I have to catch up with myself. It’s been 2yrs now since I posted here after being forced to YWCA in 2024 after being homeless on and off for 5yrs.

There have been 6 moves since then and I’m now in Center Square, Albany NY. It’s true what they say as a sought after neighborhood because you’re close to so much; Lark street, Empire State Plaza, NYS Museum and Concert venues.

I’m slowly settling in once again hoping for the best—a home.

I want to continue my writing and posting my photos and would love the company. I appreciate my followers and look forward to posting more now that I’m no longer technically homeless, even though after you have experienced it, you still often worry and have anxiety over it! It never goes completely away. I also had nightmares as a child that returned recently with a vengeance about always moving.

Each School year, I was the new kid. The bullies would invariably call me out. They never got very far, but they still tried and some I actually made peace with as the years went by.

The bullies come back around when you’re an adult too! Nice offices are full of them too—The Mean Girls! The Sexual Harassment, the Mean Girls, and of course the Bullies! The bullies can also be the Mean Girls, but mostly for me the Mean Girls were women that I worked with that grew up with parents in nice homes and for the most part weren’t poor. They had a childhood very much not like mine!

I remember early in my Career, I would gloss over Holidays and my home-life. I would often work because without children it made it easier. Women with children often wanted time around the Holidays and I didn’t mind working; it was usually quiet and the extra money was good. I also didn’t have to talk too much about why my family didn’t visit for Holidays or the fact they often would not show up if invited.

Letting go and saying Goodbye to my Career has been hard. It came abruptly and was brutal with no fan-farewells, Retirement parties or other noted events. It was ripped from me like a horrible abortion—a death. A death of something I had carried so long, loved and had been so hopeful about. A means to provide for myself, the promise of a life, a home, a place to be okay. It was all gone now! I had fallen in love metaphorically with Gloria Steinem and the idea you were able to work yourself out of poverty and build a life in spite of obstacles.

I lay bleeding out in the parking lot terrified about not being able to provide for myself now and being told to “Go Turn Tricks!” You’re a Whore! What was I going to do? I was Middle age, in Menopause and grateful I wasn’t following my Mother in this area and literally passing golf-ball size clots. I had no Health insurance now either!

My stamina has been severely compromised. The waitressing jobs and other entry-level jobs I had starting out would be impossible now. My computer skills were now deteriorated, and in the business I was in, even 2yrs can sideline you. My age was also a factor now and in the Arts can definitely bench you!

I had been climbing the ladder the past 40yrs since graduating college and was inline to be a Director, which I thought a pretty cool “Day Job!” I liked Corporate Communications. In Upstate NY, it’s not easy to pursue the Arts, there isn’t much opportunity, but I had made my way in spite of the bullying and abuse, few opportunities and being told throughout my life that being a kid of divorce and poor there wasn’t much you could do!

I had been resourceful, ambitious and determined, often because I only had myself!

The Domestic Violence had become unbearable, the violence wasn’t physical, but the underlying assaults on things like my Career and the Business I was creating were taking their toll.

I had not anticipated that Men could be so deeply resentful towards your success! The viciousness and gaslighting was becoming ugly and overt, spilling over in ways I could no longer contain. We were partners I had believed for so long. Two souls that had found each other later in life and had made a go of it, but this was my story, not his!

I saw us as partners—everything 50/50! I was a “Modern Woman,” with a Career or so I thought!

This was only in theory. He ran our marriage as if I was the new term definition of “Trad wife,” where he had all the power, “The Man,” as in “Man and Wife,” but where I always paid my 50% of the 50/50 split, did all the domestics and took care of his family, but he never intended to provide anything and he never did!

I ended up violently forced on the street with only enough for food and not housing—Homeless in spite of owing numerous properties! How was this possible I struggled to understand in shock?

My Career destroyed and my ability to resume my life was over. My new car was also gone as I struggled to walk everywhere with my backpack and suitcase after housefuls of furniture and belongings. My Portfolios gone also and without them I could not interview for the Professional jobs I had been getting. The small Graphic Design business I had started was gone too after my beloved Apple Computer, a MacBook Pro, was smashed and all the equipment stolen from the storage unit after paying on it for months unable to find a safe place.

I had always planned on working, but the 9-5 was over and so was my business! Along with the “Rental Income,” I had been promised from 20yrs of Eldercare I had provided to my in-laws and the Rental business we had been working on the entire marriage. I was back to wondering what to do about work as I was told repeatedly now that I wasn’t a “Professional” and was in fact a “Homeless Crazy Woman,” and need to adjust to my situation!

I almost didn’t survive it all, but here I am finally coming home to myself. The shock gone as I pick up the broken pieces of my life, sort and sift, putting something together in Midlife now.

Work had always been my saving grace and here I am and as we often do as Artists—We Begin Again!

Thank you for sharing this journey with me. Namaste Dear Readers!

Rhonda

Photo Credit: Rhonda J Syzdek