I read Randall Munroe’s amazing comic XKCD on a regular basis but Teresa NH at Making Light pointed this one out today.

I gotta see this movie.

Interview with Tiptree-Award-short-listed author Sandra McDonald.

This is not my Tuesday post, for the simple reason that it isn’t Tuesday yet. That will come in the fullness of time. Meanwhile…

Remember the homeless person sleeping across the street? I had decided to live, let live, and give the person his/her space. Apparently someone else felt differently. In the last week or so I had not seen him there, and thought perhaps he had moved on to some other place. But on Friday the following note was taped to every front door on the block on:

Hello (and for the purposes of this letter, goodbye). In case you’d never noticed me previously, I was the younger gentleman who was, on a near-nightly basis, sleeping on the northern end of the grassy area across the street.

Needless to say, I am a person who is homeless. While there are many reasons that I ended up in this situation (both as a result of my own actions & of circumstances beyond my control). it doesn’t negate from the fact that, like every other living being…I have a need to sleep. For many reasons, I chose this parcel of land to do such, in PART out of my belief that your block was safe.

In regards to my treatment of this land (which is, in fact public) & my behavior while there, I can honestly state that I was nothing less than considerate. In fact, I even went beyond my responsibilities as an occupant by picking up garbage (including the bodily waste of OTHER creatures non-human and human alike) & otherwise ensuring the area as as good or better when I left as it was when I arrived. And, I made a point not to dwell in the area all day, giving you (the residents) “alone time.”

In short, I was in ever way the ideal neighbor.

So, with that having been said, I must ask this one poignant question.

WHY DID ONE OR MORE OF YOU STEAL MY GEAR?

“Gear” meaning a hiking pack containing clothes, hygiene items & most importantly (especially the wet cold NIGHT I had to endure this)………my SLEEPING BAG!!

Yes, there’s a remote chance another homeless person took it or the DPW swiped it while cleaning. However…most OTHER homeless aren’t that detail-oriented (neither are most DPW street-clearners). It wouldn’ve taken someone who knew EXACTLY where to look to find my bag where IT was. Unfortunately, the demeanor & vibes I interpreted from a share of your community during the few encounters we DID have weren’t those that’d make me feel that my belongings or ME were welcome.

Bogus police reports resulting in (illegal harassment w/equally bogus pretenses (”these homeless people sexually polest the kids” was the funniest) were bad enough. At least all I had to do THEN was gather my BELONGINGS and go elsewhere.

However, to take the possessions that are for survival SOLELY to send a vindictive message of “you’re not welcome” is CRIMINAL. I had NOWHERE to go that night & had to endure the elements. I actually began to experience hypothermia & had to go to the ER just to warm-up. That one mindless act could have KILLED ME, for real!!

This petty act was, at the very LEAST, THEFT, although if the worst had happened, it could’ve become tantamount to INVOLUNTARY MANSLAUGHTER.

I could have been ANYONE. Your spouse; child; relative; friend; even YOU.

I was ALL of those things to many once ago; and STILL am to some.

He left an email address, but I’m not sure if it’s a real one, or if what sort of response he expects.

I feel awful for the guy. To have so little and then have it taken away from you–it’s such a lousy, low blow. Even if (as I suspect) it wasn’t theft but clean up. I’d seen DPW workers cutting the lawn and clearing out stuff across the street, and they may have turned up the fellow’s belongings wherever he’d hidden them and cleared them away. Whatever disgruntlement the neighborhood might have felt (and I never spoke to any of the neighbors about him), I can’t believe anyone would have stolen this guy’s stuff.

I feel like writing him a note, or responding to his email. I suspect that’s not a great idea, as I’m not sure that it wouldn’t destabilize an already unstable character; and I don’t feel up to engaging in what might be a long-term conversation with him right now (that’s pure self-protection; I know how much I’ve got on my plate and how scrabbly I feel about handling it all). I feel guilty. And like a lot of these situations–hell, like the initial situation itself–there’s not a whole lot I can do.

Hmph. I’m conflicted tonight.

I pulled out an old story with the intention of publishing it here, as I did with ‘Do Me Good’. I got to reading it, and then I got to editing it. It tightened up nicely. I think I could in good conscience send it out for another round of submissions. Especially since a lot of editors have died or retired since last it made the rounds.

It’s from my Dark Period, but isn’t nearly as gothically melodramatic as ‘Do Me Good’.

Even though there’s a chance I could still sell it somewhere out in the paper world, I had a specific intention in pulling it out, and I think I’m gonna honor that intention.

Martha Wells’s LJ is the first post I saw regarding the recent letter, reproduced on Will Shetterly’sSFWA’s LJ, from Howard Hendrix, regarding his decision to not run for SFWA President this year.

Here are the nut grafs, toward the end of his letter, which have pissed some folks off:

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