My Homeless Notes (YMMV)
It's amazing how fast you can fall off the "norm" of having a place and be in a new world. The days suck, the nights crawl by slowly and I could see how one might easily turn to drugs or drinking as a palliative.
January, February, March I stayed in a friend's house which was empty because they were spending the winter in Florida. This was great, although the small town is dark and isolated during these months. April I spent in an extra bedroom at another friend's house. May, June, July, August, and September I lived in a tent and out of my car. Here's what I learned about being homeless.
You need a place to store things. I put a few plastic buckets in a friend's basement. I left the rest in my car. The back-left seat was clean clothes, the back-right seat was dirty clothes.
Things I miss while living in the tent: refrigeration, food at will, available drinking water, a place to relax, security, civilized conversation, Internet, having access to a printer, NPR, respectability. I paid a lot of attention to weather forecasts. I learned the locations of available bathrooms. There is no leisure time, every hour is something you work at. Nobody knows where to find you, you're in the wind.
Things I rely on: a network of friends willing to store a box, or invite me to their social events. My car, which started every time I needed it to.
I certainly relied on my tent and sleeping bag. The tent did deteriorate and tear in months of continual use, and I patched in here, and patched it there, and I could see how in a few more months it might have more patches than original material.
Things I got used to: Being scruffy. Being outside the norm. People wondering about me.
Eating is much more expensive being homeless. You're continually getting single meals in shops.
One continual challenge was trash management and disposal. You go to the city stadiums and see rows of portapotties and trash cans. Homeless people need that, too; not just suburbanites.
Things that were better for me: I drank a lot more water and a lot less Diet Coke. I lost weight.
If anything breaks or disappears, you have to replace it or do without. There's no spare things. It's forced minimalism. You have to travel to get things.
You can't have anything sent to you. General Delivery via the USPS works at times, but in my experience it's hit-and-miss.
You have to take good care of your feet, and you have to dry out if you can when you get rained on. If you get sick, even just a head cold, it's a really big deal. The person who wrote, Summertime and the Living is Easy got it right. Summertime is much easier than the cold months.
It just sucks. It's easy to fall into, and complex to get out of.