Homeless people always come into this laundry mat. They sleep, ask for change, eat out of the trash... Sometimes they talk to us, sometimes they talk to themselves, and every once in a while they just talk. To no one. Or maybe to someone we just can't see. ?
One night, a homeless woman came into the laundry mat. Let's call her Betty. Betty seemed pretty harmless, but also like she was completely out of her mind. She acted sort of like she was really drunk, and sort of like she had transported here from another timezone where her drunken mind was still functioning in a room full of people. She was older, had brittle blonde hair, and was unfortunately disheveled. ...and there was something about her that I liked right away.
When she came through the laundry mat door, she looked like she was passing from the living room to the kitchen of the party to discover a whole new set of people to talk to. She said some kind of greeting to the room, and then plopped herself down in a chair and began a conversation, in the middle of which she sang a slurry song to no one. There were two other women in the laundry mat who seemed sort of amused by Betty's performance. The women were both using the machines near our homeless friend, which gave them a front row seat to her wonderfully bizarre behavior. This particular night, I happened to be on the other side of the mat.
After Betty finished her serenade, she decided it was time to do some mingling. She got up from her chair and stumbled over to one of the women and began talking - not really to the woman but sort of near her. The woman went from being entertained to being completely distressed, but seemed to not want to give Betty the impression that she was even aware of her presence. Then Betty started reaching around by the woman's stuff like she was blindly looking for something she'd put there. This made the woman crazy. While still trying to act like Betty wasn't there, her movements became quick and sharp, and when Betty's hands would almost brush over her items, the woman would do this stealth thing to move them a few inches out of reach while trying to act like she wasn't terrified. Watching these two realities converge in a moment of don't-touch-my-stuff was hilarious!
I couldn't help but think how brilliant it would be if Betty knew exactly what she was doing from the moment she walked in the door to the moment she was able to create this fascinating display of humanity.
After a few minutes of innocuously terrorizing this woman, Betty decided she was done with this room and was on the next. She turned, and stumbled right back out the door.
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