trapeze

Sometimes you just know what kind of day it is going to be from the moment you roll out of bed. This day was one of those. Half asleep and wanting desperately to crawl back under the covers, I dressed myself in the dark so as not to wake Andrew, but he was wide awake. I stumbled through the house, slipped on my helmet and clumsily pushed my bike out the door.

Usually I meet several folks along the way, although it is merely 4:30am: the guy riding an old mountain bike on the sidewalk, probably a bouncer on his way home from work, the garbage truck drivers and the milk men, and the guy filling his yaris with gas at the corner station. Today I crossed paths with all of these familiar faces in their familiar machines, and a few others as well.

Getting to know the homeless population has been an adventure in and of itself.

There was Randy, who would always order a medium coffee and would share with me such intimate information as: what it was like to sleep outside in the city, how you choose your bed at night and what resources were out there for the homeless. He would always call me the "pretty one" and blushing, walk away with his head nodding after a good conversation. He was gone when I came back from Oregon. "went south" someone said. I didn't know whether to think he'd lost it, or he'd literally headed south. I think the latter is actually the case.

Then there is Mary. She is short with a round face and black curly hair. She has a hard time completing thoughts before she jumps into the next, although I'm pretty sure the information is all there, only slightly anachronistic. One day I saw her running and jumping with such enthusiasm you might have thought she won the lottery. She had an aggressive look in her eye, and she was jumping around as if there was an invisible hopscotch sketched onto the sidewalk in front of our store. "don't get in her way today" I thought. Only because she looked determined and focused, not dangerous. She is a sweet soul, always saying please and thank you even if she is just quickly moving through the store, grabbing a cup of water and heading out the other door. She often comes in with stories of how she's been wronged and what she's learned from the experience. One day she marched in and announced to my co-worker, while lifting up her shirt "guess what?!? I'm pregnant!". On another occasion she asked for pen and paper so she could write us a note. That note was an entire 2 page legible letter to us, although not one person could figure out what it said. Word salad, I believe it is called. Thoughts all connected in some way, but only to the person thinking those thoughts.

Toupee guy waltzed in one morning to a friendly crew. "Someone new", I thought. I was leading our crew that morning, and feeling relaxed I handed him the cup of hot water he asked for. He bathed in our bathroom and fell asleep on our bench. At around 8:00 when the shop was getting busy, I asked him to leave so our other customers might have somewhere to sit. All the tables were full, it was warming up outside. He happily agreed and mentioned he was planning on leaving at 8 anyway. The next day he showed up again, asked for a cup and proceeded to fill it with our milk. I asked him to leave. He did. Since that day a couple months ago now, I see him often, on the bench outside, occasionally walking through towards the bathroom, the thin man and his dry, tattered blond toupee, his black duffel bag and gray quick-dry pants. He sometimes shows up at the shop before we do...

Carol is possibly my favorite of our customers. She is roughly 5'6" tall, incredibly fit and extremely strong. The first time I saw her, she was wearing a full-sized statue of liberty costume. The next time I met her she was wearing a viking helmet. After a while I realized that she has an incredible wardrobe that she must keep somewhere, but not in the two giant duffel bags she carries with her everywhere. I've seen her in mini skirts and full length evening gowns, I've seen her wear glittery sparkling shirts and I've seen her barefoot. The wardrobe is not the only spectacular part about this woman, however.

Her creativity is limitless. She was spotted on day painting a pizza box with her piece of pizza. Making brush-stroke, then sitting back to analyze and admire her work. I've spoken with her about religion and philosophy. A friend has seen her throwing a textbook into the air and catching it on her back: over and over again until they stopped watching some 20 minutes later. One day my co-worker handed her the coffee she ordered saying "here you go my friend" and Carol responded quickly "you are not my friend. I've let too many people down in my lifetime, you are not my friend" She is sharp as a tack. It has always been a mystery what her background is, why is she so strong, where does she keep her wardrobe, just WHO is this woman? We found out the other day that she used to be a trapeze artist. Explains everything. Well, maybe not everything.


There are others, oh yes. There are customers with stories coming out our ears. But these are some of my favorites. And this morning, I got to see all of them. Except Randy.

I saw a flash of red out of the corner of my eye and looked over. In the doorway to one of the stores on our street was Carol, spinning around in a red mini-skirt holding a blanket out like a cape. I kept riding. Just as I pulled up to the shop, parking my bike, toupee guy wandered by with his duffel bag in hand, blank stare. All was normal until after opening, when Carol burst into the store, her face twitching and her hands moving like lighting. I dropped what I was doing and turned around to help her. "I'm moving really fast, I didn't mean anything, fast, moving fast, I mean, the usual just the usual." she said. I asked her what the usual was and she motioned with her hands and said "the usual". "a cup of water, I'll come back, just a cup of water for now". I got her water, and she filled it the rest of the way with milk. I went on with my work. Until I noticed that she had her hand in the tip jar, an empty tip jar. I looked over at my coworker, and we exchanged confused glances, but left her alone. She left.

Five minutes later, after examining and re-examining the parking meter, miming the putting-in of money and trying to understand the machine beyond its worth, she came back into the store, repeating "the usual, return, return", put something into each of our three tip jars, and walked back out the door swiftly. I was in the middle of helping a customer, so I ignored it. Until I looked down and realized that she had put a tampon in each of the three jars.

An hour or so later, Mary walked in looking bright-eyed. She ordered a medium coffee. Then she said something that sounded like the following "Penny from mental health she has a crab right here [pointing to her cheek] but Robert, also from mental health he said no, and his brother hit him, and they accused me of doing it, but penny has a crab on her face, you know, chlamydia, the clap, penny has crabs but not me, I'm clean, okay thank you bye!" Then she walked out the door.

And that was my morning in a nutshell.