Down and Out in San Francisco

For many residents of the United States, especially those in its cities and larger suburbs, the fact of homelessness is quite well established. Camps made up of lean-tos, tents, small fire pits and people exist in parks, woods, along city streets and under freeway bridges around the nation. The reaction to these settlements by residents with houses and local authorities ranges from acceptance and providing services to the unhoused to vigilante and police attacks on the encampments. Despite the differences in these responses, both represent an acceptance of an essential fact: most people living outside because they can’t afford to live inside do so because of the capitalist economy.

Those who support the vigilantes and the police attacks on the unhoused are, in essence, rejecting the humanity of those being attacked and “swept” up (to use a popular euphemism). Whether they acknowledge this truth or not, their actions reveal an understanding that only people with houses matter when all is said and done. Meanwhile, those who work through churches, social services and other organizations that assist the unhoused prove a certain belief that modern capitalism is irredeemable.

J. Malcolm Garcia worked in an organization helping the unhoused during the 1990s. The agency was in San Francisco. I lived in the San Francisco Bay Area from the late 1970s until the mid-1980s. Of the seven or eight years I lived there, I spent a few of them on the streets. Even then, there were several hundred, if not thousands, of unhoused folks making do, keeping away from the cops, hitting the free meals and sleeping where they could. By 1984—after almost four years of neoliberal Reaganomics—those numbers had increased dramatically. So had a certain sense of desperation as funding was taken away from government agencies and non-profits that served the poor—housed and unhoused. I was lucky. I got out. Some of my friends did not.

Since his work in the social services world of San Francisco, Mr. Garcia has gone on to become one of the world’s most unique and honest journalists. His articles focus on those whose lives have been disrupted, even overturned, by US capitalism and its wars. Several collections of his work have been published and received plaudits and awards. This summer, Seven Stories published his first novel, titled Out of the Rain.

Like his journalism, this novel is about people. Based on his experiences as a social worker in an agency that worked with those without houses, Garcia tells his story with a collection of profiles. From the chronic and amiable alcoholic Walter to the tragic life of a crack addict named Varneeta, the author weaves a profound tale of humanity. Lives that most of his readers can only imagine, if even that, are chronicled in bits and pieces. People in recovery struggling with the urge to go to the liquor store instead of work; men fighting off urges to take advantage of vulnerable women they interact with at the shelter and men that give in to those urges; recovering alcoholics and drug users living lives of loneliness because their previous friends are still using and are nothing but a temptation. Informing it all is the primary protagonist Tom who directs the shelter and center that serves as the focal point for the novel’s characters. His job is one that requires compassion, but demands a certain ruthlessness. That ruthlessness is most often related to the other primary informant of the tale: a national and local economy that cuts funding for services to the poor in favor of profits for the rich. For anyone who has been to San Francisco since Reagan took over the country they must certainly agree that it is the rich who matter the most there.

This is a very human story. It is also very honest. Despite the occasionally unbearable misfortunes that happen to different characters at points in the narrative, a certain hopeful spirit remains the novel’s essence. At the novel’s end, Tom has moved on from his role at the shelter and center to a new job helping refugees. His burnout from caring too much while wrestling with politicians and funders who don’t really like the grimness and squalor of lives lived in the street has won out. This novel is his reminder to the reader as to why we need to care.