"Lori's doing the right thing," she said to me. "Sometimes you need a
little crisis to get your adrenaline flowing and help you realize your
potential."
Mom and Tinkle moved into the van with Dad. They lived there for a
few months, but one day they left it in a no-parking zone and it was
towed. Because the van was unregistered, they couldn't get it back. That
night, they slept on a park bench. They were homeless.
MOM AND DAD CALLED regularly from pay phones to check up on
us, and once or twice a month, we'd all get together at Lori's.
"It's not such a bad life," Mom told us after they'd been homeless for a
couple of months.
"Don't you worry a lick about us," Dad added. "We've always been able
to fend for ourselves."
Mom explained that they'd been busy learning the ropes. They'd visited
the various soup kitchens, sampling the cuisines, and had their favorites.
They knew which churches passed out sandwiches and when. They'd
found the public libraries with good bathrooms where you could wash
thoroughly. "We wash as far down as possible and as far up as possible,
but we don't wash possible," was how Mom put it—and brush your teeth
and shave. They fished newspapers from the trash cans and looked up
free events. They went to plays and operas and concerts in the parks,
listened to string quartets and piano recitals in office-building lobbies,
attended movie screenings, and visited museums. When they first
became homeless, it was early summer, and they slept on park benches
or in the bushes that lined park paths. Sometimes a cop would wake them
up and tell them to move, but they'd just find some other place to sleep.
During the day, they'd stash their bedrolls in the underbrush.