From Streets to Screens: Dave's Pursuit of Filmmaking Amidst Homelessness
Tapping into Ancestral Wisdom on the Road from Homelessness to the Big Screen
Photo by StreetLife Stories
Dave’s journey began from his hometown in Alltwalis, Wales where he inherited his parent’s house after their death. Unfortunately, due to an incident at a small holding located nearby, the house flooded at a loss of £90,000 which insurance did not cover. After several years, Dave managed to sell the property, buy a one way ticket to London with the clothes on his back, a questionable hard drive and a vision to pursue his dream of being a film director.
“If our ancestors did safety, we wouldn’t be here”
When Dave said this, I shuddered and then again on writing this up. It hit me, stories of my ancestors; the ones I knew and didn’t. The moves they made, the risks they took with 0 funds to their name and yet they moved countries by boat, had businesses and a community around them. (Cue the viral picture of our PM, Mr. Sunak, on a stand with the slogan “stop the boats”).In a time where we are consistently bombarded with negative news, backward systems and told these are how we do things with no wiggle room, we have forgotten that our ancestors, despite countless challenges and obstacles, were courageous, intuitive and persevered which many homeless individuals live by.
Why have the rest of us forgotten adventure and self-reliance; living on our own terms?
Dave had no idea what his hard drive had held on to. Was any of his work on there? He didn’t know and it didn’t matter, London was calling and his end goal, everything in-between was a matter of hope, faith, belief and trust.
“Fear should be used to ascertain risk. Once you have ascertained risk, you should forget about fear”
Although Dave began his new chapter sleeping on a piece of cardboard on London streets, he eventually managed to pick up some part-time retail work which helped him to source a second-hand MacBook Pro and a microphone. Once the retail placement came to an end, he used this time to concentrate on his movie project: Mystic Demon Killer.
Dave was picked up by Vice for a documentary which led to Mystic Demon Killer being showcased at Islington’s independent cinema, Screen on the Green.
“…the peaks have made up for the troughs”
Dave and I spoke in depth of how chapters of our lives are different versions of ourselves from various perspectives much like the multiverse concept. For someone who has experienced street living and minimalism for the majority of their adult life and only continues to see the positive shows the power of mindset and recognises the fact that our mindsets can influence how we perceive and respond to challenges we face. For those experiencing living on the streets, cultivating a positive and resilient mindset can be an important tool for survival, growth, and ultimately, finding a way out of homelessness.
“I moved to the City as I had been attacked a few times because partially people were jealous of what had happened to me with the Vice documentary. That’s another thing, I hesitated when Vice said they would do a documentary because I thought to myself if I don’t get off the streets through this, there’s going to be problems so I separated myself from Tottenham Court Road and I was sleeping down the City Temple, not far from Chancery Lane”
Dave recognised the potential for resentment in his environment and made the decision to move his ‘home’ as a way of protecting his positive mindset. While it's true that jealousy can be a negative emotion, it can also serve as a powerful teacher. It’s important to contemplate the possibility that what one perceives as jealousy may, in fact, have another meaning in disguise - after all the world would be a much easier but boring place if we all saw everything in the same way.
In Dave's case, his experience with jealousy may have served as a reminder of how far he's come and the connections he's made. On the other hand, the other person may have been reminded of what's possible for them and what they could achieve - a desire or inspiration some may say? Ultimately, it all comes down to mindset and being open to the range of emotions and motivations that every individual experiences.
Our conversation veered to the pandemic era and how an idea was portrayed to the rest of us that all homeless individuals were taken off the streets into shelter, but behind the scenes of empty roads shown to us in the media was a slightly different story.
According to Dave, individuals in hostels were the first to be placed in hotels during the COVID crisis due to their potential health risks and liability concerns. Dave described hostel conditions pre pandemic which could sleep 30 to an area.
“…you don’t know who they are, what drugs they’ve got, what condition they are in or anything and that’s the conditions you live in in these places. There were separate rooms upstairs but apparently only for the select few, normally that came under the druggie or other things that ticked all their tick boxes…my argument there is, you have a problem there anyway as I don’t think we are tick boxing or any animal is a tick boxing product”
Put another way, I am who I am perceived based on how I tick a box in that moment in time but my answer could potentially change.
