I decide to spend New Year's Day going in search of what lunch I may be able to find, from whoever is open. I also need a handful of groceries. I need something from an organic grocer a short distance across town. It's another beautiful winter day. It feels as though it's well into the 40s F. Along the way, I've just crossed a busy highway when a van honks at the light. I turn to look. It's the manager where I work. I ask him what he's doing out on a day we have off. He's doing pick ups at our stores today instead of tomorrow. Almost at the market, I can't believe that I forgot this grocer was here. It's in a neighborhood of old bungalows. The clientele still leans toward the natural side, but unlike those from other neighborhoods with one of these particular grocers. Belmar, where shoppers of this chain seek a natural perfection. Downtown, where they come to their store to be seen. Or Cherry Creek, where the priority is to shop with speed and avoid everyone else in silence. When I was there a week or two ago, I spotted a line around the building to get in before I abandoned all hope. But this neighborhood right next to the interstate feels very, very local. The shoppers truly seem to appreciate the store, greeting each other with, "Happy New Year" as they pass each other in the parking lot and also inside. And nary a line may be seen. I remember at least six years ago, when I would on occasion find myself walking this direction. Sometime before 4 AM, I would come walking down to the light rail station just across the bridge over the interstate from the grocer. They were infrequent occasions when my shift as a floater at the time was to cover for the production manager at one particular plant. Today I arrive at the grocer ready for lunch. I get but a simple breakfast burrito, but it's delicious. The sun is out now and has burned off the overcast clouds. I grab a desert and cross the bridge to the light rail station., and find a bench on an outdoor plaza for a bit of reading. But I have a couple of items to get at another supermarket. I'm in and out of there. On the way out of the parking lot, I spot an elderly homeless guy coming out of a row of bushes.
The following day is the last one of my work week, and it's back to a regular schedule until Memorial Day. Yesterday I took down my lights. This morning I feel hungry. While others may have gorged themselves during the holiday, my weight today hasn't been this low since my first doctor put me on my first diet six years ago. I leave early to get to a breakfast place in the shopping center where I work. While Denver County (where I live) remains locked up, Englewood (where I work) can't seem to be shut down. This restaurant had a sign which said it was open on weekends. I thought only for take out. They're open for indoor dining as well. Next week, they go back to being open all week. The morning is cold enough that my toes are frozen, but a pair of diners are appear happily seated at a single outdoor table. My order takes but a few minutes, and I'm off across the parking lot to work. After work, I'm coming off the trail, next to the lot with a sometime giant RV camper. Late in the afternoon, three cyclists are taking bikes out of their vehicles, all parked in the lot. The same lot from which the death-warmed-over Toyota pulled out of this week. The following Sunday is another fine afternoon, with a high of 49 F. Having washed the pants I wear at work, I take a look at them. As comfortable as they are and still in great shape, I bought them somewhat in a pinch. They have extra room in the legs. I decide that I need something more straightforward and less baggy. I'm off to Walmart, which unlike Target has a men's department. I also need new shoes and bedroom slippers, and a bit of kitchen supplies. I score all these at low prices I like. My previous slippers I got at the supermarket. They lasted no more than a few months. I also grab lunch and take it outside to a small covered spot with benches. It's popular with homeless. Today, it's just me. I sit and eat and open a book. A young guy comes by and acts as if he's mistaken me for someone else. He sits on the back of a bench, his feet on the seat, pulls out his phone. He asks me if I smoke anything. I tell him no. He wants to know why I'm homeless if I don't smoke anything.
