When the
sight of homeless people became more prevalent in Langley City, B.C., Canada,
where I live, I started wondering about the tragedies that could lead to such
dire circumstances. I wrote the
following story to muddle my way through to some sort of understanding from the
limited knowledge I did have.
It was
published in 2011 in the Polar Expressions anthology “Inkspots” and won an
Honourable Mention designation and my name was one of the authors featured on
the back cover of the book. It’s
something different to think about.
FREEDOM
Roger woke to the heavy drumming of
winter rain on his tent. He shivered and
pulled himself in his mummy-shaped sleeping bag away from the tent’s edge that
leaked. It wasn’t still pitch black in
his tent, so he knew daylight was trying to poke through the heavy cloud
cover. He was luckier than some, he
figured. At least he had the tent, which
he’d rescued from a dumpster last summer.
And he had an old bicycle, too, so he could travel the streets, looking
for cans and bottles he could return for cash.
Not bad for an old bugger.
He pulled himself reluctantly out of
his bag and put on his only pair of boots.
They were somebody’s discarded work boots, with steel toes. Kind of heavy for walking, but way more
waterproof than the last pair of used sneakers he’d had. He was still wearing his only set of clothes
and his only coat that he never took off, and an aviator hat that kept his head
and his ears warm. Once the boots were
tied he was ready to start his day.
Roger emerged from his tent with his
rickety bicycle and pushed it gingerly through the brush to reach the path that
would take him from the bowels of the park closer to the more used areas, and
then to the street. Once he was out of
the mud, he’d be able to ride and he would quickly travel the streets that had
garbage pick-up today, scrounging all the cans and bottles he could from the
blue recycle bins as he went. When he
had three or four garbage bags full to overflowing, he would head to the
closest grocery store or liquor store to return his finds for cash. He was lucky he lived in Langley. The City divided the garbage pickup into four
different areas, with one section of the town designated for pick-up each day
Tuesday through Friday. The other three
days, he scavenged from the dumpsters in town.
So for most days of the week he had an income, of sorts. It was enough to buy the rum that kept him
warm at night.
He went to the shelter for a free
meal every day. But he wouldn’t let them
talk him into staying there to sleep. No
way. He hated crowds. Couldn’t stand to be around that many
people. All the noise drove him
nuts. It was all he could do to get
through the half hour it took to get a meal.
He couldn’t imagine all that ruckus for hours on end all night
long. And no, he didn’t want anything to
do with staying there permanently in their attempt to get people off the
streets. He didn’t want anything to do
with those judgmental bastards down at welfare, either, thinking they were
doing so much good by making you feel like you’re no good cause you don’t have
an address, or any relatives to vouch for you, or any I.D. from the frickin’
province. And he sure as hell wasn’t
going to let the Sally Ann shove any fictitious God down his throat,
either. He didn’t believe in God.
If there had been a God, he wouldn’t
have lost everything. God died twenty
years ago when he got a pink slip the day he left the mining camp to come home
for a break after working three months to make good money to support his
family. Only the break was
permanent. And then coming home to find
his wife had split with his three kids.
What God makes that happen? So he
goes to the pub to drown his sorrows and after a couple of hours hears some
fire sirens. By the time he made it back
to his house, it was all gutted by the fire.
And then the insurance wouldn’t pay up for it because nobody had been
living in the house for the past thirty days.
So don’t talk to him about any God.
He didn’t need to suffer all those sermons for a place to stay. He had his freedom, and nobody could ever
take that away from him. He started
humming “Me And Bobby McGee” as he pedaled through the rain.
_________________________
By Lisa A. Hatton
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