Some Thoughts on Writing About Crisis of Homelessness in Oregon

I just passed 300,000 words writing about the crisis of Oregon homelessness. I recently extracted and polished 40,000 words from that output for a book. It will be released this spring and distributed in novel fashion. I hope readers of this newsletter will help me with this endeavor. More on that in the coming weeks.

There is so much more to write on this subject, a veritable War and Peace every week. I've compiled a list of writing ideas about the crisis, but I doubt I'll get to many of of them because something new and more pressing always seems to arise...such as the homeless man in Portland in my neighborhood who owns a vintage white Corvette and parks it here and there, routinely services/repairs the vehicle, but does not live in it. Every now and then I see him driving the Corvette around and he looks very cool doing so. How anyone came to own such a fine car and consistently care or it, but lives outdoors on the streets is beyond comprehension to me. As soon as I get the opportunity, I am going to ask him about it.

Some other writing ideas:

Accompany a homeless outreach worker for a day and report

Accompany a bureaucrat tasked with addressing the crisis and report

Pick five tiny rural towns in Oregon, visit them, and report on the homelessness there because it will be there.

Investigate how some of the battered RVs came into possession of their current owners.

Return to Sweet Home and check into the progress of their fascinating effort to alleviate the crisis.

Investigate why Street Roots, the Portland weekly print publication that advocates for the homeless never investigates the effectiveness of homeless service providers.

Take my putter and golf balls to the putting green of my local socialist golf course and engage with homeless men who occasionally practice their putting and chipping there. I am not making this up. I wonder what we'd talk about? I doubt it would be golf.