch, we wanted to take some short videos of surrounding areas including the Hollywood sign for our upcoming film. We used my cell phone to capture some great shots… even random gun shot audio in the background. It was so loud and scared everyone on our block. I think it was literally just around the corner. You can hear it along with police sirens in the background. View the video here. Tourists don’t know this, but Hollywood is not very safe – even on Monday afternoons.
After getting some work done we had lunch then headed home. Well, I dropped off Pauly and Mark, and then I came straight here, to FedEx Office aka my office. I spend my days and nights here using their free wifi and counter space to work on client projects, look for more work and communicate with 1000s of other homeless people online via Facebook and Twitter. There’s so much I can tell you about how many homeless people, and how many types of homeless people are online today. Or you can find out yourself here. Thankfully, I’m fortunate enough to be in a position to help others find shelter, friendships, jobs, food etc. I do it because I can, and I hope you’ll consider doing the same when given the chance.
Thanks for listening. Stay Passionate.
