Unshackled

On Monday, I signed up for Food Stamps and Medicare. I got both approved.  Yay!

The SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits started the same day. I have an EBT (Electronic Benefit Transfer) debit card that I can spend on groceries. No hot prepared meals are allowed, but the cold ones are okay. The best part of paying with the card is there's no sales tax on the purchase!

My Medicare card arrived! I have no idea what my coverage does, but I pay no premium on it. The card is just a piece of paper with perforated edges pushed out of a larger sheet of paper. The card is kind of crappy, so I expect my coverage to be equally thrifty. I'll find out what Medicare doesn't cover when I break both my legs on a solo hike.

The medicare card was the reason I couldn't leave the area. I needed to receive it in the mail. The homeless shelter allows me to receive mail through their address and this morning I went there and found my card arrived in a letter. Now that I have the card, I'm free! Yay!

Medicare Card

Except, there is one other tether on my freedom. A stipulation of receiving Food Stamp SNAP monies is that I go through their job forcing-you-to-get-one program. I don't know what it's like yet. In February, I have an appointment in Boulder, CO with a social worker. I'll find out what restrictions this program puts on my time, and if it makes my physics plans unfeasible I'll make the choice to cancel my benefits. I don't want to turn my life into "how to keep getting food stamps".

Going to the shelter for breakfast and showers is nice, finances-friendly, and hassle-free. But for the same reason I don't want food stamps, I don't want my life to be about "how to get free breakfast and showers". I know these things are supposed to get assist you to get back on your feet, but I gave up those things in pursuit of a purpose to life. That's why I set out on this journey. I could've stayed in Virginia for social services; that's not why I made it to Colorado.

The homeless outside their shelter

I will miss out on the up-scale facilities in Boulder at the shelter. There are private booth hot showers, hotel miniature shampoo and soap, deluxe pancake breakfast (better than IHOP), $1 laundry, in a clean and civilized facility. I will leave behind the warm parking garages free on weekends, the mountain just steps from downtown, the free street parking two blocks from the university. All the stuff I've figured out the past week how to access living needs will be unnecessary once I leave this place.

Talking about living in boulder.

My desire to leave has grown because I haven't been able to focus and feel comfortable here. I realized I've been spending a lot of time fighting a loneliness and isolation that I feel in this place. The interactions with people (or lackthereof) are a concern that has become intolerable. This Quora post and especially the comment responses describe specifically what it's like to live in Boulder, and I agree with the consensus of comments. It's a White affluent bubble, lacking a population of 'normal people who have normal problems'. This place might sustain my living, but it won't nurture my ambitions. This is not the place for me.

I want to live in a place where people are engaged, bustling, there's room for a middle class, and interactive. That I can get exposed to new ideas, people, and conversations. Living conditions-wise, I'm thinking of a place where it's easy for me to rotate around places to sleep at night, places to get cheap buffets for lunch, and lots of libraries. Colorado Springs seems like a really, really, very, really, especially, really good place for living conditions. I want to go back there. Maybe I can transfer my SNAP job-manacles meeting to the Springs area.