Asleep at the Wheel
Confessions of a suburban homeless guy
Cover Story
The most recent Homeless Enumeration from the Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments tallies more than 15,000 homeless people in the region. Of those, about 2,000 live in Fairfax County, Va. I am one of them.
But I might not be counted as such. Some of us don’t make the official numbers, as Nancy Taxson, executive director of transitional-housing provider Homestretch, recently told the Falls Church News-Press. These folks, said Taxson, “don’t show up on the homeless lists because they aren’t living in shelters or receiving services. Rather they are living homeless below the radar with friends, family members, in cars, or other makeshift shelters not meant for human occupancy.”
I fall in the “in cars” category. I have been spending my third bout of homelessness since May 2005 in the Big Wagon.
And I don’t mean that I had a fight with the missus and spend the odd night in the family Buick. Picture instead languishing on the seat belts for long stretches, through the notoriously steamy D.C. summers and the wildly capricious winters. But then, even with a 24-year-old car’s leaky roof and lumpy seats, I’m living a life of luxury compared to those sprawled on steam grates, roughing it in the woods, or huddling under bridges.... Continued 
Issue of Feb. 24 - Mar. 2, 2006
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- Asleep at the Wheel
Cover Story - Washington just wasn't big enough for both of us.
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City Lights - Strange New World:Art and Design From Tijuana
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