Homeless in Vancouver: It’s snowing—no fault of you-know-who

Snow has been falling steadily across Metro Vancouver since early this morning (February 3) and try as I might, I can find no single overarching thing to blame it on, beyond ordinary cold air.

Apparently there is no El Niño weather pattern at present and I can think of no way to pin it on the hombre-niño in the White House—despite the snow having obvious Trump-like qualities of being cold, regressive, disproportionately hard on the poor, and unwanted by a majority of voters.

Any snow is mildly unusual for Vancouver but the fact that this snow isn’t even remotely connected to, or about Donald Trump makes it especially unusual.

For over a month now, virtually everything, it seems, has been about the blustering new president of the United States—all the news sources I read can’t stop writing about him. My friends can stop talking about him and the people I follow on Twitter can’t stop tweeting about him.

Even in the back alleys there's no escaping Donald Trump

I can’t even escape Trumpomania when I’m in the back alleys doing the whole homeless person thing of looking through the Dumpsters and recycling bins for returnable beverage containers and other valuables.

Last night, for example, while I was checking the recycling blue bins along the route that I take to my parkade sleeping spot, I found blaring Trump headlines in each of the newspaper bins. And in one particular paper bin I found black and white protest leaflets, obviously spit out of someone’s home printer, which read:

“No! This fascist regime must be stopped before it starts”

Even though I live in Vancouver, Canada, and even though the strong wording doesn’t explicitly name the new U.S. Demander-in-Chief, I still have no doubt about which “regime” the leaflet is referring to.

All of this constant trumpeting of alarm and panic is having an effect. It’s making me feel like I’m living in a constant low-grade emergency. I’m keyed-up, like I’m in a permanent state of pre-fight-or-flight. Almost certainly my adrenaline levels are elevated.

It’s exhausting, to tell you the truth.