​Observations from the world in Phoenix AZ on a 107 degree day.

I sit out at the smoking section drinking piss warm tea out of my water bottle,in the 107 degree heat. The hip-hop music plays from the white kids bluetooth speaker too loud for the heat and time, but like a funnel weaver spider with his spiral web, this is the only bait he has to make a friend, if only for an hour or so. I ignore him, take a drag from my hand rolled cigarette, and look around.

I spotted her again. I don’t remember her name, but that’s OK. I’m like an old IBM 8088 with limited ram, a dead CMOS battery, and a 1440 modem. If I burn something into memory something else gets erased so I need a very compelling reason to remember a name.

She’s an asian woman, she’s somewhere between 40-60. Long straight hair with lots of silver in it. I’m not judging. She has a stroller and a cat. The cat is grey and white. I think she calls it Simba. I’ve noticed her. I’ve even spoken to her. She blipped on my radar because usually Asians have a tight enough family unit or community, to not fall through the cracks.

I’ve visited with her a time or two. Just a ‘How are you?’ or ‘That’s a pretty cat.’ Just small talk, not flirting, that’s not my thing. I can’t even blame it on the circumstances. I’ve just been alone long enough to have grown comfortable with it, and my reluctance to change, or even experience changes around me, have ruled that out.

When I did visit with her I wanted to ask her what happened or why she was here, but I didn’t. I could feel her reluctance to communicate at all, so I just sat, and petted her cat for a moment, and then moved along.

I just see these things, and I can’t do anything about it, and I’m sure no one else sees it, and I know as sure as I know that this heat wave will end, that something happened to her or with her in the last 10 days or so.

Maybe she’s off her meds, maybe she’s given up, maybe she suffered a loss or experienced a tragedy, but something happened with her, something changed, and recently too, and she’s alone, we all are, but she seems to be buckling under the weight.

The point is, I’ve noticed in the last week or so. That she doesn’t smile, like not ever. And if someone sits at the same table she is at, she gets up and moves, and she seems to be talking to herself, and her vibe is different.

I won’t do anything, I say to myself, the is a Discovery Channel Documentary, and I’m just a viewer, just the man behind the literal lens. Nature is going to do what nature does, and if the polar bear eats the seal, I just watch.

‘Right!’ I assure myself. ‘Sometimes the bear eats the seal, and that’s as it should be. Right? Right……?’

I guess I will go write about it. I know how to do that.

(This is 100% true. It’s not fiction. This is homelessness on a 107 degree day. I’m not asking for donations and won’t accept them if offered. This is just testimony from a world within a world. Thank you for Reading.)

Solomon.