Thursday, November 15, 2007

spotted in the hood

A cold front is blowing in today, making for some wacky weather here in ILM. Earlier this morning it was blue-sky sunny but wind was already picking up, with the air slightly chilled. A few hours later it's gray and just has that look of "storm" about it. With it, a kooky, what I assume to be homeless woman walks up and down the street outside our house, having a meltdown because her armload of trash keeps blowing away.

The woman is middle-aged, wears a pair of jeans and raggedy sweatshirt, and generally has that air of "disheveled" about her. I don't know if she really is homeless, or if she is, wtf she's doing around here--there's just no place to really go. But she's carrying an armload of trash with her, mostly crumpled up paper, and spends about half an hour engaging in the following routine:

walk a short distance
lose some paper
drop all the paper
bend at the waist and hang there for several long moments, as though entirely defeated
pick up a few wads of paper
lose that, too
watch paper blow away
march another short distance, looking pissed
pick up paper
lose paper
watch paper blow away
march in a circle at intersection, now holding canvas bag--not sure where bag came from
pick up more paper
lose it
stand for several long moments, gazing in distance, holding hair in pose of frustration
march away
look angry
wave a few cars to move on past her while she stands in the middle of the street
leave paper in pen's yard (THANKS)
skulk away down the street before pen can work up nerve to snap a picture

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hope she's not your new mail carrier.

mendacious said...

genius!

Anonymous said...

Oh dear. It's not like you live near a park in the barrio. There was an older homeless lady who swept the parking lot and picked up trash in the park that's near my office. She'd scold people to their face, or after the fact to no one in particular for littering.

hannah said...

i'm concerned bc i think it's a woman i've seen before. except, used to be she'd walk around with her twin. they were always dressed the same. and their hair, it was stringy. and armloads of paper. and v. thin, empty looking purses. i'd see them walking this great loop round town all the time.

what if it's just the one twin now. and she just has. to. keep. that. paper.

Cue said...

I wonder WHY with the paper? ...Fascinating. Also, a little sad.

penelope said...

it's baffling, all of it. i'm now obsessed with the idea of a twin.