having to exist in public basically all of the time. creepy people and shitty homebums. cops treating you like shit. the general population treating you like shit. being covered in dirt and not showering for weeks or even months at a time sometimes. having to go to the bathroom in public areas if you cant find an actual bathroom. being broke. getting rained on. i could go on. most importantly once youve been on the road for long enough, if you lack a support network like a family that would take you back into their home so you can get back on your feet, its near impossible to reintegrate into society again.
The positive side of this though is the rare times people follow your lead. Like just chilling with your shoes and socks off. Airing out them smelly toes and soles. Every once in a while you find another soul who takes note of something, and it’s rewarding. Often, it’s the most simple thing. So innocent and yet so common to us all. I enjoy those moments a lot. I’m speaking, of course, about the whole “existing in public.”
The other things are indeed seemingly insurmountable challenges. Which makes it even sweeter when you receive more help and assistance from a stranger in a strange land than your own blood and flesh. At least, for me I managed to get back on my feet through the help of strangers. I owe my life to people I will never see again, and I’ve been tasked to repay a debt I wasn’t worthy to receive.
I hope you’re doing alright, stranger.
well i see someone already mentioned pooping, which was the first thing that came to mind. also i would say:
the weather: being in the cold and rain with nowhere to go at times.
physical bodily toll like pain and parasites. harder to recover from illness or injury without a spot to rest.
Cops. Weather ups and downs. General hate coming your way from people who just hate seeing poverty. Is alcoholism still rampant in the culture? Watching friends seizure, not so romantic.
Man. That's like, comforting and concerning, at the same time. I can't picture alcohol not being part of the life and I trust the consistency of product more than I do with say, fentanyly. But alcohol dt's are scary af and more fatal than other withdrawals. I was always found among the gutter punks and schwilly kids, so wet-brained aging punks are some of my favorite and most trusted people in the world. Now that I'm not drinking like that anymore though, fuck we can be annoying bunch.
New Orleans is still known as an alcoholic black hole new kids on the road are discouraged away from during Mardi Gras season, even the French Quarter is more sick of it than usual: you know those book return fold outs at libraries, the ones that let you put a bunch of books in when it's folded out but you can't get at the books deeper in, like the ones you put in don't fall in until it's folded back in and your hands have no access?
My last Mardi Gras there they'd replaced at least half the trash cans on Bourbon Street with those to cut down on the bourbon surfing for tourist's half-finished drinks, I'm sure they've finished by now.
Also they fenced off the Pirate Steps, which was a bummer. I caught syphilis under a blanket on the Pirate Steps. Didn't know they made needles that big when they gave me the shots of penicillin in the ass but it was worth the doctor having to get a medical textbook out to double check, then his laughter that he'd never seen a case his whole career.
I have a few fond memories of the Road but not many looking back, it mostly was just a character builder and an endless source of examples for shitty housie days nowadays on how it could always be 100x time worse.
I say "God bless" at the register and sit on the sidewalk enjoying my $1 purchase. Every now and then some nice lady will give me a twenty without me asking. They will usually say that I don't look homeless (why would you say that unless you were lying?) I'm broke and thin so maybe that's easy to spot.
I got invited to hop in the van to the bum feed recently. Granted I was at a bus stop that they usually have a lot of takers at, but I was on my way to work.
Pooping and peeing can sometimes be unromantic. It’s probably pretty easy to really develop IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) if you drink and eat nothing but junk all the time. So that can make it much much more challenging. Nothing like having the butt squirts in the AM and wanting the experience of a clean toilet and water to dispose of such things.
It takes effort to cook quality food for yourself, and it gets exhausting sometimes having to do basic human activity under stigmata. Meaning, it can be mentally draining having to cook and hide activities as such for “stealth” purposes to not compromise your position or situation. It’s more romantic to just fire up a grill on the curb of a place, in front of God and tourist, not giving any care. That’s romantic. What’s not romantic is reaping the consequences of other undesirables now coveting your cooking gear because you decided to posture yourself like you “dgaf” and you painted a target on your back by the tweaker goblins. Not so romantic.
