- [Interviewer] Lanette, you're a homeless
veteran livin' in your car.
- Yes, sir.
- Tell me about it.
- Well, it started July of last year.
I was in Compton, that's my home of record,
where both my parents grew up,
and my grandparents are from.
My grandfather is Maxie Filer,
and Blondel Filer is my grandmother.
And I get a lot of my ...
Background, a lot of my upbringing from my grandparents.
Some people say I'm like a old soul.
And so, they passed away.
My grandmother passed away last year in February,
and my grandfather in 2011.
And after they passed away, I wanted
to come back to Compton, just to kinda get more
of my roots after getting out of the military,
Well, I found that some of my beliefs,
and my understandings clashed with Compton and my family.
I have PTSD from going to war twice,
and the core of me likes structure,
it likes discipline, it likes to have evidence,
it likes to have understanding about things,
and I realized not everybody thinks that way.
So, when I moved back home with my family in Compton,
we got into fights and disagreements
about some of my beliefs.
One belief of mine is that the household should be clean.
There should not be filth, everything has a place,
you can make a mess, but you have to clean up that mess.
Another belief is that you can
control the environment, you can control the energy.
The gang activity that was happening
at my grandparent's house disturbed me,
my grandparent's house was never tagged
with graffiti, or anything like that.
And when I came back to Compton last year, I saw that.
So, one of the disputes between me and my family
was about me painting my grandparent's wall white.
I have a judge, my uncle that's a judge,
and he owned the house at the time, and he said
"Well, why did you paint the wall white?"
And I said, "Why not? Isn't it beautiful? Isn't it clean?"
I said "It had graffiti on there."
He said "Well, you don't understand because
you've been away from Compton, that now will
attract the gang members to come tag the house again."
And I just didn't understand that.
And we couldn't see eye to eye about that,
so I basically kept painting the wall white
'til they stopped tagging it.
That was a problem between me and my family,
they felt I was attracting gang energy.
I felt I was blocking gang energy,
and supporting my grandparents
in a way of, you know, old-fashioned,
this is your property, no-one comes
on your property and just ... - [Interviewer] Yeah.
Degrades it, so that was one disagreement with
me and my family when I was living there.
The other was: my brain went dark after
seeing young people die, I really truly
believed that Marines couldn't die,
from the training that I was with,
as a hospital corpsman, we trained with Marines,
and if we passed their training, we walk,
talk, eat, live Marine corps.
When you do that, you believe in everything
they teach you and everything you trained with.
And you don't believe that Marines can die.
You think it's impossible.
So when you go to war, and you see that happen,
it does something to your soul.
It does something to your soul, it's not like
I hadn't seen death, I had seen death
in older generations, people getting sick
and passing away, working in the hospital,
I saw death, but when I saw Marines die,
it did something dark to my brain,
something bad to my soul.
- [Interviewer] So, how long have
you been livin' in your car?
- So, when I told my family about smoking,
that helped with my ptsd, spice,
they decided that was not something they would
tolerate or accept living at the household.
So, we agreed that I was gonna use my time
to find a house, find an apartment with my disability,
and move outta the household, because I had
already gone to treatment, and I had decided
that this was something that was gonna be
helpful with me. - [Interviewer] Mm-hmm.
- [Interviewer] So you're smoking spice,
and that's how you became homeless.
- That's how it happened. - [Interviewer] Oh my gosh.
My family, I went to the hospital one night,
I had gastritis, 'cause I was internalizing
a lot of my stress, I was seeing a psychologist,
psychologist said "Hey, you need a better environment."
Said "It's your environment!"
Said "Look, the spice is not good, but the fact
of you balancing your priorities, and having
structure, and you're coming in, you're talking
to me about your stressors, that's what's
helping you, y'know, go forward."
He said, "Get outta that household,
that household is just not good."
- [Interviewer] Your only option was the car?
- Only option was the car after that,
so what I did was, I said "Well, I have my
disability", I was happy, I had my disability,
I can go, I can look for apartments, I can
try to find some type of temporary program,
I applied for U.S. Vets, they said I wasn't
eligible for the care that they, the services
that they offered, I wasn't eligible, I made
too much money with my disability.
So, I said "Okay, let's try apartments."
So I searched for some apartments because,
mind you, I have two kids.
And it was summertime, when they had
gotten through the last year of Compton,
and it was summertime. - [Interviewer] Yeah.
And I'm using my disability, my social security,
and I'm givin' all the documents that you need to,
y'know get an apartment, I'm waiting on the phone call,
that takes time, I get the phone call back,
"We didn't approve you for the apartment, sorry,
you'll get something in the mail."
Well how will I get something in the mail if I'm homeless?
So, it was like, okay, discouraging, because
first off, that's not my norm, I'm not used
to looking for housing, for 14 years, Navy,
Marine Corps, always supplied housing.
So, this is a new process to me,
but I understand, my psychologist told me,
"Apply again, it just takes a long time, takes a long time."
