Today I saw a woman who was clearly homeless (or just really, really enthusiastic-- I couldn't tell from her intermittent screaming, but she did sound mad) waiting for the light to change before she crossed the street. She even pushed the button. Also, this woman had three neatly packed suitcases, she had makeup on, and she looked like a regular person you'd see in an office, except for the series of terrifying screams she uttered every five minutes or so.
I used to notice this alot in New York- it's almost as if they can push "pause" on the crazy long enough to get themselves safely across the street and out of harm's way, to do logical things like find food, and to pack everything into neat suitcases. I am not kidding-- this really confuses me. How can someone be (literally) stark raving mad one minute, and then be, for instance, ordering food, which entails many series of complex systems--choose an item from the menu, dig out correct change, pay, then wait for the food to be served to you? This is something I've actually seen down on the Promenade in Santa Monica.
Wouldn't you figure if you could pull it together enough to be really highly functional, you could put some of those lucid moments toward finding the right medication so that those voices go away? I know, mental illness is a terrible problem, and I really feel for the people as well as the family members of the people who suffer from it. But...I just really don't get it.
Of course, on this same street I also saw a grown man who probably WASN'T homeless rolling a tire that he'd just found through a crosswalk. So, there is the possibility that Santa Monica is just filled with strange people. I'm not ruling that out.