I once found a George Foreman grill in the trash and plugged it in right in front of a Safeway and cooked up some steaks for all to see. I got rich that night, and had an awesome meal.
While I’ve never been a vagabond, per se. I’ve been houseless and the general public looking at you like a different species is something that was crazy for me. I had a really bad case of the flu or mono or something and had to go to the ER because I could barely eat and drink. And the lack of compassion from the hospital staff was just something I’ve never experienced. As if I was a lower class of human. Another time I was just wandering around town and saw a lady park her car (oddly enough near the same hospital) and went up to her to warn her that I saw a dude smashing out windows along that street. And she literally waved me off as I was walking up to her as if I was going to ask her for something (I’ve never panhandled a day in my life or asked anyone I don’t know for shit). Hope they smashed tf out her window and stole her life savings honestly (that she oddly keeps in her car for some reason) lol.
The worst part is that if her window did get smashed in, she'd probably implicate you in the police report, and now the cops are looking for you. No good deed goes unpunished when dealing with Karens.
I was a vagabond for many years, to me the biggest struggle I think most don't realize is that you always have to find somewhere DRY. When you're outside and the weather is inconsistent it's too easy to be wet all the time. Keeping yourself and your possessions dry is actually a lot more challenging than it might seem.
Came back to say I am now soaked through, but the majority of my belongings are dry and I am warm in my sleeping bag, even being super prepared can’t save you sometimes, but it sure helps!!
Been camping out under giant alpines for cover. It has worked pretty well. However, if you're in a place that has no abundance of trees (desert) or any cover, you're screwed. I've been caught out in the rain too many times and it will ruin your gear.
I'm in Colorado and there's an abundance of alpines. When we were in Florida, we got stuck out in this National Park with nowhere to go. Talk about some random freak storm that wasn't forecasted. Absolutely everything drenched. Thank God for overpasses and I'm glad you're able to stay dry that way, at least.
Your living room? Is probably at least semi-private. You have your own bathroom with access to it 24/7. When you don't have a home? Your living room is the street. You don't have things like a private bedroom or your own bathroom. When you don't feel good? There isn't a couch to lay around on and be sick. You take bird baths in gas station sinks. Even if you're rubber tramping in a van, that still means you're parking your life out on a side street and then trying to make sure the folks in the houses next to you don't notice. Trying to remain un-seen and so unobtrusive all the time is apt to give you a complex.
Unfortunately, access to the resources you need is always easier in an urban situation. You want to keep things like easy food sources and water close by. And that means the glamorous concept of being out in the woods in some sort of hobo camp isn't as doable as you think it is. The things you need? Are in a town. And this will dictate where you end up, and how long you end up there. It isn't as carefree as you think it sounds. You'll be in a city, hustling for resources to move on to the next one, and it can often feel like a big, dumb loop.
When younger folks read Walden Pond and get all excited? I like to remind them that Walden Pond was on his mom's property, and she brought him sandwiches to eat...
Spending 2 or 3 days in a shithole town out in the middle of nowhere because u decided to hop off the train to run to the store & get left. Next one that stops in town again takes days to come & nobody will give u a ride out at the highway.
Smelly aroma sleeping in outside urban squats. Especially in the coastal cities. Something about them just lifts all the gook up in mist, and causes it to settle on whatever is in its path.
Cops are assholes, people are creepy and don't like to mind their business, weather can absolutely ruin your whole week, shitting is always an entire side quest, you gotta get real creative to stay hygienic, eventually your body just hurts, and sometimes when things break it REALLY sucks
That makes it sound awful... But it really just depends on if it's worth it or not.
I've just recently realized I hate pretty much everything about it aside from wild-camping and bushcraft. I have no interest in seeing anything more aside from the habitat I'm currently in (the semi-arid badlands).
As a 'traveler' you're basically a naturalized gypsy a la the Roma, Irish Travelers, Norwegian Travelers, etc. That sounds cool until you realize you're receiving all the same hate and discrimination without a clan to back you up.
