Mary

For the Set Me Free Contest

My commute is 1 hour each way. Most people would become conditioned to the landscape, but not me. I'm an observer. I know when a lawn's been mowed, a parking lot has been recently paved, that sort of thing. The strip malls especially draw my attention, like the combination of stores that choose to be next to each other. My favorite one is the Tattoo Parlour, Tax Lawyer and Pawn Shop, combo.

 

Yes, I'm an observer. This is where Mary comes in.

 

I don't know if Mary is her real name, but it's the name I've given her. Mary is homeless and road hard.  She also has, or I'm pretty sure she has, Schizophrenia.  I see her almost everyday. She has a definite pattern she walks, about a two mile radius from the Shell station, that is on the corner of the only trailer park in our area. Its not all single wides, there are some small post WWII bungalows scattered in there too. It is also the short cut to my more affluent abode on the other side.

 

I think Mary had a home in that park at one time, or what was left of a home. An old condemned house that had all the windows knocked out and the doors broken into, but that is not where Mary stayed. No, I believe she stayed in the shed behind it, or that is until the city dealt the final blow to the house and with it, Mary's home. I often see her sitting in the bare spot where it was, just staring or talking to her hands.

 

I think the people who own the Shell station must have accepted the fact, she has decided for her, it is home base. Sometimes I see her pick up the payphone thinking there is a call, sometimes she's asleep in the grass and other times she is having a heated discussion with the light pole.

 

I've tried to get close to her, to give her something to eat or some water, but like a abused animal, she won't come near, so whatever offering I have, I place on the ground and walk away. When I am a safe distance, she'll timidly approach, picks it up and hurries away, all the while watching me. I've never seen her smile, only a soul less look in her sunken face.

 

My friends say I'm crazy for even doing this. "She might be dangerous." "You don't touch her, do you?" "Why would you want to do that?" When I tell my kids I'm stopping to give her something, they ask "What for?" I tell them all the same answer, because it is the right thing to do. You see, Mary, was somebody's daughter, granddaughter, friend, sister, and maybe somebody's mother.

 

For Mary, there is no heaven on earth, so I like to think for her, and others like her, there's a special place above and the suffering she's endured here will be greatly rewarded in a different place, a different time.

 

I don't know what her story is, maybe someday I will, maybe I won't. I know that occasionally weeks will go by and I won't see her. I worry, but then just when I think she's disappeared, she's there again, at the Shell station. Most of the time with clean clothes and her hair washed. I think and hope that there is someone else who shares my same philosophy.

 

I think and hope, for Mary's sake.

 

 

 

Reviews

[Pax Analog]

This is very touching, JC. Besides your calm, compassionate, and objective treatment of the subject matter, the fact your style is, as you noted, journalism-based, and mine is poetic parable-based makes reading your writing an intriguing complemenary opposite to me.

"Schizophrenia" is the correct spelling, tho' the pronunciation sounds the "t" you put in.

And of course we all have poignant recollections of homeless folk in our neighborhoods. For me, it was a guy who looked "old-school" hobo-like, perpetually dirty and frayed, but oddly lucid when he recognized you, as in "Hey Peace, you got a quarter?" since he knew me, delivered, I believe, with a slight southern twang. Well, JC, I was shocked some weeks back, to see a news item on TV, with a picture of this guy, don't remember his name, and he had just been burned alive by some decidedly psychotic nasty youth in the mid-Wilshire area of Los Angeles, near where I live. Apparently he was drunk, and made nothing of gasoline being poured on him till too late. There his sister was on TV, tearfully recalling his harmlessness, and his refusal of family help or lodging, just mentally ill enough to prefer his strange homeless street life. He didn't even HAVE to be on the street filthy and in rags. And now he was quite literally toast. Very strange, very sad, very angering, and I certainly hope the killers were apprehended.

Anyway, thanks for your thoughtful, well-etched chapter, and thanks again for finding meaning in the installment of mine you read. Given your predilections, it was a pleasant surprise. I shall return again to peruse your other chapters.

[Chillbear Latrigue]

Homelessness is one of the saddest things that I have dealt with in my line of work. I hope people read this story and are inspired to put themselves out to help the less forturnate. I thought that actually writing flowed very well and kept my interest throughout. I liked how it developed from a kind of run down of your routine into a much more significant piece. Nice work.

[Samuel Dickens]

Your writing is outstanding. I'm assuming that this is a true story. I guess there are a lot of "Marys" in the world. When I was little, we had hobos, then Vietnam came along and produced a brand new crop of human debris. Bless you for caring about Mary.

[Otter]

You're my kind of person, JC! I loved this, and I'm sending you a link that I think you'll like to read.
http://www.payitforwardmovement.org/individuals/kenneth2.html

[Rodney Russ]

Very interesting piece. It reminds me of a woman in my neighborhood. Most people seem to walk by as if she doesn't exist. It's a shame we throw away people much like we throw away garbage. It's a shame that some people refer to these individuals as human trash.

[Wildfleour]

JC - This is a wonderful piece of writing.

Seems like you and I should be friends in "real life". (Take a look at my writing - My name isn't Marcy, My name is Maureen."

Perhaps leave her a cup of coffee one day........let her see your kindness and it might be enough for her and you to know you connected even on that level.

[LadyLove]

Awww geez! This one touched me greatly! I have given to homeless I have seen as well. Sometimes anonymously as they slept, bought and left something, or given of what I had on me for my own lunch,or bought and given into their hands right there. Once a man with a dog..dog food included. I agree with you that it just right to do that. We feel our own pangs of hunger, why not another's? We grieve our own tears of sorrow, does another feel less? I feel your story is an important statement of your heart and soul and to have given her a name when you didn't know it humanizes her and gives her an identity other than.,"That homeless woman." We are what we write in so many ways! Blessings to you for such a touching story.