Morning of the Third Day

We slept far better the second night.



We slept well, guarded by our wall, tucked away from passerbys, blessed by a higher blanket-to-person ratio (as some people had gone but left their blankets), and being totally exhausted from not sleeping the night before.

We did have a neighbor. The same I had seen on the scouting night, I assume. He came after we had gone to sleep and left before most of us awoke.

Power Nap

As noted previously, underfed, under-slept, over-exposed retreatants are harder to energize than those who are nestled in the lap of luxury. I am entirely unused to getting sleepy at 11:00 am. But here we are.

Unfortunately, I cannot sleep. Every ten minutes or so someone passes through. Our spot is on a homeless circuit, since it is near the service outlets and one can avoid walking over the whole bridge by cutting through this space. While I feel more or less safe, I can easily imagine some of our stuff walking away. So while I try to sleep, I cannot. I spend a few minutes looking over the schedule and moving things in my mind to make up for the nap. Eventually, I have staring contests with pigeons. I win.

Morning of the Second Day

On an average day, I sleep from 2 a.m. to 10 a.m. I write well during late hours and generally am having too much fun with my day to go to bed early. Because of this, I have little familiarity with 5:30 a.m. Let's just say I have more experience with sunsets than sunrises.

News flash: It gets light around 5 a.m.

Normally this is a truth pleasantly obscured by the walls, roof, and window shades. When sleeping out in the library park, however, there are no barriers between me and the rising light.

When uncomfortable, I can sleep.
When cold and uncomfortable, I try to sleep. At least I can fantasize about it.
When cold, uncomfortable, and having unwelcome sunshine on my face, the fleeting hope for sleep evaporates.

Fuck it. Time to get up.

Making it Through the First Night

At first, things didn't seem too bad. We each had two disaster blankets made from woven recycled cloth, and they were surprisingly soft. One folded in half for the ground, one draped over the body. There was some conversation about shoes on or off, and where our stuff should go. Around midnight the talking started to settle. By this point I am feeling pretty tired, and a fairly reliable method of settling people off to bed is bedtime songs. So, drawing on my youth, I sing "Michael Row Your Boat Ashore" (chosen ironically because of Michael), and "Where Have All the Flowers Gone." Few would be startled to learn my mother was a hippie.

I don't know when other people went to bed. I slipped off after about half an hour of trying to find which part of my hip I didn't mind jabbing into the ground.

I wake around 2:30 am. It is cold. The blankets may be soft, but they don't hold the heat. I spend more than an hour rustling around trying to figure out how to get warmer. Judging from other rustling, other people are awake, too. Eventually, I manage to wrap the bottom blanket around me as well, which helps. I sneak around the group and wrap other peoples bottom blanket around them. Some are awake and thank me. Others are sleeping.

In all, I managed to get another 30 or 45 minutes of sleep out of the darkness.

End of Day One

Our evening wrapped up nicely. After the talks and activities were through a few people called home, a few walked and talked, and a few played football. No Stand Up For Kids activity is official until there has been the throwing of the football.

Some of our late comers even brought a guitar. At that moment, it felt a little like a camp out.




There were some worries about the sprinklers coming on. Unfortunately, the worries were not unfounded. About ten minutes after the camera was shut off and we were all laid down for the night, the sudden rush and sputtering of the nightly watering surrounded us from all sides. Panic unfolded as disaster blankets, backpacks, and humans were picked up and thrown to safety. A few folks got a little wet, but no one was majorly drenched.

We reasoned the city of Phoenix would not water the rocks. They did not, though the gravel bed was decidedly less comfortable than the grass.

The practice of watering the grass late at night makes a lot of sense. Grass needs to be watered, particularly in the state of Arizona. Watering at night cuts down on evaporation, which increases water efficiency. This policy does, however, make the public space less usable for the homeless.