I don't find out until Monday that both the governor and Denver's mayor have reopened the city's and state's restaurants for limited dining in again. I wonder if I could have eaten inside someplace New Year's Day? I'm in the locker room at the gym when a naked guy with a white Van Wick beard and white head of curly hair step over to the hand dryer. He continues to press the button as he stands in front of it. Then, he turns his back to it and continues to press the button. He's just out of the shower and drying himself with the hand blower. The following day I'm on the way to work. There is a new smaller camper in the small lot across from the trail head. It's not long before I'm down the trail and approaching a big golf course past a huge strip mall. The trail is below the mall at the top of a hill. Down by the trail are a pair of benches. Both empty and clear of snow. Perfectly fine for sitting on. On either side of one of them, each in a camp chair, are a pair of ladies. Between them is an empty bench. One is telling the other, "I like online grocery shopping. Why should I spend 30 minutes in a store?" Some time this week, on my way home from work, I'm up and over the hill along the street with the gulch I mentioned. Where it turns out that I mistakenly thought suitcases were found with body parts of an unidentified white male inside. Parked in front of a home is the big silver RV trailer from this past autumn. On Wednesday, again I'm coming home along the trail. I'm passing a golf course just before I exit the trail. Laying on a metal bench is someone in a powder blue coat with a hood, shaking visibly even in the dark. Just ahead, at the trailhead, across the street the small lot is once again empty. Thursday. On the way to work, I'm rolling past the ccc camper. A few yards from this one, parked in the end of a drive, is another smaller camper. Hours later, on the way home, I see someone asleep in a pickup truck in front of the ccc camper. The cab light is on and the engine is running.
...head of Denver's Department of Public Safety [during] the George Floyd protests...said that officers faced threats... But [said of the] report into the city's handling of the protests...he'd work...to implement...recommended changes. [He's] now heading a new city initiative to nip new homeless encampments in the bud... - Westword, 1/7-13/2020
Friday. I'm headed to work, turning onto the street with the open field. Parked at the curb is a previous trailer. After work, I'm home when I see a post on Facebook. An arrest has been made in the discovery of the dead young guy in suitcases. The post mentions evidence related to the crime was discovered during a "medical call" to a residence some thirty-five blocks north of where I live. It turns out that the gulch where the cases were found is, in fact, not past where I ride home each evening, but just down the street from where I live. Saturday. Again I'm turning down the street with the open field on my way to work. There at the curb is yet a different camper. This one I immediately recognize from last summer's homeless RV camp. The hand painting on the entirety of the exterior is undeniably distinctive. It's proof positive that the former camp has dispersed to parts including my side of town. I make it to work before snowflakes begin floating down. It snows throughout the day with a few inches on the ground by midafternoon when I leave work. I approach the trailhead knowing that ice in under the snow in this spot. I slip and fall anyway. Half way to the connecting trail, I go down on my ass, landing on my back, right where I know there also is more ice. Once I'm off this section of trail, the snow appears not to have accumulated. Earlier this morning, I got to work early for a take out breakfast. As I waited inside, the familiar family and local atmosphere. The manager mentions to the staff that the wife of a regular customer passed away. The place is full of the middle-aged and elderly along with their families, and it's full of chatter and residents who all recognize each other. The manager I know and caters perfectly to this crowd. On Sunday, late in the morning, I'm on my way to a particular grocery chain. I stop at a diner along the way, the one with the orange booths and waitresses in white. A week and a half ago, both the governor and mayor of Denver have allowed restaurants to reopen for dining inside. This morning, a pair of young couples are at a table. Who knows how long they've been sequestered. They don't strike me as hipsters. One guy looks like a skinhead from the early 1980s. The other guy is in a Hawaiian shirt and has a shaggy perm dyed orange. The place has always served an eclectic cross section and loud with voices of those who pulled in off the highway out front.. What a contrast to yesterday's breakfast.
...the visitant history, sometimes...tangible... The voices of the long-withered dead were nearly audible in the late-night hum: Nazi SS soldiers drunk in the ballroom, partisan spies whispering of revolution... ...I...made it out of the city at precisely what would have been rush hour anywhere else in the world. But once...past the suburbs... The tollbooth attendant seemed shocked to see a car when I pulled up... As I crept the car through the vivid destruction, a lone man stood...in front of...a pile of broken bricks and rubble at his feet, and he was...wondering where to start cleaning or whether it was even worth it. A grey cow skull was hung over the building's front door, twisting like a nefarious wind chime. A brand-new hand railing on the bridge with a sharp coat of blue paint does nothing but make the ruin more acute. ...the Hotel Grmac. ...a television's blue radiance weakly shining through. There, a lone man sat in the dark at a table for six, watching TV with the sound off. Cigarette smoke bunched around him in a neon cloud... "Dobro veche" (Good evening), I said at last. Hotel Grmac was cheap and pathetic, but...somewhat endearing. The stairs...at every ninety-degree turn...a full stand-up ashtray slumped in the corner. The lights on the second floor didn't work. - The Road to Kosovo, by G. Campbell, 1999
The arrival of nearby Coors Field and the delivered-on promise of redevelopment in the neighborhood felt, in retrospect, like the beginning of the end. "...musicians...shouldn't have to time their sets around baseball innings... ...we shouldn't have to be worried about our safety when it's time to leave. Denver's outgrown us." "There was nothing around here. Just a few guys laying on the street..." "It didn't matter...what your lot in life was, if you had enough money to buy a beer...you were welcome."
