“I got to looking on Craigslist and found a little trailer. The guy wanted $300. It was 41 years old and someone had gutted it out. It just basically had some beds in it. I thought at least we'll have this. But I kept thinking, we're gonna get a job,” he said.
Then one day, all they had left to sell was their laptop, said Veazey. So as Sabrina sat down in the gutted-out trailer to erase their personal information, she noticed there was an Internet signal from somewhere that allowed them to get online.
“I know the governor, everyone has a Twitter account, so I thought I'm going to get on there and make some noise and try to get us some help,” he said.
While he never got a response from the state's elected officials, what Veazey did find was a homeless community online.
“It was a shock to find there were that many homeless people online,” said Veazey.
The discovery couldn't have come any sooner, said Sabrina.
“I was having a hard time. I was this close to giving up,” she said, holding her fingers an inch apart. “No matter what we did, it just kept getting worse and worse. People kept telling us all the time, it will get better, but with everything we'd been doing it just kept getting worse. I had hit that breaking point. I was done."
“Nobody would talk to us anymore. Family, friends. I talk to Sabrina all the time and it wasn't helping. I didn't know where to turn,” he said.
“It must have helped,” Sabrina said, smiling. Just talking with someone in a similar situation made it easier to deal with it all, she said.
While he never got a response from the state's elected officials, what Veazey did find was a homeless community online.
“It was a shock to find there were that many homeless people online,” said Veazey.
The discovery couldn't have come any sooner, said Sabrina.
“I was having a hard time. I was this close to giving up,” she said, holding her fingers an inch apart. “No matter what we did, it just kept getting worse and worse. People kept telling us all the time, it will get better, but with everything we'd been doing it just kept getting worse. I had hit that breaking point. I was done."
“Nobody would talk to us anymore. Family, friends. I talk to Sabrina all the time and it wasn't helping. I didn't know where to turn,” he said.
“It must have helped,” Sabrina said, smiling. Just talking with someone in a similar situation made it easier to deal with it all, she said.
And now Sabrina, as “bully_lover78,” and Keifer, as “keifer1122,” are tweeting. Keifer even managed to attract the attention of his idol, skateboarding legend Tony Hawk. In October, Hawk sent Keifer a care package of clothes and an iPhone, which Keifer uses to post his Twitter updates.
They are surviving on $500 in food stamps a month, and $307 cash from welfare. They don't panhandle, Sabrina said, because they are making it — just barely — on that.
“Most people didn't see us as people after losing our jobs and home. It's time we open the eyes of people to the problem,” he said. “This is not a big city issue, it's a world problem — and problems can be solved.”
They are surviving on $500 in food stamps a month, and $307 cash from welfare. They don't panhandle, Sabrina said, because they are making it — just barely — on that.
“Most people didn't see us as people after losing our jobs and home. It's time we open the eyes of people to the problem,” he said. “This is not a big city issue, it's a world problem — and problems can be solved.”