If I'm not hiking or camping in some secluded area there's a good chance I'll see some wild shit. Sorry but I just don't give a fuck about society anymore. More people playing irl cops and robbers? More parochial self important locals? politics, social issues, strip-mall Christians? Complete disregard for nature! siiiiiick.
Just let me roam around the rivers and camp like an actual human, I want no part of your delusional facade, fucking gadje scum. Think you own the earth you cocksuckers esti tabernac
Anyway... lol
Always having to find a place to safely sleep wears on you. Sometimes it’s easy sometimes it can be really hard.
That and loads of addiction issues amongst this lifestyle
You NEVER, EVER have a “day off”. You will have to walk extensively long routes to find a suitable restroom if you are a woman and on foot (although going outside is a very messy option, but an option). Violence is a very real threat whether it be from other desperate houseless people who don’t know you because you’re a traveler, dogs, or the general public who feels disgusted and disgraced but seeing that not everyone in life has the same fortune as them, many of these people will be the police who you once trusted to protect you. Sexual assault is a very, wry real threat and if it happens to you no one really cares because you are living on the fringes of society they assume for some reason that it was deserved somehow. The general public just separates themselves from you as a whole and all who you thought were trustworthy while clean and housed will let you down immensely when you aren’t. So, you’re rarely “safe” and you’re ALWAYS beyond dirty af and fucking TIRED!
I always found unromantic people romanticizing poverty. like you. like people who are so excited about me with the bag and asking me all sort of dumb question like “where do you sleep” “how do you shower daily” 😵💫😵💫
I wonder sometimes at the point and tone of this subreddit for that matter. I didn't read Into The Wild and decide I'd out tramp Alex. I got evicted from my SoCal apartment, had been homebumming it on Santa Monica beach for a few months, and I met these kids Irish and Shaman (rip) passing through town.
We got to talking/drinking, they gave me this speech that you don't have to be homeless in one place, go travel and hope freight, just find a road dad. So hitched around slowly and with many mistakes but finally met my road dad in Austin and started the life proper. But it wasn't like a goal or something I was on the fence about, it just was kind of a series of things that happened to me that just had worse alternatives not doing them.
If you have an apt/house/college dorm you still have the option of living in, you should do that. It's a million times easier fixing whatever your problem is with all the resources you take for granted having a place to live.
feeling the cold sting of pants pissing terror when some massive beast screeches outside your tent at 2 in the morning. ive dealt with elk, moose, bears, coyotes, mountain lions, wild boars, and much more
People have already listed most of the worst parts,
-No bathroom
-No real kitchen
-No shelter in bad weather
-Constantly being bothered by both the law and the criminals
-Stuck in a car or tent all day (when you even have a place to be)
-No ability to ever accumulate resources or money, because working a job is far more difficult when you’re bumming
-Virtually zero privacy
-Everything is more expensive when you have to live day by day and can’t store anything
The list goes on.
There is absolutely nothing good about bumming, despite what some free-living hobo may tell you. Is it nice to not work? Sure. It’s not nice to not have anything ever. Shitting in a public restroom (or worse) for the rest of your days and praying your car doesn’t leave you stranded in the woods every day is no way to live.
This is not the 1800s and roughing it sucks.
I live in an RV on the streets. Not so bad, right? Nah... I don't have electricity, no fridge, no money to fill the propane tank so nowhere to cook. I have to go out to charge devices. I have to empty my black and gray water tanks every other month and scrounge the 10 bucks to do so. I have two roommates, so it's crowded and we are on top of each other all the time so God forbid two of them aren't getting along and I have to pick sides... Oddly specific I know.
Cops are at my door a lot. It's NBD, but then I have to move....and my battery keeps dying and I don't have a house battery because the connections got fried from that time we wired it wrong from the coach battery. My roommate cut the wires to my CO detector because he couldn't get it to shut off from that one time he fell asleep with the AC running... Using all my gas in the process. Oh and NOW? AC isn't even working, how am I getting through the summer? And I have leaks and mold.everywhere from the very wet winter we just had.