The year 2020... Imagine...making an offer on a $600,000 home...$50,000 over and that still losing out. ...the traditional bungalows...the most sought-after home type in Denver. ...shot up in value over 20% - an amount I've never seen in my 20 years in this business. Neighborhoods that only a few years ago had never seen a million dollar sale were now having dozens. - Washington Park Profile, 1/2021
Monday. On the way home after sunset. On the street just south of mine, a camper has returned. The following morning, I'm on the way to work. Just past a golf course which begins at the trailhead is the street with the ccc camper. The other camper at the end of a street some yards behind it has moved to a spot along this same curb. Between these two, a third camper has joined them. Is this a new homeless RV camp? On the ride home after sunset, I'm coming along a section of trail between a couple of golf coursers. It's a long stretch with woods and the river on one side and a thoroughfare on the other. In the middle of the trail, I come upon a shopping cart piled high with crap. Fortunately, I spot the black cart in the dark because I have a pair of headlamps. Off into the woods is a guy having a smoke. he comes out and moves out of the way. In the dark, he looks like a young twenty-something. Around the bend, I'm about to come out of this stretch. Another guy is walking slowly down the middle of the trail. He spots my headlamps from behind. Across a bridge and under a street, and I'm rolling past a playground. On the other side of the trail here is the street with the trio of campers. This evening there are now four of them here. I exit the trail and approach the street with the open field. Leading the other traffic toward the top of a hill is a camper. On Wednesday, on the way to work, I bypass the street with the open field. It's not until I'm on the way home after work that I'm on this street. The camper is gone. Thursday, on the way home after work. Just before the golf course before the trailhead. Are there now 5 campers here? In the dark, a few people are milling about them. There appears to be some collective activity here, one camper with it's hood up. The following morning, I'm coming right back past here, this time on the way to work. Four of the five campers, the ones parked end to end last night, are all gone this morning. Later on, just south of here, I'm coming across a bridge in the dark on the way home from work. I come upon an individual wearing a blanket and a knit cap, pushing a shopping cart piled high as they shuffle across from the other side. Saturday morning. I'm out of the door earlier than I am during the week. I'm speeding down a hill toward the street with the open field. I almost miss the pair of campers now parked on this street, next to an electrical substation. Where the silver 1950s camper used to sit. At the bottom of one of the campers is a running generator. A good hour later and I'm well into a connecting trail to work. I'm climbing a steep hill toward the stretch of trail which parallels a big park space at the bottom of a taller hill across a field. At the top of the hill, just across the creek, is the waterpark shut down for the season. At the top of the rise of the trail, a lone homeless guy stands. He stands motionless in the middle of the trail. He stares silently at a scratch ticket in one of his hands.
Sunday. I need a few groceries, I need to send a package for a previous tenant back through the mail, and I'm going downtown for lunch. For the first time since this summer. The errant package barely fits in the postal box. The pedestrian mall is busier than it has been since the past spring. The brief time between last year's first and second shutdown, I ate out where I was served in Styrofoam containers and with plastic cutlery, and a Styrofoam drink cup. A week ago as well as this afternoon, I eat upon real plates. Toward the end of my meal, three people come in, including a young guy in a T-shirt with the following on the back, "Freedom has a nice ring, and a bit of a recoil." After they are seated, I hear the young guy speak in a voice several years too young for him. "It's against the law to carry a firearm while wearing a mask," he says to the other two. "Isn't that sickening?" After lunch, I head back down the mall toward the supermarket. I hear what at first I think are a couple of homeless arguing with each other. I spot an employee of a shop on the mall. She's standing and holding open the door to the shop. She's yelling at a security officer out on the mall, telling her that she and her fellow security officers, "don't do shit." I'm assuming that she's complaining about undesirables in and/or around her establishment. The security guard is repeating to her, "That's not my job." We are on the block with the 7-Eleven which is host to a parade of street folk. I stop into Starbuck's for a quick snack. The Krispy Kreme next door did not survive the past year. I haven't seen this Starbucks open since the previous spring. I swing by my old gym to see if it's back open. It has the same notices from last year and is locked up. I'm right next to the train station, and I have new transit system ride coupons for the new year. I take the train for a couple of stations. I run into an old coworker from years past, the same one I ran into last year. We ride the bus home together.
