How not to become a homeless person

   How not to become a homeless person? It's not good to be a homeless for many reasons. First of all our climate is very unstable. We have like two-three months with good warm weather and then suddenly we have rain, frost, sleet or whatever you call that thing that falls from the sky and freezes around you and you need a warm place to hide from it.
    I am not going to tell you about weather in December or January when cold wind and frost around -20C and more can totally kill somebody on a street, especially if you do not have food in your stomach  and warm boots on your feet. How to avoid that? Well, we all live somewhere. We are not born on a street, not in this country, not as a rule. So, if you live somewhere and you know that you have to move for all kinds of reasons, don't do that before you find a place you can afford and can live in. If you don't have money, you can always get some crappy job or some government support until you find a job.
   Sometimes it's very difficult to find any job if you are too young or to old to work. If you are too young you have to wait until the age when you'll be allowed to work. I am not sure if it 16 or 18, but I am sure that you can clench your fists and your soul and wait couple of years if necessary until you job will give you the possibility of independence from circumstances you are right now. I know it's possible, I've been there. I wanted to run away but realized that they will just return me back and eventually I managed to get away and change my circumstances.
    I know it's not easy, but life is not easy for most people and we have to adjust our wishes very often due to circumstances we cannot change right now. It's much harder to change your circumstances when you are on a street already, so do not put yourself into that position, it's not necessary and is not that kind of freedom you are looking for, not in our society, not in our climate. It's good thing we have Internet nowadays, free in a library, and you can always find on line all kinds of ads regarding rental places. Kijiji gives lots of variants and it's very easy to use and you can find all kinds of places for any budget anywhere in most places in Canada.

I am an invisible woman.

   I think I've become completely invisible  here in London, Ontario. I don't even need magic for that. I just have to be what I am now - disable, poor and old, not beautiful, not pretty, not well dressed or with good make-up, just plain old. I am not ugly yet, people usually notice an ugly person, because he/she is different from others in his/her ugliness but me - I just plain and old. My stroke made me old right away - I used to be pretty (I was told) and now I am nothing but plain and old and that bothers me sometimes, because I am not used to be invisible and now it happens every day. One day I may be crashed between doors and people would wonder, what is it that stuck in the door so no one can open it properly. And it will be me.
   May be I am not the only one. May be we have lots of people like that, people we never notice, because they are invisible. They walk around us, they sit on benches and on pavements on the streets. They do not have anything to do , nowhere to go. No one waits for them, no one wants them. There is no place for them anywhere. At least I am not homeless, not yet and I will try not to be the one.
   It's very cold in winter on a street even if you are invisible. You still need some warm place and some food and not just coffee and donuts. Sometimes those invisible people feel like they cannot be invisible anymore. Then they cry, shout something, then a security shows up or police, or both and they make them stop crying loudly,because no one wants them to bother the rest of us - visible people. If you still can tolerate your invisibility, you are not going to shout, you'll keep quiet like a mouse,doing what you have to do - nothing, just don't bother anybody and don't open your mouth.
 When those people shout all the time and become very dirty in rugs, then they become a little visible and they eventually disappear from the streets. Where? I have no idea. May be they just die, or go to prison. I don't know. I've never been in that position, not yet. But I am clearly invisible woman now, as no one needs me, no one calls me or talks to me, no one is interested in me in any way, and it makes me sad as I don't want to be like that but don't know how to become visible again.