Following your tour, I agree with much of your sentiment.

I believe after 78 1/2 years of wandering the planet myself and observing there is one problem with the idea of sharing. It should be on an individual basis. Every public assistance area I have ever been around is wonderful for a few years, but the residents overwhelm the system and the system deteriorates as the beneficiaries begin to work the system and it corrupts, falling into disrepair and becoming a magnet for malcontents.

If the government gets involved, it will eventually be a mess, full of rigid rules indiscriminately applied, often hurting the very ones it is intended to help.

By the way, I retired from working for the government and saw all the kingdom building and well-intended rule making that causes it to fail.

I'm excited to read and follow your new adventures 🙏

I've been traveling a bit, but meant to write that I've been following some of the news coming out of California re. homelessness. It is a problem, and the fact that it's a relatively easy problem to solve does not mean it's easy to solve. Hope this finds you well.

Thank you--appreciate the kind comment. My journey feels like it's coming up soon (though not soon enough:), but yours is right around the corner. Enjoy the ride. By the way, I have a few British cousins living in London.

I've just started reading through your journal, I'm absolutely loving it and it's helping me to get motivated for my own 7 day tour in the UK England. I'll take your journal with me along the way and pick up some tips. May 5 I'll be setting off for my first cycle tour 🙏
Thank you for sharing your wonderful journey 🙏❤️🙏

First, thanks again Karen, for reading my journal entries and your thoughtful comments. Sorry to hear Rowland's idea backfired. Of course, I'm not a betting person, but I'd bet $100 that his idea(s) were not exactly the same as mine, because I haven't told you my ideas yet:). Seriously, I've been involved in districts that have virtually eradicated homelessness, and lived in places where none existed. There are many ways...

Ha! To some extent gloves are gloves.

You sound so promising. Rowland Rebele had the same idea as yourself, but it has backfired terribly here. “If you build it, they will come”, and they have. I also believe our too small police force coupled with no viable mental or drug solutions has allowed the escalation to become too large to solve in this “small” city of mine.
The temperate weather along the Pacific Coast is also another draw.
We as a people are going backward and not forward with this situation all over the world.

My husband, Michael wears his old canvas painting gloves..😂

Awesome Bontrager pick!

I haven't been to Santa Cruz in a while, but I enjoyed the couple of times I was there. Would love to help: homelessness is a relatively easy problem to solve--not solving it is extremely costly.

Thank you for this--small world, and the internet makes it smaller:).

You can come here to Santa Cruz, CA and “solve” our HUGE homeless problem, too…

And, Keith ( Bontrager) actually lives three blocks away from me, plus, he’s a nice guy..Good purchase!

Good point--will do. Thank you.