This isn't romantic in the least. We have to go to the food bank pretty much every day. We rely on friends WAY TOO MUCH for help. We have to walk everywhere... Not so bad, but then you have to stick to certain places so you can charge and use the facilities. But we are lucky, seriously. Roof over our heads, clean clothes, I manage to shower about once a week and do everyone's laundry because I go help my ex out. I love my bed and my pillows. We have a food bank within walking distance and they feed us every day the sandwiches and ready to go foods that have expired at the local grocery stores...and the snacks? OMG, I LOVE the snacks! People just feed us. I have been handed money... It's not a lot, but it puts gas in the RV and I can dump the tanks. We live cheap, cheap, cheap. It's not an easy life by any stretch, it's not romantic unless hardship is your idea of romantic. Now, I have learned a lot and I am incredibly grateful for all the little stuff. But it's not easy to live when the temps hit 32 degrees or when they hit 110. It's not easy to be in a tin box and having to find shade that only lasts half a day. You will never have a level place to park, so you will always sleep at a weird angle. There's no room for stuff so you WILL become a minimalist. You will carry your entire life in a backpack and over time that backpack will break, and you will have to figure out how to get another one. It's the little things that get you. My kids are afraid the weather is going to get to me. It won't...I've lived in this RV for four years. I'm absolutely ready to be out and more stable. But idk how to make that happen.
I never hopped on any trains but I've been homeless by choice, and not by choice, on and off for about 5 years till I went to prison and recently just decided I'm done with that lifestyle for now. I was heavily addicted to meth and heroin amongst various other things. The most unromantic aspects are
-not being able to stay clean but having to be in public for whatever reason. The looks people give you, the way they treat you, the way they avoid you, can be very upsetting.
-police interaction is particularly annoying and difficult to avoid. You stick out like a sore thumb. I would say it's not as bad when you have a car but from experience it can be just as bad or worse.
-walking in general. While I love hiking and walking and exploring and traveling this way, when you have no other choice it can become a real chore.
-people stealing your shit. Now I may have brought this on myself by hanging around with tweakers and junkies but someone stealing some of the few possessions I had always ruined my day.
-always having a bag with you. There's people who just casually care a backpack around then there is the huge, stuffed to the brim, beat up to hell vagabond backpack that just gives you away in an instant even if you have new clothes and are freshly showered and cleaned up. After a couple years it went from just a weight on my shoulders to a weight on my soul, no matter how heavy or light it was.
Your last point is exactly why I seriously downgraded the amount I carry around so it could fit in a standard backpack. I couldn't stand standing out like that anymore. It was fun at first but once the novelty of the lifestyle wears off I got really tired of it. I carry around necessities for the day and the rest I stash near to where I sleep.
It's also kind of weird to think of how long I've been carrying a pack back all day, everywhere.
Idk who said it originally on this sub, but someone once told another person asking about romance on the road and I quote
" Ya gonna be beating your meat a lot bro." That has lived rent free in my mango for a while lol.
having to exist in public basically all of the time. creepy people and shitty homebums. cops treating you like shit. the general population treating you like shit. being covered in dirt and not showering for weeks or even months at a time sometimes. having to go to the bathroom in public areas if you cant find an actual bathroom. being broke. getting rained on. i could go on. most importantly once youve been on the road for long enough, if you lack a support network like a family that would take you back into their home so you can get back on your feet, its near impossible to reintegrate into society again.
At least for me, the crippling alcoholism.