I had driven from life and vibrancy into death and despair, into a town that had been "cleansed"... ...buildings that lurked like crazy animals in overgrown glades...with groaning whispers of pain and torture... The only people there were the unseen dead... ...this bog of wraiths and spooks... - Campbell
On Monday morning, I get a late start. I decide to take the train to the gym. We take a bridge over the Christmas tree lot with the new homeless RV camp. But a single trailer remains. And on the way home, upon the street with the previous five campers, the final remaining one is now gone. The following morning, I'm rolling down the trail to work, along a stretch of what's left of the river with a line of trees. Walking my direction is a guy yelling at the world. I don't remember the last guy doing just this, who I've seen on this trail. The following evening I'm again on my way home. I notice there is a single trailer back on the curb of the street with the open field. This is where I turn up a hill, on a street past a tiny park space. Running along this small park, just down to the next street, is a little drive wide enough for a single vehicle. In the dark, I can see a pickup truck coming slowly out of this drive. It's a beat up vehicle, and it's pulling an old pop up tent trailer, which has been converted into a makeshift flatbed trailer. Both the bed of the pickup and the makeshift trailer are loaded with what appears to be scrap metal. I follow it up to the next street, where it turns and disappears. It must have pulled into another nearby open field. On Friday morning, I stop into a clinic just down the boulevard from home. I'm picking up my first prescription from Medicaid. I stand in line watching a middle-aged Hispanic female patient at a window. On the other side is a Caucasian guy in a shirt and tie. She tells him her machine she uses as a diabetic isn't working, and that she must borrow another machine from a friend. He asks her how she is using it. She replies that she's been a diabetic for 30 years and she knows what she's dong. Later on, along my ride home from work, I'm turning off the street with the open field, and up a hill. At the top is a camper.
Saturday. This morning I'm turning onto the street with the open field. I can see that last evening's camper at the top of the hill has gone around the block, and is tucked in behind the trailer. The camper has a flat front left tire. A turn down another street and I'm on the trail. After the golf course and the lane formerly with the five campers just beyond, I cross what's left of the river. The trail parallels a busy thoroughfare. I watch as a homeless camper which I recognize passes by. The driver is wearing a yellow coat, and he appears as less homeless than perhaps a city worker. Is this camper being confiscated by the city? The ride home after work is unexpected. i don't know if this Saturday is significant, but this particular trail is full of cyclists. On Sunday, I decide that I need a handful of particular groceries from a certain supermarket, and to turn it into a reason to have lunch at yet another recently reopened restaurant. Modest as it is. It's a little Denny's along the way. I'm across my boulevard and along the park there. 'Tis another chilly day. At a far corner of the park is a camper. I'm on the bike which I used to ride to work. My new one is a "large," which I found out is the size I should have had all along. The one I'm on today, as well as the one I had before it, are both mediums. And the difference is ridiculous. This one now feels tiny. But it still gets me where I'm going on weekends. I hook up with the trail, just long enough to get me under the busy avenue. Just before I exit the trail, I spot a couple of homeless coming the other way. Both are dressed from head to toe in black. One pushes his bicycle (as so many do). He stops to pick up something which catches his eye. I climb the off ramp and am across the street from Denny's. On this side of the avenue is a big empty lot, where a line of homeless tents sometimes appear. But I am shocked to see Denny's expansive parking lot. It sports three campers and a tent. The corner has an off ramp from a highway, and is a favorite of panhandling couples. Including a couple here today. A motorcycle revs its engine at the red light. The guy, with wild hair and growth of beard, begins waving his arms. "I love Harleys," he tells the lady.
