Storm Trooper
“Ready for the snow?”
I’d hardly noticed the woman standing near the Hannaford entrance until she spoke. “Ready as I’ll ever be,” I chirped, head down, but then I stopped. It took a minute to put the picture together: two overflowing shopping bags, a large backpack and a smaller one lined up on the curb. Youngish woman, 30 maybe, a little heavyset, worn sneakers on her feet. A sign made of torn cardboard that read: Anything helps. The marker she’d used had been almost out of ink because the letters faded as they went on. You could barely make out the word helps.
I hadn’t intended to walk into town, but a blizzard was approaching and I needed a green vegetable or two to bolster my larder. It was a steely morning. You could almost taste the snow in the air. When I walk, I never bring my wallet. Instead, I tuck a business card in one of my pockets for ID in case I’m found dead in a ditch. But today was an exception. I fished out what little cash I had, apologizing. The woman smiled warmly. “Like the sign says…”
C. said her husband was out collecting bottles and that she had a job interview coming up at a local chain restaurant. They were new in town. They’d come down from Augusta. “We didn’t fit in there,” she said. “Too many drugs. I don’t do drugs. And I don’t drink. I only smoke pot. It helps with the stress out here.” (I know MAGholes would jump on that, but they can put their opinions in their pipes and smoke them as far as I’m concerned.)
C. shifted from foot to foot as she looked down at her bags. “I think I have another pair of socks in there somewhere.” I asked if she knew about the warming center across the way. She did. She was waiting for it to open at 8:30. “They,” she gestured to the people beginning to gather there, “told me this is a good place to stand.”
I wished her well as I headed in to buy my baby bok choy so that I could whip up a steaming pot of what I call my faux pho, a soup whose resemblance to its namesake ends with the fact I serve it in an oversized white porcelain bowl. I decided I was going to find C. some of those gel-pack hand and feet warmers, but my search was in vain. Oh well, I thought at the checkout. I tried.
“Trying” used to be easy for me. In my other life, I was asked all the time to lend my name or voice or body to various fundraisers and initiatives. I taught workshops to inmates and older adults and middle school boys. I emceed and performed at charity events. I contributed writing, worked with refugee/immigrant communities, donated services. I even once shared “celebrity” dunk-tank duties with then-Sheriff Mark Dion. Causes came to me.
But that was then. The world is more harrowing now, and I’m no longer sure of my place in it. I brace myself before I dare turn on the news each morning. By the time my feet hit the floor, I’m already filled with fury. Some people are good at channeling that energy into action, but I feel aimless. I run to this meeting, that march, donate here, make that phone call, send that letter, volunteer at this or that food program. But it still feels like I’m doing nothing.
As I checked out, I stared at my wallet. I keep a $50 bill quartered in a side pocket for emergencies. I knew it was there when I stuffed singles into C.’s hands, but it hadn’t occurred to me to offer it. That’s a lot of money, surely too much to just hand over to one person on the street. What if she wasn’t looking for a job? What if the husband was waiting around the corner in his Tesla? Or – what if she too was just trying as best she could?
I raced back and saw C. standing next to a very shiny, very black, very big SUV. An arm reached across the passenger seat with a crisp bill extended between two fingers — clearly someone accustomed to tipping. Discrete.
“I got you some money while I was inside,” I kinda-sorta-but-not-really lied. She glanced down at the two bills in her hand. “You know what this means? I don’t have to stand out here anymore.” She asked if she could hug me.
We lugged her bags across the way just as the center was opening and said goodbye. “I’ll look for you out here!” she called.
“I’ll look for you too!”
The first flakes fluttered in the air, danced together, then diverged. But by the time I got home, these tiny specks of ice and light were already gathering into a powerful front. This storm, I sensed as I began grating ginger, was going to be a doozy.
Elizabeth Peavey musters her resources here monthly.