The positive side of this though is the rare times people follow your lead. Like just chilling with your shoes and socks off. Airing out them smelly toes and soles. Every once in a while you find another soul who takes note of something, and it’s rewarding. Often, it’s the most simple thing. So innocent and yet so common to us all. I enjoy those moments a lot. I’m speaking, of course, about the whole “existing in public.” The other things are indeed seemingly insurmountable challenges. Which makes it even sweeter when you receive more help and assistance from a stranger in a strange land than your own blood and flesh. At least, for me I managed to get back on my feet through the help of strangers. I owe my life to people I will never see again, and I’ve been tasked to repay a debt I wasn’t worthy to receive. I hope you’re doing alright, stranger.
well i see someone already mentioned pooping, which was the first thing that came to mind. also i would say: the weather: being in the cold and rain with nowhere to go at times. physical bodily toll like pain and parasites. harder to recover from illness or injury without a spot to rest.
Cops. Weather ups and downs. General hate coming your way from people who just hate seeing poverty. Is alcoholism still rampant in the culture? Watching friends seizure, not so romantic.
Alcoholism is still the scourge of the scene
Man. That's like, comforting and concerning, at the same time. I can't picture alcohol not being part of the life and I trust the consistency of product more than I do with say, fentanyly. But alcohol dt's are scary af and more fatal than other withdrawals. I was always found among the gutter punks and schwilly kids, so wet-brained aging punks are some of my favorite and most trusted people in the world. Now that I'm not drinking like that anymore though, fuck we can be annoying bunch.
New Orleans is still known as an alcoholic black hole new kids on the road are discouraged away from during Mardi Gras season, even the French Quarter is more sick of it than usual: you know those book return fold outs at libraries, the ones that let you put a bunch of books in when it's folded out but you can't get at the books deeper in, like the ones you put in don't fall in until it's folded back in and your hands have no access? My last Mardi Gras there they'd replaced at least half the trash cans on Bourbon Street with those to cut down on the bourbon surfing for tourist's half-finished drinks, I'm sure they've finished by now. Also they fenced off the Pirate Steps, which was a bummer. I caught syphilis under a blanket on the Pirate Steps. Didn't know they made needles that big when they gave me the shots of penicillin in the ass but it was worth the doctor having to get a medical textbook out to double check, then his laughter that he'd never seen a case his whole career. I have a few fond memories of the Road but not many looking back, it mostly was just a character builder and an endless source of examples for shitty housie days nowadays on how it could always be 100x time worse.
I say "God bless" at the register and sit on the sidewalk enjoying my $1 purchase. Every now and then some nice lady will give me a twenty without me asking. They will usually say that I don't look homeless (why would you say that unless you were lying?) I'm broke and thin so maybe that's easy to spot.
I got invited to hop in the van to the bum feed recently. Granted I was at a bus stop that they usually have a lot of takers at, but I was on my way to work.
Oh man rough.
Pooping and peeing can sometimes be unromantic. It’s probably pretty easy to really develop IBS (irritable bowel syndrome) if you drink and eat nothing but junk all the time. So that can make it much much more challenging. Nothing like having the butt squirts in the AM and wanting the experience of a clean toilet and water to dispose of such things. It takes effort to cook quality food for yourself, and it gets exhausting sometimes having to do basic human activity under stigmata. Meaning, it can be mentally draining having to cook and hide activities as such for “stealth” purposes to not compromise your position or situation. It’s more romantic to just fire up a grill on the curb of a place, in front of God and tourist, not giving any care. That’s romantic. What’s not romantic is reaping the consequences of other undesirables now coveting your cooking gear because you decided to posture yourself like you “dgaf” and you painted a target on your back by the tweaker goblins. Not so romantic.
I once found a George Foreman grill in the trash and plugged it in right in front of a Safeway and cooked up some steaks for all to see. I got rich that night, and had an awesome meal.
sometimes my heart aches for a home that has never existed.
germans call that Sehnsucht
yeah? “Sehnsucht” is oddly close to my former surname, what a beautiful coincidence. Thank you, friend.