During the past week, I noticed that the end of my townhome complex closest to the now finished brand new Vietnamese grocery building has a brand new section of chain link fence. The parking lot for the new grocery has it's own shorter chain link fence, opposite the drive next to our new fence. I've since seen a couple of homeless wandering along the short length of ours. This weekend, I saw a homeless woman in a camouflaged coat come along toward the Chinese place. I was leaving from there myself and waiting for traffic to cross back over my street when I saw her also with food from there. She was waiting to cross as well, but she never seemed satisfied that the street was clear enough for her to cross. I cross during a clear spell and leave her there.
I wheeled through the littered streets...under dusty trees, past the colorless people trudging along with balled fists... The front doors were open...but the doorway was a narrow fit, like the dimensions of a coffin. The stairs were dusty with pulverized plaster, and the distinct ammonia smell of urine... From somewhere up above came the refracted sound of [heavy metal band] Metallica. All the mailboxes had been ripped out, and...two bare wires...where the foyer light should have been. ...the hallway was clogged with garbage... The roof had caved in above, raining, raining rebar and concrete slabs onto stairs, pieces of red tile crunching underfoot like spilled cereal. There was a red swastika painted on [the door to an apartment], signifying the Ustashe, the Croatian insurgency that had sided with Nazi Germany during World War II. - Campbell
On Monday, I'm rolling to work down the trail, past a second golf course I refer to as golf course #1. I happen to glance across the expanse of this course to the west. It continues past a line of trees. But, just beyond the trees, I see a pair of trailers. Homeless? Well, the smattering of flakes continue to blow in. I'm back at this same spot, and I take a detour to the other side of the river to see if I can find these trailers. I've never been over on this side. The trail goes up to a small lot surrounded by a chain link fence. The lot is up on a hill above the trail. There are indeed a neat row of trailers. None of them appear to be run down at all. This appears to be some kind of parking for camper trailers. The rest of my ride to work is uneventful. I decided it's just cold enough for my ski pants, and I'm wondering if I dressed too warm. The ride home after work is another story entirely. With the temperature dropping, I'm eventually onto the trail. Tiny flakes are blowing sideways. I employ my trusty safety glasses. This snow is not at all deep, but I don't recall anything like it. It's below freezing, and the snow itself is slippery. It appears to be layered in frozen drifts. Simply by going too fast, I begin to fishtail. This means I must be careful not to even decelerate while making the slightest turn, but to brake only in straight lines and turn as slow as possible. I pass two separate intrepid cyclists on the way home. On the stretch of trail between golf courses, the snow becomes a little deeper, and I must slow down as I feel the traction slipping. Toward the trailhead, all I'm doing is cruising along straight, and suddenly I lose traction. I don't recover before I'm on the ground. It almost happens again before I exit the trail. It takes me an extra 45 minutes to make it home. I call my boss, who generously agrees to give me a lift to work tomorrow. Of all days, I'm working open to close tomorrow. I prefer not to think about how early I would have to get up just to make it on time otherwise.
Wednesday. The snow stopped. My boss and his wife haul myself and my bike to work. I sneak over to the pancake house for a take out breakfast. I wait for the waiter to run my card. Sitting at a table is a dad and his five sons, ranging in age from grade school to teenaged. The four oldest are all wearing bland-colored hoodies, on a morning when it's six degrees F. They appear still groggy with sleep. The youngest is going on about not being able to see his "favorite TV show," whatever that is. The five sons are in stark contrast to the young dad, with manicured hair and a black two piece suit. He's focused on his phone, and must have a Bluetooth because he's having a conversation with someone not in the restaurant. "That's great input," he says, "I appreciate that." The following morning, I'm on my way to work. Overnight was 10 degrees F. The high is supposed yo be 58. I'm turning onto the street next to the open field. There is the specter of something i saw earlier this month. It was along a ride home after sundown. I was climbing the hill just a block from where I am this morning. That evening in the dark, I thought I saw a broken down pickup truck pulling what appeared an Starcraft pop up trailer, with the tent top removed. It appeared to have been converted into a flat trailer, filled with scrap metal. It emerged, strangely, from a path along a small open field. That evening, I followed this truck pull the makeshift trailer up to the next street, turn, and disappear. It may have turned onto a drive along another open field. Well, this morning, not only a single converted trailers piled with scrap metal is parked along the same curb as the pair of trailers. There are two converted Starcraft pop up tents with the tents gone and piles of scrap metal. At the end of a line of these two scrap-filled converted trailers, and two camper trailers, is not the broken down pickup truck but a much newer pickup truck. A female stands next to it. Walking down the sidewalk, from the open door of one camper trailer toward her, is a guy. This evening, as I turn back onto this street on the way home, one of the scrap-filled converted trailers is gone. The following morning, I turn back down this street, right past the last remaining Starcraft. I can see that the pop up ten hasn't been removed. It's still underneath its metal cap. The scrap metal is piled on top. The other one, perhaps it also has it's tent inside as well. I just can't imagine that much junk piled on top of a flat surface and it remaining there. The following morning, I'm turning back onto this street. The last Starcraft is gone. both trailers are gone, and a single camper remains.
