I got a surprise visit yesterday at my university office. Jean Scarpati, a 70-year-old homeless woman, arrived with her little shopping cart stuffed with small plastic bags, and a large black sack slung over her shoulder ala Santa Claus. After smoothing out a crumpled piece of a page from the recent article on homelessness I had contributed to for the Jewish Journal, she explained that she had travelled by bus and on foot, searching for David Blumenkrantz to discuss her artwork with him. We ended up chatting for around an hour, during which time I found out that she sleeps on a bus stop bench in Encino (Ventura and Woodley); has been homeless for 7 years, since the death of her beloved man; survives on her Social Security income; and that in spite of her bag lady appearance, was sharp-minded, spoke with a classic Queens, NY accent and possessed a subversive sense of humor (just my type). She dug through her things for a good while until she finally was able to locate a series of printed postcards that featured her artworks, under which she had written philosophical phrases. They were all signed and dated, early 2000s, apparently just before she became homeless and lost her momentum as an artist. Could I, she wondered, help her get these printed on t-shirts, coffee cups, or however might best work to market them? She explained that the originals (acrylic paintings) were in her storage unit somewhere, and could retrieve them if necessary. If anyone is interested in helping Jean and I have products made that can be sold to raise money for her (and she added, for any charity group that participates), please contact me.
#OneOfUs
#OneOfUs
From #OneOfUs, interviews and portraits.
Who are these people, relegated to sleeping on sooty sidewalks and along dusty freeway offramps, each with a story to tell, or many stories, of a hand-to-mouth, life and death, impoverished existence? Linda, Gracie, Terry and his wife Amy are but four of one such community. Waiting for a Deliverance that might never come…
https://www.youcaring.com/melissa-marelic-613815
Melissa is one of the strong people I’ve met during the homeless project– battling mental illness issues, she has a tough time sustaining the life she longs to have; with her constant companion Joey Bear, she makes it from day-to-day. Her dream is to start an organization to help other homeless pet owners and pets. The least I can do is post her crowd funding site here. She has been sleeping in a van but that is no longer and option and she wrote to me today to let me know that unless something happens quick she will be back on the streets at night…. please make a small donation toward her goal….
I’ve yet to get a really nice portrait of Linda, but I’m glad to say that may happen later this week … her nail polish art and jewelry designs are better than dreams. Linda’s fortitude is impressive, in the face of the constant pressures of economic survival, poor health, and a lack of a coherent public policy toward the treatment of the internal refugee problem that makes settlements that crop up like this one an absolute inevitability.
Face Value
“Who are you who will read these words and study these photographs, and through what cause, by what chance, and for what
purpose, and by what right do you qualify to, and what will you
do about it?” James Agee, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men

