Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Unpredictable - (part 1)


"Excuse me miss. Can you undo this?"

For a second, I imagined that the voice belonged to one of the Spartan warriors from 300. He was referring, of course, to his leather shield strap. The buckle had inconveniently [for him] slipped around to the small of his back. A bronzed back, rippled and glistening. I'd be happy to oblige him.

But the voice was a little too high, though a bit gravelly, too plaintive. Definitely not sexy.

It belonged to a rather large black woman in her mid-to-late 50's, dressed in a floral crepe skirt and top. The kind of pattern you'd expect to see as wallpaper in the early 80s.
She was dark-skinned; lighter than Aunt Jemima, but darker than, say...Oprah.
Her hair, un-permed, stood in a coarse, chunky 'fro, blackish and scattered with patches of a color I call "dirty squirrel"...a failed attempt at gray coverage.

We were at a Barnes and Noble Starbucks. Outside.
I was on the phone with my cousin, Dexter, detailing the events of my birthday weekend. The woman sat at the un-umbrella'd table (brave, given the heat), riffling through a clear plastic purse whose contents included a crumpled Wal-mart sack, some pens, receipts, unwrapped sandwich cremes and a wide-toothed comb (clearly unused).

Slip-on sandals clamped like man-made leather traps around her doughy feet, both of which were covered with flakes of dead or dying skin and dusted from shin to toe with a thick layer of ash.

I'd seen her when I first sat down, muttering to herself in the way that homeless people and writers usually do.
And now she was talking to me.
My hesitation to acknowledge her was born of two things.
  • Fear
  • Selfishness

1. What if I walked over there and she seized the opportunity to grab me by the wrists and pull me down onto her lap? She'd pat my head and call me by the name of some long-lost loved one or soap star. What if she stabbed me?

2. I came to Starbucks to read, to be seen reading and thought an intellectual, and to eavesdrop on the conversations of others (who had obviously come to be heard).
By muttering to herself and appearing to be crazy, this woman had made herself useless in my pursuit of these goals.

I had not come to undo the trappings of ambiguously homeless people.

I would have ignored her, but it was too late because I was already looking at her.

"Excuse me?"

I made my voice polite, yet firm. It said, "I'm a nice person, but don't try anything crazy".
She pointed to her neck.
"Can you help me with this?"
She was wearing a two-strand, beaded necklace. It did not match her outfit.
I lowered the phone from my ear, pressing it to my chest, which supposedly keeps the person on the other line from hearing what you say.
The woman's rheumy eyes searched my face.
"Here, undo this."

I didn't want to touch her and it wasn't just because of the waves of noxious fumes rising from her chair like summer heat dancing above the pavement.
Hers was a smell that my brain classified as "hot garbage", "fermented sweat", "poor lady" and "Damn".

But that wasn't it. It was more about the fact that I could not predict what would happen next.
Any number of outcomes were possible.
  • Lap-sitting
  • Head-patting
  • Repeated stabbing
  • "Thank you"
  • "F**k you"
  • or nothing.

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