Citizen of the Streets

There he sits at age 24. Hair grown long. Goodwill clothes. Body odor emanating. He wants to be a citizen of the streets. He strums his guitar that he never learned to play. In fact, it was one of the many Christmas gifts he was given so many years ago. He beat it up though. He wouldn't dare let the other people of the street see that he came from privilege.

How could he risk being rejected from the one place he ever really felt at home? "Does someone need to know your entire past and the nature of your roots for you to really belong?" He wonders. Is he just an actor on this stage that all the others experience as real life?

What is the difference between living and observing because there most certainly is one. Once he becomes a participant, he loses his entire sense of wisdom and control. Because to live, we must love. And as Bob Dylan once said, "There is no wisdom in falling in love." Did he really say that? He wonders.

That's what started his whole journey to begin with. He met her. The woman of his dreams. She was from the same kind of family. Their paths aligned perfectly. At least from his parents point of view. They were so proud. The future seemed so bright and so certain. Rich, smart, perfect babies. Luxury cars and fun vacations. And the only dark day would be one where he would have to work too late.

But something happened. Something so inexplicable, and yet so obvious at the same time. Things didn't work out. She ran off with a wealthier man and he realized all of his aspirations revolved around a future which was entirely contingent upon her existence in it.

He keeps a picture in his pocket of himself. A picture from not so long ago, and yet it feels like it feels like it is from another lifetime. He wonders if all the discussion of past lives really just refers to the phases of life we live on this planet. Not lives that require actual death. Maybe just a figurative one. After all, aren't all of our cells remade every 7 years? Isn't that one of those annoying facts everyone knows, but remains to actually be proven?

He looks at the picture and sees a different man. A man whose skin is perfectly smooth. Whose teeth aren't stained. Whose smile has no idea that there are no such things as happy endings. A palette that is made up of two flavors. Good and bad. Somehow he misses that man that he used to be. But in the same breath, he feels strong in the man he has become. Maybe he's not ready to to be called a man just yet. But he feels proud of the person who has dared to lose his sense of security and self and venture into the unknown. The place where nothing is safe, and the only thing anyone can judge him by are his actions.

He sits there strumming his guitar reciting the words that come into his head as he watches the passersby. He knows better than to be judgmental. Not wanting to create any pain for another being.

And stories flood through his mind, almost as if he can see the future and past in one blink of an eye for every face he views. The stories he sees though, remain in his mind. He is so afraid to put it all on paper. What if he offends someone? Words like Black and White. Mexican and Vietnamese. Gay and straight. Married and cheating. Bored and manic. Such labels that are so necessary, yet so constricting and imprisoning. How can one break free from what they are so they can become what they might be?

Maybe that's what imprisons him. So afraid to make a move for fear of how it will define him. That is why there is so much comfort in remaining the lonely observer. It's almost as if he can watch life like a movie, predicting every success and failure, without having to do either himself. No one to tell him, "I told you so." No one to point and laugh. Or worse, talk about him behind his back. Especially now that he is a citizen of the streets. No one knows him, and yet he knows everyone.

In Spite of Perfume.

He stands in the wings of a California restaurant. A fine dining restaurant that bustles with diamond drenched, hair coiffed, middle aged women. Expensive perfume permeates the air. He leans up against the ice machine with one leg up, picking at his nails. Although his body is relaxed, if need be, he's ready to pounce. I could see him cage fighting. His pointy jaw and spiked hair, his trimmed beard and beady eyes. But somehow it has nothing to do with the way he looks, it's something in his energy, like he could backflip over me, steal my wallet, knock me out and escape without time for me to even notice.

He didn't like me when I first started. I could tell. I would try to make eye contact with him as we passed each other, parting through the perfumed air, carrying expensive salads, and he would look right through me. Like even though he knew I existed, he wasn't about to waste his energy on an acknowledgement or expression.

And then I'm not sure what happened. I'm not sure how I won him over. It was when I stopped trying, as generic as that sounds. But, I wonder from his perspective what the moment was that he decided to accept me.

The day he did, it was like a flower bloomed. All of a sudden, the cage fighter became and indescribable spirit. No longer just a stereotype. No longer a 30 something white male who probably grew up in foster care, and spent time drug dealing, stealing and abusing. Suddenly, his smile shed the scars of 30 years and a child like innocence bloomed through.

He spotted a Bixie on my bracelet. A Chinese winged lion that wards off evil spirits. "That's my favorite animal too." He told me without an ounce of agenda or flirtation. Simply for the sake of relating. He has one that faces his front door. To keep the evil spirits out.

He plays in a recovery flag football league. Alcohol and drug free since 2005. And this is his first job. Waiting tables. His first "real job", that is. We talk as the perfume dissipates and the lunch rush dies down. He tells me he got this job by the Grace of Gd. He's done a lot of bad things, but he's a good person. He decided he was going to change his life for the better.

Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one who finds that decision to be nothing short of miraculous. That switch that goes off in people. The one that makes them want to change their ways and take responsibility.

So often stories like this fall on deaf ears.

People proclaim: People don't change. You never really KNOW someone. If someone has the capacity to commit evil once, what's to say they won't do it again? How do you know he's not just pulling the wool over your eyes?

He tells me he wishes he hadn't wasted so much of his life and missed out on so much. He's 35. He has the rest of his life. Contrary to what some might believe, there can be value in the darkness. Especially once one makes the choice to turn towards the light.

Maybe it was all of his tumultuous, irresponsible choices that gave him the well of strength to change his ways and attack life with such power and dedication. To commit to the light. To never go back to the darkness, because he knows it too well.

Only someone who has had the courage to see the darkness could understand this about my new friend though. Someone who fears the darkness, but has never truly seen it, may fear him instead of understand him and embrace him as nothing short of human. Because in the end, we really have nowhere to run and nowhere to hide. We are all dark, we are all light. We are each other.

Maybe I am getting a little existential, but the point is, my friend is beautiful. He is always trying. Abiding by rules he used to break. Serving old, perfumed ladies from whom he used to steal. Selling food instead of drugs. Paying child support for a child he used to pretend was not his. Committing to a woman on whom in the past he would have cheated.

Who's to say that isn't magic? Who's to say that miracles don't happen? Who's to say he isn't worthy of trust and love?

Stories. We all have them. Some of the most interesting, victorious ones remain untold out of fear of misunderstanding, abnormality or disrespect. Some of the world's greatest heroes work in restaurants, gas stations and dry cleaning shops. Their magical powers and strengths- a mystery to most who cross their paths. Except those of course who dare to stop, look a person in the eye, and care. Not even ask, but just have a moment of human connection.

Sometimes it requires offering a personal piece of information first. Other times, it's merely a compliment or just existing silently next to someone. Or maybe even noticing a Bixie on someone's bracelet and sharing, "That's my favorite animal too."

The Art of Companionship.

Two gray haired, 70 year old companions wander through an abstract art museum. I can tell they have spent their lives together. They aren't holding hands. I watch them. One trails behind the other. And then they sit and discuss the art. Side by side. Like two friends. Barely touching, but connected. It's The Clyfford Still art museum to be exact. An artist who spent his life finding beauty in the bleak tundras of the Western United States and Canada.

Although Denver isn't considered the 'tundra', it is considered 'bleak' at least by my definition at this time of year. Snow drifts the size of small buildings encase the roads, uneven, dirty ice cakes the streets, and the brown ground peaks out for a breath of fresh air as the snow melts. The excitement of the terrain lies in the mountains that jut out from the horizon in the distance and the occasional blue sky that peaks through the heavy clouds.

I miss LA. The city life. The colorful people. The loud traffic. The sirens. The helicopters. The palm trees. The 70 degree winter days. The random encounters that make everything seem meant to be. The beauty that lies directly on the surface. The kind you don’t have to dig at all to see.

I find myself in this museum contemplating commitment as I watch the elderly companions. Is companionship like the tundra? Does it appear bleak on the surface, but does it reveal it's beauty with time and deeper understanding. A view that is anything but surface based?

I think about what these two must have experienced together. A first date. A first fight. A first time. Marriage. Birth. Adventure. Excitement. Change. Aging. Struggle. Success. Romance. Depression. Loss. Hope. Death. And probably an infinite amount of other concepts a 27 year old like me can’t even begin to imagine, let alone express.

I watch them on the bench together. Side by side looking at a mish mash of shapes painted in layers on a canvas worth several million dollars. They discuss it, almost as if they are speaking their own language that only the two of them can understand. They are making sense of life from this painting, solving the puzzle together. They understand the beauty of the tundra. It epitomizes the beauty of their commitment. Maybe a mystery to the observer and possibly even a little boring on the surface, but the layers of paint underneath and the purpose behind each stroke make perfect sense to the painter, never lacking an ounce of meaning

I look at the couple in their Easy Spirit shoes and their flannel button-downs layered beneath their fleece jackets and I realize that it is never where we are that matters. It’s the work we do while we’re there that counts.

How is it that sometimes we know certain concepts, but those same concepts can be difficult to understand? Why is it that although I know the beauty and the depth of the tundra, do I still sometimes crave the immediate satisfaction of the city? Does wisdom require restraint, and in turn does a deeper sense of beauty arise?

It must. Because how else would this couple have remained together all of these years. And how else would they be able to find so much meaning in something that could appear so bleak and simple on the surface?