Well, in the meantime, I'm in Compton,
staying in the parks!
I got shot up in my car!
If I take you to the back of my car--
- [Interviewer] That's why you had that--
- That's the Spider-man!
I had to be creative and cover my car,
now let me tell you what happened.
- [Interviewer] 'Cause you got shot out?
- I was in Long Beach, - [Interviewer] Oh my gosh.
trying to find apartments and learn Long Beach
a little better, because that's where I'm from,
that's where I was born, now, my parents were
raised in Compton, but I was born in Long Beach Naval Base.
- [Interviewer] Right.
- I stayed in a park and the police said,
"It's too late, you gotta go, you can't stay."
- [Interviewer] Right.
- I said, "Oh, man!"
Well, Compton has a park that I can go to,
and I can stay, Gonzalez Park.
Fireman house right there, and it's a big 'ol park.
I'm headed down Compton Boulevard, goin' to the park,
when I get to Arembe, I believe, is the street,
there's a carwash to the right, and there's a stoplight.
Well, I see a vehicle going this way,
and traffic's supposed to be going this way.
So I said "Oh, it's like, 11 o'clock at night," said
"Oh, this guy must be a drunk driver or something."
I pull out of the way, I don't want him
to come my way, - [Interviewer] Right, right.
I pull over to the car wash.
The individual pulled all the way around,
I thought he was leaving.
Pulled out right behind me, jumped out of the car,
point blank started shooting at my car.
- [Interviewer] Oh my gosh!
- I drove just like I was in Iraq,
went right back to my training.
- [Interviewer] Oh my gosh, wow.
- Now, I can show you, I had--
- [Interviewer] No, I was wonderin' why that was like that,
and it makes sense, so what's it like
livin' in your car, what's gonna, what's your future like?
- Well, this is the point where I been out for
let's see, it was 2011, I've been out for six years now.
I have been back and forth with apartments,
out of apartments, staying with family,
out of apartments again, Trying to find my own place.
I'm to the point now where I
really would like to use my VA loan.
That's my bigger plan. - [Interviewer] Right.
I've kinda given up on the other stuff,
because it's kinda, the system's kinda beat me.
I can't seem to win with those, so,
my biggest hope, I've talked with the police
officers down here, I've tried to network
a little bit, to see real estate, realtors,
people that know about, y'know, the houses,
I understand you have to have your ducks
in a row when you use the VA loan, so that's my hope.
My dream is, I would love to win the lottery.
(laughter)
- [Interviewer] Well, I was just gonna ask you, yeah!
- That's my dream!
I have dreams still, - [Interviewer] Yeah.
I still have dreams.
- [Interviewer] Well, if you had three wishes,
what would they be?
- First, get my children back.
I miss my children.
The way they were taken, it was terrible.
And they weren't taken by any authority,
they were taken by family, so that's what hurts the most.
It's like, who gave you the right?
So, my first wish would be to have my children back.
If I could have them back, my heart would
feel like it's back, y'know, like it's normal.
Of course, to have them back, I have to have
somewhere to be, I have to have shelter,
so any human being needs shelter,
so, my children, shelter, and then I would love
to win the lottery.
And the reason why I would love to win the lottery:
My understanding about healing, and people,
is that you need shelter, you need love,
you need a little bit of laughter,
a little bit of learning, a combination of all of that.
And what I would do with that money is,
I would build a hotel.
And I would have where you could come in,
you could get massage, aromatherapy,
food, a meal and a place to stay.
With that money, you could afford to do that,
that's what I would love, that would
be my dream, my business.
And I understand, you have to have
a lot of money to do that, but that's
what I would do with that money.
And I would also lend, like the Bible says lend,
you saw my Bible.
- [Interviewer] Yeah, you got your Bible.
- I read, lemme tell you, I read Psalms
and Proverbs a lot, so, one thing that's
helped me from being in my car and being
homeless is, I've gotten back to reading.
I literally, I read in the Navy, but it
was to memorize and apply, okay,
'cause that's how they teach you.
But, getting out, I'm learning to now
understand and read, read and understand,
read and understand, so that's the difference.
And that's one thing I was trying to tell
my family about the spice.
I didn't really trigger that until I started
smoking and I'm like, whoa, that was deep, y'know?
And, I dunno how people take it, but for me,
- [Interviewer] That spice is bad stuff.
- It's horrible!
Once I found out what it was and all
the reactions it could cause, it's horrible!
But the problem was that the evidence
it created for me was good, so it was like
trying to balance that, y'know what I'm saying,
trying to take ...
- [Interviewer] It's good for a little bit,
but then it gets, y'know ...
- It can get you into trouble.
- [Interviewer] Well, thank you very much for talking.
- You're welcome.
Thank you for coming by and asking,
and I mean, here's my Navy sweatshirt.
This bad boy has been with me for a long time,
you know it's your favorite when the pockets
are torn, things are tore up, and you still hold onto it.
- [Interviewer] Yeah.
(strings music)