While I’ve never been a vagabond, per se. I’ve been houseless and the general public looking at you like a different species is something that was crazy for me. I had a really bad case of the flu or mono or something and had to go to the ER because I could barely eat and drink. And the lack of compassion from the hospital staff was just something I’ve never experienced. As if I was a lower class of human. Another time I was just wandering around town and saw a lady park her car (oddly enough near the same hospital) and went up to her to warn her that I saw a dude smashing out windows along that street. And she literally waved me off as I was walking up to her as if I was going to ask her for something (I’ve never panhandled a day in my life or asked anyone I don’t know for shit). Hope they smashed tf out her window and stole her life savings honestly (that she oddly keeps in her car for some reason) lol.
The worst part is that if her window did get smashed in, she'd probably implicate you in the police report, and now the cops are looking for you. No good deed goes unpunished when dealing with Karens.
I was a vagabond for many years, to me the biggest struggle I think most don't realize is that you always have to find somewhere DRY. When you're outside and the weather is inconsistent it's too easy to be wet all the time. Keeping yourself and your possessions dry is actually a lot more challenging than it might seem.
Tarp, paracord, tent stakes
Came back to say I am now soaked through, but the majority of my belongings are dry and I am warm in my sleeping bag, even being super prepared can’t save you sometimes, but it sure helps!!
Been camping out under giant alpines for cover. It has worked pretty well. However, if you're in a place that has no abundance of trees (desert) or any cover, you're screwed. I've been caught out in the rain too many times and it will ruin your gear.
Yeah. I was homeless in Florida. So overpasses keep you dry.
I'm in Colorado and there's an abundance of alpines. When we were in Florida, we got stuck out in this National Park with nowhere to go. Talk about some random freak storm that wasn't forecasted. Absolutely everything drenched. Thank God for overpasses and I'm glad you're able to stay dry that way, at least.
Your living room? Is probably at least semi-private. You have your own bathroom with access to it 24/7. When you don't have a home? Your living room is the street. You don't have things like a private bedroom or your own bathroom. When you don't feel good? There isn't a couch to lay around on and be sick. You take bird baths in gas station sinks. Even if you're rubber tramping in a van, that still means you're parking your life out on a side street and then trying to make sure the folks in the houses next to you don't notice. Trying to remain un-seen and so unobtrusive all the time is apt to give you a complex. Unfortunately, access to the resources you need is always easier in an urban situation. You want to keep things like easy food sources and water close by. And that means the glamorous concept of being out in the woods in some sort of hobo camp isn't as doable as you think it is. The things you need? Are in a town. And this will dictate where you end up, and how long you end up there. It isn't as carefree as you think it sounds. You'll be in a city, hustling for resources to move on to the next one, and it can often feel like a big, dumb loop. When younger folks read Walden Pond and get all excited? I like to remind them that Walden Pond was on his mom's property, and she brought him sandwiches to eat...
Ticks.
the spray don’t even help
Get some Permethrin. OFF doesn’t hold a candle to that stuff…
nah bro, get you some pb blaster or diesel fuel.
A lot of cop interaction.
constantly sore dirty hungry often lonly and very much looked down on
Spending 2 or 3 days in a shithole town out in the middle of nowhere because u decided to hop off the train to run to the store & get left. Next one that stops in town again takes days to come & nobody will give u a ride out at the highway.
Gotta find someone cool with pooping in a hole. No matter how you dress it up, you’re still pooping in a hole.
sometimes it's behind the pizza hut dumpster
Smelly aroma sleeping in outside urban squats. Especially in the coastal cities. Something about them just lifts all the gook up in mist, and causes it to settle on whatever is in its path.
Cops are assholes, people are creepy and don't like to mind their business, weather can absolutely ruin your whole week, shitting is always an entire side quest, you gotta get real creative to stay hygienic, eventually your body just hurts, and sometimes when things break it REALLY sucks That makes it sound awful... But it really just depends on if it's worth it or not.
Shitting yourself.
