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Steamstacks Approaching Boston on the Tobin Bridge, yesterday morning's commute There's a homeless man I see every day on my way to work, I call him Hello Man. He hangs out by one of the North Station entrances. Every day, he says hello to every single person he sees. Sure, he's begging for money, and he holds a cup, but the thing is, he always says hello. His voice is deep like Barry White's and has so much warmth and personality that it's hard not to look at him. His manner is always gracious and cheerful. Hello Man says things like "Mornin', ladies!" and "G'day, guys!" or "Enjoy your day, Miss. Oh my, isn't that a lovely dress you have on!" I see people talking with him one-on-one every so often, and most people do answer his good wishes in kind. But I avoid looking at him or talking to him. He says hello to me every day anyway. Sometimes I feel angry that Hello Man expects me to talk to him. Sometimes I feel sick to my stomach. There are mornings I may feel sadness, and then empathy for a few seconds as I get closer. I'm not really sure what I feel, but whatever it is disappears. Even when my headphones are on and the volume is up, I can still hear him welcoming me to the city and wishing me a good day. And sometimes, when I can feel his eyes on me and I know he is wondering why I never look at him, I cross the street. Once as I walked by, he said, "Why you gotta look at the ground?" And the next day, he noticed me on the other side of the street and said "Why you gotta be so heartless?" - - - Last night I didn't see anyone on the streets who wasn't surely headed somewhere warm. The usual folks who hang out between the bars in Faneuil Hall and Haymarket and North Station or Downtown Crossing or South Station, they were all nowhere to be seen. Gone? Somewhere. On nights like last night, I think about all the people who are out there in the cold. All the people who have nowhere to go at the end of their day. The people who have no end to their day, or night. The people who have no place to call home, no one to call. When I think about them, I feel sick inside. I feel helpless, helpless. The cabbie, an older guy, asks me how my day was. "Pretty good, a little long though. Got in at 7." I pause, sliding on the seat, straining a little to see in his rear view to get a glimpse of his face. "How was your day?", I ask, quickly adding "Is this the end of your day? Or the beginning?" Often I take cabs home late at night and often I ask cab drivers this question. Ever since that transient period of my childhood, seeing people who drive for a living, or seeing people who work when everyone else is asleep, reminds me that time can be slippery. The time when a day ends and when one begins. That year or two? when my brother and sister and I traveled up and down the west coast and criss-crossed deserts of Arizona with my mom. We stopped at rest stops and truck stops in the middle of the night, and I learned just how different the lives of people could be. One person's day might be getting started at 11 pm. Another one might be bedding down in the cab of their truck 'til the 4 am alarm. Others, like us, had no schedule, were wandering through days, driving straight through the nights. There was no beginning or end of day. Our only anchors were one another. We were moving and dissolving and reappearing in space and time. "I've been on since 5, just getting started." I'm shivering as I daydream the route from the morning's commute, wondering if I saw Hello Man there this morning from the opposite corner. Then, we pass the next corner just before Haymarket, where the homeless people stand at night or sleep rolled up in mover's blankets or carpet scraps. But there's no one there. "Brrrrrrrr." I'm shaking and wondering why I decided to put thin pants on this morning. "I can't believe how cold it is out there." "Yeah," cabbie says, "it's gonna be colder tomorrow - but without the wind. So it'll prolly feel the same as it does now." By now we're speeding down the row of pubs that faces the Holocaust Memorial with its clouds of ghost steam rising up the glass smokestacks into the sky. The walls of the glass are etched with all the tiny names of the people who died in the Holocaust. You can see the names if you look closely, but if you look at it from across the street you might think it was just textured glass. I walk through the memorial every morning. Some mornings I get inexplicably choked up. Sometimes I cry and actually choke. Though it hasn't happened in a while. Before Hello Man came to the street 2 years ago, I used to just ignore the memorial, not that I would do it consciously. It was not an active avoidance like my avoidance of Hello Man, I used to walk opposite the memorial on the cobble stones, along the Freedom Trail, past the oldest restaurant in North America, The Union Oyster House, past the Purple Shamrock, past nighttime memories of dancing and karaoke and tequila shots and lemon drops, and tripping on the bricks home, past the sausage vendor stands on Friday and Saturday nights, past the McDonalds where the homeless people sit on the numbing sidewalk with signs that read "Vietnam Vet. Sober." and "Help me, I have 3 kids at home." I could ignore all of them. But now Hello Man stands on that side of the street. See ya, Hello Man. "I hope nobody's out in this cold tonight..." I mumble. "What, young lady?" "I just said, it's so cold, unbearable, I hope no one else is out here. You know, no one who has to stay out here tonight..." "Yeah, they're comin round ever' so often and pickin up people... So's most of 'em are stayin inside tonight." We cross the surface artery, riding past the arch of the Harbor Hotel I try to get my camera out, but I'm too late and miss it. The archway is all lit up at night, and inside is a banner like a huge white parachute billowing in the wind. I stare at the parachute until it disappears from view, and then the cabbie breaks the silence. "But. But... some folks just won't go. They're afraid of the cold weather round-ups. Now that they've closed down all the mental institutions, there's just no place for them to go. No place safe." As the cab crosses the Tobin Bridge, I know it's a long way down, but it's dark. I like watching the massive billowing clouds of white steam, in contrast with the darkness, rising out of the stacks and brushing over the cab like a crowd of ghosts crossing the bridge. I notice that they took down that sign that used to be there. A highway sign that said something like, Are you feeling down? Are you feeling depressed? Don't jump! And it gave a number to call. And there was a phone. - - - On nights like last night, I sometimes think of the times with my mom, when she was very sick, and we were "running away". There were no bedtimes, there were no beds. No curfews, no meal times, sometimes no meals or heat or water. Days never ended, days never began, days didn't have names anymore. And as much as that should make me feel something, it doesn't. Instead, when I remember our 'homeless period', I often remember how I felt when she was alone and without us. When I was 12, my mother left us behind, and the state got involved and took away her parental rights. I remember laying in a bed I didn't know, not being able to sleep just because it was night. Staring at the moon and wondering where she was, wondering if she was cold, if she had something to eat that night, if anyone was hurting her, if she was letting God steer the car. And I remember telling myself over and over, even though she was crazy and even though she dragged us all over kingdom come and that time she threw away the christmas tree and we fled town on christmas morning, and even though she almost killed us... and even though she didn't really kill us after all, but she did hurt us... And even though she finally left us behind, that if anything ever happened to her, I would never speak again. Ever. I knew if I tried hard enough, I could stop my own heart. In that little kid feeling helpless way, feeling the kind of powerlessness that makes you dream up super powers, I dreamed up a super power to beat all super powers. I decided if anything (else) ever happened to her, and if I couldn't stop her from hurting herself, and if I couldn't even be there with her when it finally happened, I would just make myself disappear. |