I hadn't been to Smiley's in ages but we had a snow day at work yesterday so I piled all my "big" items in the car and went there.Right away this girl starts talking to me. The place is empty, so she picked me. She's like: Do you know what they're doing? Have you been watching the news? And she proceeds to tell me that they're trying to make the United States into Russia.
(By the end of the night, or at least by the end of my stint at Smiley's, I had figured out that she knew next to nothing about history.)
She opened our conversation by asking me if I had a cell phone. I said no and pointed to the fact that I had flip-flops on in the snow (socks, yes, real shoes, no) because I lived close by and had no reason not to go out in the snow storm with flip-flops on -- and no reason to carry a cell phone with me, either.
Of course then I ended up offering her 50 cents because, of course, you have a whole roll of quarters with you when you hit the local laundromat, which later made me realize that that is precisely why she was there. Because folks have quarters they are more willing than usual to part with when they are at the laundromat. Never mind that I had to leave my BFF there watching the clothes and worried for me driving because I had to go get more from Queen Soopers.
Usually I don't mind talking to folks for 2 minutes or less but she was so stupid she was irritatingly stupid. And to make matters worse she had three kids.
She told me she was a "panhandler." I mean she actually delivered that in our conversation as her line of work. She said she was on disability, then she changed her story to say that she was waiting to hear whether she was going to get disability -- she said she had three back surgeries. Whatnot. On and on. I have a good disability lawyer. His name is blah blah. I was too busy surviving to do well in school. Mother an alcoholic. Father gone. Life is such a tragedy! And now look at poor me panhandling with kids at home and no future. Father of the three children a felon. Just wants to learn and live!
(She was only 24 but looked mid-30s.)
I tried to get away from her a couple of times -- you know that Smiley's would not be a bad place to do your laundry were it not like folks like her cluttering the place up and the fact that the place is not well maintained. (But the machines that do work work well and are big and cheap.)
Really if I were to win Lotto and got terribly bored I would buy it and make it a very cool place to do laundry.
Anyway, so she's telling me she's got to catch a bus to get to Colorado Boulevard and I'm like "Why Colorado Boulevard?" And she's like "Because I'm going to panhandle."
I'm like: Oh good.
But what I said was: Good Colorado Boulevard because if you were going to Walgreens I would say stay away from that Walgreens because folks like me always walk out of that store into a batch of pandhandlers and get PISSED.
This is true. I'm not nice to panhandlers at that Walgreens on Race because it is MY FUCKING Walgreens and there are too many FUCKING BUMS. Wouldn't matter if one of them were Jesus in Disguise. I am rude to the panhandlers at Walgreens. (My friend Monica used to say panhandlers were Jesus in Disguise.)
Anyway, I asked if she stood on a corner with a sign and all and was asking why Colorado Boulevard etc. (I really did not want to talk to her but she was like a small fly and I just had no energy to be rude or possibly to be rude and then get shot or cut in the face. Whatnot. She looked like a woman who would cut your face if provoked.)
Answers: She doesn't use a sign. She starts conversations. (The balls of her to tell me this.) I WAS PISSED because I realized she had just pulled this stunt on me and that I'd given her 50 cents.
Her conversation starter with me was "those people" are trying to make the U.S. into Russia.
I told her a little bit about Russia and about Native Americans. (She is Cherokee. Hispanic Cherokee mixed but looks very Native.) I told her to get some books from the library to read up and asked her if she could read. She said yes. I said: Can you read well? Because you know being able to read a sign and being able to read a book -- even a basic book -- on Russian history are too very different things.
I thought she could not go wrong with a trip to the library.
As long as she doesn't start any conversations. Because we have one of those where I work. A woman who is on the edge of some invisible precipice and can't resist asking the person next over from her for change. Here in the city it is one thing, but in a suburban library, quite another.
I do like the city. I just don't get homelessness. I mean I DO GET IT THAT I COULD FIND MYSELF HOMELESS. But that's not the point. The point is that you don't accept it once you are there. And you get back to something. And if you are that prone to it, why in FUCKS NAME WOULD YOU HAVE THREE FUCKING CHILDREN?
I am into birth control for everyone. I think the world is overpopulated. I hate those Volunteers of America signs that are like: Joe Blow steals so he can feed his kids. Joe Blow's home has a steering wheel.
I just want to write BIRTH CONTROL in big black letters in the middle of the night on those billboards.
I told this to a colleague of mine at work -- about what I wanted to write on the billboards -- and he said: "Just did not see that coming from you, Jeanie."
I think people think I am really liberal. I am really liberal about some things and VERY CONSERVATIVE about others. I've lived next to Section 8 housing for almost a decade and I can tell you it is a CROCK OF SHIT. Those folks buy food for lavish meals and drive better cars than folks like me.
And they are raising kids that stand around outside all day with nothing to do. No books. No adults. Just the crack dealers to look up to.
What is wrong with this picture?