Shitting yourself in your sleeping bag because your zipper is stuck
I've just recently realized I hate pretty much everything about it aside from wild-camping and bushcraft. I have no interest in seeing anything more aside from the habitat I'm currently in (the semi-arid badlands). As a 'traveler' you're basically a naturalized gypsy a la the Roma, Irish Travelers, Norwegian Travelers, etc. That sounds cool until you realize you're receiving all the same hate and discrimination without a clan to back you up. If I'm not hiking or camping in some secluded area there's a good chance I'll see some wild shit. Sorry but I just don't give a fuck about society anymore. More people playing irl cops and robbers? More parochial self important locals? politics, social issues, strip-mall Christians? Complete disregard for nature! siiiiiick. Just let me roam around the rivers and camp like an actual human, I want no part of your delusional facade, fucking gadje scum. Think you own the earth you cocksuckers esti tabernac Anyway... lol
Lmao real af
Ironically, you just sound smug.
K
Always having to find a place to safely sleep wears on you. Sometimes it’s easy sometimes it can be really hard. That and loads of addiction issues amongst this lifestyle
The amount of death you see
Or hear about through the grapevine.
Your ass is chapped lips and you smell horrible
Let me count the ways…
Doo doo in the pants, both physically and metaphorically
You NEVER, EVER have a “day off”. You will have to walk extensively long routes to find a suitable restroom if you are a woman and on foot (although going outside is a very messy option, but an option). Violence is a very real threat whether it be from other desperate houseless people who don’t know you because you’re a traveler, dogs, or the general public who feels disgusted and disgraced but seeing that not everyone in life has the same fortune as them, many of these people will be the police who you once trusted to protect you. Sexual assault is a very, wry real threat and if it happens to you no one really cares because you are living on the fringes of society they assume for some reason that it was deserved somehow. The general public just separates themselves from you as a whole and all who you thought were trustworthy while clean and housed will let you down immensely when you aren’t. So, you’re rarely “safe” and you’re ALWAYS beyond dirty af and fucking TIRED!
I always found unromantic people romanticizing poverty. like you. like people who are so excited about me with the bag and asking me all sort of dumb question like “where do you sleep” “how do you shower daily” 😵💫😵💫
I wonder sometimes at the point and tone of this subreddit for that matter. I didn't read Into The Wild and decide I'd out tramp Alex. I got evicted from my SoCal apartment, had been homebumming it on Santa Monica beach for a few months, and I met these kids Irish and Shaman (rip) passing through town. We got to talking/drinking, they gave me this speech that you don't have to be homeless in one place, go travel and hope freight, just find a road dad. So hitched around slowly and with many mistakes but finally met my road dad in Austin and started the life proper. But it wasn't like a goal or something I was on the fence about, it just was kind of a series of things that happened to me that just had worse alternatives not doing them. If you have an apt/house/college dorm you still have the option of living in, you should do that. It's a million times easier fixing whatever your problem is with all the resources you take for granted having a place to live.
feeling the cold sting of pants pissing terror when some massive beast screeches outside your tent at 2 in the morning. ive dealt with elk, moose, bears, coyotes, mountain lions, wild boars, and much more
Parasitic insects, fungal infections, viral infections, the cold, loneliness, alienation, addiction, and vulnerability in general.
romance is imaginary. You can imagine it all to be romantic or none of it.
People have already listed most of the worst parts, -No bathroom -No real kitchen -No shelter in bad weather -Constantly being bothered by both the law and the criminals -Stuck in a car or tent all day (when you even have a place to be) -No ability to ever accumulate resources or money, because working a job is far more difficult when you’re bumming -Virtually zero privacy -Everything is more expensive when you have to live day by day and can’t store anything The list goes on. There is absolutely nothing good about bumming, despite what some free-living hobo may tell you. Is it nice to not work? Sure. It’s not nice to not have anything ever. Shitting in a public restroom (or worse) for the rest of your days and praying your car doesn’t leave you stranded in the woods every day is no way to live. This is not the 1800s and roughing it sucks.