We both agreed that nowadays the tick box was a source of reliance and from personal experience, our modern world is using it as more of a means to show quotas are being met than analysing the data for genuine research and changes. This is happening in the corporate world, a place that is managed by the likes of the FDA and the Government. The people we are meant to turn to as our security blanket. Perhaps we have been seeing this all wrong?
”What matters is what they are going through, as an individual”.
Are the powers that be the equivalent of our parental figures? They are there as our support system to help us grow into adults but just as our parents, they have been misguided too. Using their past experiences, traumas and perspective lenses to make decisions that don’t work with an evolving world that is simultaneously falling apart. The pandemic after all gave mother nature a well-deserved break.
The Law of One philosophy suggests all individuals and beings are ultimately a part of this unified consciousness, and that separation is an illusion. The purpose of life is to learn and evolve towards a state of greater harmony and unity within our reality and yet we are in a time where we are actively finding new ways to segregate ourselves, be it careers, sexual preferences, culture etc. Whilst the veil slips for some, are other individuals directing themselves to such communities for a way to feel accepted or hide from a deeper truth; perhaps the fear of vulnerability leading to love?
Maybe it is time to re-strategise the entire industry/ concept rather than cover up with cheap plaster. For those interested, Dave recommends “The homeless industrial complex” documentary on YouTube.
“We have a military complex with the war so why wouldn’t we not have one with homelessness?”
The Industrial complex quoted Adam Zivo (2022), “the ecosystem of bureaucrats, NGOs and corporations that claim to aid the marginalised, but actually do little beyond profiting off the perpetuation of homelessness, poverty and addiction”.
This speaks to the systemic issues that reinforce homelessness, poverty and addiction. The current ecosystem of organisations and institutions that claim to help the marginalised may be contributing to the problem rather than providing real solutions. How can we unite profit and meaningful change with a blend of what has previously worked with some innovation?
Looking at the roots of homelessness in today’s economy, we need to address the lack of affordable housing, access to mental health and addiction treatment (without the long waiting lists), creating job opportunities and livable wages. Perhaps, there needs to be an increase in transparency and accountability measures and provide funding and resources to organisations that are proven to be effective in addressing homelessness. Ultimately, we need to prioritise the wellbeing of our most vulnerable over profit alone and bureaucracy.
Taking care of our health and wellbeing is a known factor to all of us but for those without a door to close behind them, it also means there is limited choice on what nutritious meals are on offer. It is easy to take for granted the ‘urgh, I have to cook’ but as with everything there is someone somewhere who is unable to when what they are craving for is something green. Dave mentioned that his hotel stay during COVID, there was no regularity to meals.
“In my hotel we weren’t fed regularly enough at all. If you relied on food coming in, you would have had a very bizarre diet and you probably would have been very unwell because definitely not enough food would have come in”
Dave believes the decision makers could have chosen a different plan to look after the homeless during this time.
“[The kitchen was closed] I would have done it so they had a team of people in there, maybe like the army who would have cooked for everybody so everybody had decent meals but that wasn’t done and it was left with what had come in”
It is said that around 90% of the food we consume makes up our bodies. Contrary to what many perceive the street living life to entail, Dave among others, does not drink alcohol and is conscious of what he puts into his body.
“I have never been a drinker. I found out off the internet that 10 years ago or earlier, 90% of liver damage was caused by alcohol abuse now 90% of liver damage is caused by bad food and that’s not people making bad choices that means that the processed food and the quality of food is so low that it is putting strain on our liver and obviously, sometimes you will be fine. That explains why some of the younger homeless I know have got through it because they dealt with what was being given better than I could…I drink apple cider vinegar which repairs your liver as much as possible. I’m trying to give myself a decent diet. It does worry me now because if we go back in anyway into a situation where there is a scarcity of food, I am worried about what might happen”
Now in his 60s, Dave currently resides on the streets of Central London whilst he pursues securing a boat to call home which will allow him to discover cooking, catch his own fish and hopefully skip some of the 6am 2 hr queues for a morning bacon sandwich. He also continues to pursue making more movies.
“I found myself saying, this kind of makes sense and how I got to where I am. You feel like you have grown but you don’t know how or where from”