I write this on December 6th 2023, and this post is actually now more than a month+ overdue.
Unfortunately, I recently found myself in the no so fun situation where I was given a Section 21 Notice (No fault eviction) by my Landlord, and this has now made me suffer from temporary homelessness, something that yet again has is something I’ve experienced many times before in my life. I have been lucky to some extent that I have some great support around me, both from friends & distant family, but also from my local council, so that I am not on the streets, but temporary shared accommodation, which is something that the UK has done better with in recent times, though I still had to push quite hard to get that support. I think we can and should could do better for our citizens in future, and more so for people that find themselves out of paid work for any reason, like I am right now, especially for those like me that do still contribute back by doing payable but unpaid work in communities like Open Source development, which is something that I want to do more of going into 2024.
Whilst I don’t like that this is how it is, and feel strongly that we must do better for renters and home owners in future to make it less likely that people would loose their homes unnecessarily, because lack of money, whether due to illness or shouldn’t be a blocker to keeping people housed & whilst there are some provisions to combat this, it is messy and not very easy to navigate.
This is not how I envisioned myself rolling into 2024 & is almost the total opposite as I had envisioned me moving into my own home (or at least not privately rented) by 2025, which does seem unlikely right now. This comes off the back of a long period of downtime where I have been far from my best as was burnt out by the pandemic, which for many different reasons resulted in me leaving Black Marble. This was something that was bound to happen anyway and whilst I do miss working with all there, I know ultimately this was the right outcome overall, even if I do wish it had happened differently.
I then lost my dad to cancer in early 2022 & had to deal with his estate and deal with the grief of that on top of having 2 car crashes in a very short space of time.
So it’s safe to say that the last few years have been tough on me, and tbh they have been tough on most of us in different ways.
As I have been homeless many times in my life already, I know this is just a blip and hope that this cycle which has seen me sleeping on the streets in the past, as well as sofa surfing, sleeping on friends bedroom floors, including at one friends and even after his mum had kicked him out, though she’d let me stay there for a short while before also kicking me out too not long later, not that I blame her as it did help me get somewhere not long after. It also has seen me sleep in the car I had at the time for a short while, which I can’t do now without one, and at that time I was working so wasn’t struggling to get by either.
At 33, nearly 34, I quite frankly have had enough of this, and whilst it gets me down having been through all of this and being in this state, I am still doing my best to be the Enternal Optimist that I know deep inside that I am.
It doesn’t help that whilst my friends are all close, my family aren’t and that I am missing them loads & has been far too long since I’ve seen them, last Christmas for some, last year for others and years ago for many others, due to how spread out we are. This time of the year is difficult enough for me at the best of times because of this & right now I don’t think I will be able to afford to go see any of them this year either, which I really could do with, if at all possible.
I hate being the type to ask for financial help, but know that at times it is needed, just like it is right now for others like Sean Kearney from the PowerShell community that is also in a similar situation to me, please see his go fundme and support it as I know I would if I could right now!
If you can help me out though you can via these methods below that would be a great help, and whilst I don’t expect for it to happen, I do keep a track of all “donations/loans” that I have received over the years and I either pay them back directly, or pay it forward, often both when I can in one form or another & with interest too, whether hat just be a meal or a few drinks here or there, and match this with an additional donation of either my time or my own money too where I can.
- Debit card direct to my bank via Monzo.Me Link
- Paypal - [email protected]
- GitHub Sponsorship via my GitHub Profile
Over the years, I have & still donate my time towards many tech communities, mostly the PowerShell community (which I still do as a member of the Interactive UX Working Group and UK Community co-organiser) as well as when I was a Volunteer Vaccinator for St John Ambulance during the Pandemic, who I’ve donated both time and money to in the past and will do again in future, along with many other communities over the years too!
It is in my DNA to give when I can, because I know how stressful it can be to be without, and how stressful it can be to face homelessness, let along go through it multiple times.
But yeah roll on some better times ahead into 2024, which I am hopeful will see much better times ahead, with some real stability again, though I hoped for this last year, and whilst this year was unstable, like my mental and physical health has been, it wasn’t anywhere as rough as it was in 2020, 2021 or 2022.
I wish all reading this a good end of the year, with downtime with your closest loved ones, and that 2024 brings you (& me too) a world of happiness and good fortune.
If you wish to send me a comment you can directly by email to [email protected], using the this post’s title as the subject or via the embedded feedhack from or the linked GitHub Issue.
Thanks for reading, and I hope to see & speak to many of you at events like the PowerShell community calls, including the UK December one on December 14th and other events into 2024, which I hope to be able to attend, organise & support many in person/hybrid/virtual events throughout the year.
I will in the next few days be publishing another article for my 2024 wish list, so keep an eye out for that one, also I would like to see yours too!
Lastly, I know that I am not the only one that is struggling at this time, my thoughts are with all that are struggling at this time, whether that be due to ongoing wars & conflicts, illnesses like Flu/Covid/Cancer or others, or just having a bout of Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) at this time, & I hope and wish that the rest of this month & 2024 will kind to us all.