The Bainbridge Island Bum

On my bus this morning was a homeless man in a wheelchair. While I was trying to read, he was anxious to talk - as, if we are to be honest, homeless people are apt to want to do. So I put my book aside and we talked.

He explained to me how the ferry was a real bumpy ride this morning and I agreed and then he went on to explain that he prefers to sleep on Bainbridge Island. I laughed out loud because Bainbridge is a wealthy and arguably pretentious community likely not very accustomed to homeless people wandering its streets or using their trees as a sort of high class outdoor hotel. The man smiled at my laughing and he said, "I'm serious...no one F's with you out there...it's nice. No SOB's who will kick your a___ and steal your stuff."

I told him I could see his point. He then offered, "Plus I really like the trees."

Again, I told him I could see his point...I mean REALLY see his point.

And then he went on to explain how he also likes to hop the bus and go to the Casino. Where he takes the money he earns from selling the "Real Change" Newspaper and gets drunk and gambles his money away. Once he's broke, he gets back on the Ferry and goes to Seattle to sell more of the papers. He says it's TOTALLY worth the cost of the ferry trip. And I could sense in him that he felt like he was making a connection between his lifestyle with the more "normal" lifestyle of the rest of us who commute back and forth on the ferry and buses. He was making his living just like the rest of us and he seemingly had no comprehension of the futility of it all.

But then why should he be different from the rest of us? We engage ourselves with less obvious or less socially unacceptable futility all the time. None-the-less, I cannot help but wonder what the activists at "Real Change" would think of this man's use of his paycheck - however small it may be. Because the only change that "Real Change" is accomplishing for this guy is a change of environment...a real nice environment, to be sure though.

Comments

Anonymous said…
James, I take offence at your description of Bainbridge Island. Actually, I'm not really offended, but I do have to disagree. Yes, there are wealthy people on the island, but there are also a lot of normal people on the island. Where do you get the idea it's a pretentious community? I live here, so does Eugenie, and a few othe people from the parish, half might be considered wealty, but I and another person are certainly not. Of course, I've only been here over a year, but the other person, Vicki, has been here for several. It's a nice community. There's lots of normal families, I know a lot of people that are coworkers of mine that live here and are definitely not wealthy nor pretentious. There's a lot of farms and rural people, and I think it's the people that move over here from Seattle and surrounding areas that are the wealty and pretentious on the island. The actual "locals" are not. ;p
7:41 PM
fdj said…
Fair enough Dawn...I'm down with blaming the rich Seattle immigrants for BI's rep.

Perhaps we could start the Kitsap Minutemen and enforce our borders better.
6:25 AM
Post a Comment

Popular Posts