He was sitting on the sidewalk slumped against the front wall of the Kent CVS. Late sixties, cutoff jeans, ragged tie-dye tee shirt, broken down, unlaced boots, white beard, fighting the heat with a tall Arizona iced tea nesting in a clump of plastic bags. Sun and wind tanned, off the road, off the river, off the map. My wife Lu and I pulled into a parking space near him. She ran in while I waited in the car. I saw him ask something of a college student passing by. The young man mouthed a casual no and quickened his step.
When Lu came back, I handed her a creased five dollar bill. She offered it to him. A mumbled thanks. Someone stole his belongings, she said. He sat, head down, reading the concrete. I gave her twenty bucks. When he took it from her fingers, he stared at it and began to weep. Twenty five dollars would not change his lot nor bring back what had been lost. I offered him my open palm. He held up his palm, that ancient gesture, no weapon, no fear, a friend. He then struggled to his feet, leaning on a handmade wooden cane and walked to the car. He seemed intent on bringing me a message, something more than thanks. What he said, at the open car window, sounded like, to my garbled hearing, These Blues, 13, 1 & 2.
I am a man who spends his waking hours scouring for signs, starlight chatter, mosaics of broken conversations, every outward sign pointing inward, a volunteer transcendentalist. My morning prayer is may the messenger come, this day. And I am a hard-scrabble gambler, a horse player, addicted beyond recall, bedeviled by bad luck, wrong choices and busted trifectas. When he spoke, I heard what the believing heart always hungers for, the voice crying out of the present wilderness, prescience, redemption, offering what I took to be the name of a winning horse, These Blues, along with the exacta 1/2 in the 13th race.
Believe with me here. This didn’t look like the messenger I expected. CVS is not an off-track betting parlor. But, this had to be the guy, finally. My curses had been answered. What? These Blues? I asked. I wanted to get it right. If I had the name of the horse and the race, I could find the track anywhere in America and make the bet on the phone. No, No, he said, scowling, Hebrews: 13, 1 & 2. This time I got it. From the Bible. Chapter and verse. It never was about horses.
Back home, I opened mom’s old Bible to Hebrews: Chapter 13, 1 & 2.
Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them; and them which suffer adversity, as being yourselves also in the body.
To have entertained angels unawares. Over the years, I have been conned, hustled, bamboozled, robbed, stole from, duped, worked, bilked, shook down, slicked and tripped up. This didn’t feel like that; it is through our feelings that we come to know the world. The old stories tell us of how the gods and the emissaries disguise themselves to test our faith, our imagination, to remove the bandages from our eyes. CVS . . . Celestial Visitation Summertime. CVS . . . Christ’s Vagrant Son . . . wandering across the Milky Way. The Chinese have named it the River of Heaven. Angels drift through here. Not those androgynous, winged, robed, hovering attendants, but more like us. Some get tired of swimming against the current in this muddy river.
Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them.
So I am bound to him, bound as he is bound. This time I am the guy in the car, with the money. This could all change in a heartbeat. Will change.
The Sufis call this old angel, this cloud man who sits on concrete, Khidir, a teacher, a presence, an enduring spirit, who travels through time, embodying himself in whatever form is appropriate for the lesson at hand.
When a pickpocket looks at a holy man, all he sees is his pockets.
As I backed out of the lot and took a last look, I told Lu, I wish I’d given him everything I have.
That was last Sunday. Every day I have looked for him. No sign. Whatever I’ve learned, whatever happened between us, will have to be enough. Hebrews: Chapter 13, verses 1 & 2.
Featured image for this post is by Leroy Skalstad, photographer who is also a formerly unhoused Vietnam veteran. Skalstad volunteers with a community meal program in Milwaukee where his images have graced their fund-raising calendar for 22 years. Photograph is a Creative Commons image, via Pixabay.
beautiful. these blues, hebrews, the stranger, the angel.