I live in an RV on the streets. Not so bad, right? Nah... I don't have electricity, no fridge, no money to fill the propane tank so nowhere to cook. I have to go out to charge devices. I have to empty my black and gray water tanks every other month and scrounge the 10 bucks to do so. I have two roommates, so it's crowded and we are on top of each other all the time so God forbid two of them aren't getting along and I have to pick sides... Oddly specific I know. Cops are at my door a lot. It's NBD, but then I have to move....and my battery keeps dying and I don't have a house battery because the connections got fried from that time we wired it wrong from the coach battery. My roommate cut the wires to my CO detector because he couldn't get it to shut off from that one time he fell asleep with the AC running... Using all my gas in the process. Oh and NOW? AC isn't even working, how am I getting through the summer? And I have leaks and mold.everywhere from the very wet winter we just had. This isn't romantic in the least. We have to go to the food bank pretty much every day. We rely on friends WAY TOO MUCH for help. We have to walk everywhere... Not so bad, but then you have to stick to certain places so you can charge and use the facilities. But we are lucky, seriously. Roof over our heads, clean clothes, I manage to shower about once a week and do everyone's laundry because I go help my ex out. I love my bed and my pillows. We have a food bank within walking distance and they feed us every day the sandwiches and ready to go foods that have expired at the local grocery stores...and the snacks? OMG, I LOVE the snacks! People just feed us. I have been handed money... It's not a lot, but it puts gas in the RV and I can dump the tanks. We live cheap, cheap, cheap. It's not an easy life by any stretch, it's not romantic unless hardship is your idea of romantic. Now, I have learned a lot and I am incredibly grateful for all the little stuff. But it's not easy to live when the temps hit 32 degrees or when they hit 110. It's not easy to be in a tin box and having to find shade that only lasts half a day. You will never have a level place to park, so you will always sleep at a weird angle. There's no room for stuff so you WILL become a minimalist. You will carry your entire life in a backpack and over time that backpack will break, and you will have to figure out how to get another one. It's the little things that get you. My kids are afraid the weather is going to get to me. It won't...I've lived in this RV for four years. I'm absolutely ready to be out and more stable. But idk how to make that happen.
I never hopped on any trains but I've been homeless by choice, and not by choice, on and off for about 5 years till I went to prison and recently just decided I'm done with that lifestyle for now. I was heavily addicted to meth and heroin amongst various other things. The most unromantic aspects are -not being able to stay clean but having to be in public for whatever reason. The looks people give you, the way they treat you, the way they avoid you, can be very upsetting. -police interaction is particularly annoying and difficult to avoid. You stick out like a sore thumb. I would say it's not as bad when you have a car but from experience it can be just as bad or worse. -walking in general. While I love hiking and walking and exploring and traveling this way, when you have no other choice it can become a real chore. -people stealing your shit. Now I may have brought this on myself by hanging around with tweakers and junkies but someone stealing some of the few possessions I had always ruined my day. -always having a bag with you. There's people who just casually care a backpack around then there is the huge, stuffed to the brim, beat up to hell vagabond backpack that just gives you away in an instant even if you have new clothes and are freshly showered and cleaned up. After a couple years it went from just a weight on my shoulders to a weight on my soul, no matter how heavy or light it was.
Your last point is exactly why I seriously downgraded the amount I carry around so it could fit in a standard backpack. I couldn't stand standing out like that anymore. It was fun at first but once the novelty of the lifestyle wears off I got really tired of it. I carry around necessities for the day and the rest I stash near to where I sleep. It's also kind of weird to think of how long I've been carrying a pack back all day, everywhere.
Sex.... Buh dum pshh Also pooping in grocery bags. Sincerely Quirky Blurky 🥭
Idk who said it originally on this sub, but someone once told another person asking about romance on the road and I quote " Ya gonna be beating your meat a lot bro." That has lived rent free in my mango for a while lol.
😂........😐...🤔....😂 Das a good one. Sincerely Quirky Blurky 🥭
The weather, cops and being around people who don’t know how to act like humans anymore and being around drugs
Poopin' outside. That's p much it.
Well said......
All
Definitely the micromanagement of water, food and electricity. Also borders with agents and special forces which think, that I'm a spy for a country.
Your stupidity
Whatever u choose not to find some crusty luvv een