On my walk this morning the song “Survivor” came on by In This Moment. I like the song and many of my readers here would probably enjoy it too. It reminded me of someone I've recently met. He was a homeless person by the name of Stan; I changed his name for privacy. Living in Florida separates me from a true Michigander’s reality. The southern weather wraps me up in its, usually warm and temperate, climates. It inspires, most times, albeit in a different way than the gloomy days of a Michigan winter.
Stan
was sitting on a metal chair at the edge of woods that stretched between the
party store and a Kingdom Hall down the road. When I first spotted Stan, I
looked the other way, but I got a good observation of where he was. There was a
faded red duffle bag sitting beneath trees and a shelter of branches that made up an approximate
three by six foot area. This area protected what appeared to be Stan's lifelong belongs. There were two chairs, and a small table made out of a
milk crate. Stan sat on one of the metal chairs and just stared into the woods;
he didn’t make eye contact like some homeless people who often attempted to make small talk if they thought
they were going to gain something from the engagement. After I
walked by he picked a book. The book was familiar, in fact I had recently "Googled" it because the title was something I stumbled into on a sub-reddit group I was a part of.
The
book was faded and worn. It was one of those books that someone had read
many times. It was a book gleaned over until the cover was cracked and the
title barely legible. It was Stan who had read the book until he memorized the
words. I found this out when I made a proper introduction, and shook the man’s
hand, albeit from a social distance and a with glob of hand sanitizer afterward.
More
of my endeavor and Stan will be posted soon, so keep coming back. Thanks!
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