...polished grants don't necessarily mean an organization is tied to the community or is all that effective... ...with their...paper and video reports...nonprofit leaders...contorting themselves into pretzels to meet foundations' requests. They field endless questions from grant managers [about] not spending enough time acknowledging the funders on social media or...produce photos, videos and blog posts - all without a budget. "[We] fill in the gaps [where] the government cannot and will not fill. We're working in every intersection of our communities... ...doing what we've always done. Serving. Protecting. Building. Dreaming. And keeping our communities alive and whole." Foundations need to look...whether they're...just hoarding wealth that the community needs to survive...
As citizens, we need to recognize that collective liberation is the only liberation and take hold, inconvenient action to improve the lives of those around us. ...it is our collective duty to try and fail, and try again, continuously. ...countless organizations...have an understanding of the right thing to do, yet they take no action because they don't want to make waves. They feel that they should wait until no one will be offended to stand up for what is good. Well, that day is never going to come... - Westword, 1/28-2/3/2021
Sunday. I bought a ticket to an exhibition at a museum downtown, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver, or MOCAD, It opened in October, and between then and now, the museums and other businesses shut down briefly before opening again. My scheduled museum visit is 10 AM, so I'm out of the door in the morning. Headed for downtown, I turn down a hill on the way toward the bike trail. I just happen to notice, tucked along a corner of one residential intersection...a Starcraft pop-up trailer. It has no scrap metal on top of it, but the metal cover is dirty. It's along the curb, next to a black pickup I saw along the curb with the pair of Starcrafts. We aren't that far from the street with the open field, but this is the opposite direction from my path to work, which is why I find this interesting. I stop into the supermarket downtown for an onion before I hit the museum. I notice a screw is missing from one side of my bike, where the bike rack connects to the bike frame. I'm on my oldest bike. This particular screw was too narrow and held in place with a wing nut. I can't say I'm surprised it's gone. When I'm out of the supermarket, I carry my bike lock in my small pack instead of laying it back on the rack and held with a bungee cord. I make the museum appointment, and after I grab lunch at Chilis downtown. They have a Santa Fe chicken crispers salad I like. When I finish, my waitress laughs. She tells me that no one ever finishes a salad at Chilis. Really? At a restaurant with multiple TV screens with sports, where presumably the patrons appreciate athletics and perhaps healthy food...such as salad? Am I in the wrong ethnicity? No, I'm just old. Soon, I'm out of downtown and at a shopping center with a hardware store. In one entire quarter of this huge parking lot, with a supermarket and an office supply store, is some kind of street racing car meet. There's no racing going on in the lot, but every parking space of this corner is filled with street racing vehicles. Teens and twentysomethings are milling about. I take my bike into the hardware store. A wonderful young woman finds the exact screw and nut I need, and puts it on for me. Shit, just as good as a bike shop. And it cost me pocket change. After the ride home I sneak into my Vietnamese beautician's shop for a quick haircut. We discuss the old time barber shop opening next to where I work. I tell her not to worry about losing a customer. And tomorrow is a new month. And I have no clue where this month went to. Before I know it, the summer will be here. And I have more than one medical check up I need between now and then. This year is just getting started.
