I was in my shop waiting for a family to arrive for their baby shower. I could hear a gruff voice outside. Sounded like cursing. I looked out the window and I saw a woman sitting on the sidewalk giving the middle finger to drivers on Dufferin and yelling at them.
My guests were coming soon. I had to go outside and ask her to leave. I really didn’t want to do it, but I had to.
I opened the door and stood there for a few seconds before she noticed me. “Hi,” I said softly. She looked up at me over her right shoulder. She had scraggly short hair and a slightly gaunt face. “You can’t stay here,” I said, again very softly. “You have to go. We’re having an event and people are coming.”
She didn’t protest. She didn’t tell me off. And she didn’t say she wasn’t going anywhere. She just started telling me about who she was.
“I’m a university grad. I went to Waterloo. I travelled the world!” She yelled. “Where are you from?” she asked, “And don’t tell me f’ing Canada!” Where are you really from?” She said.
“What does that have to do with anything? I said. “You have to go.”
She kept demanding to know my ethnic origin. Some people passed by. She turned her attention to them. “Caribbean islands are the best!” She shouted to two men walking by. They put up their thumbs, smiled and kept going. Then “Hola Mexico!” to a man who ignored her as he walked by.
She turned back to me, this time she was soliciting me. I balked. She said “gay”. I quickly challenged her, “What’s wrong with being gay?” “Nothing.” She said just as fast. “It’s just a waste that’s all,” looking me up and down.
“What event do you have anyway?” She asked. I told her it was a baby shower. “Oh! You should have told me that from the beginning!” She started trying to get up, but couldn’t. “You gonna help me up or what?” She said to me. I hesitated.
At that moment a couple of women were walking by. “Philippines!” She yelled. The ladies smiled. “Can you help me up?” The women didn’t hesitate and took her extended hand and helped to her wobbly feet.
She was trying to balance herself. Each step was a struggle to keep herself up. She wasn’t paying attention to me anymore, more focused on trying not to fall as she stumbled behind the two ladies walking south on Dufferin. I waved goodbye.
I went back inside my shop. I felt like shit. She couldn’t have been more than 30 years old, but she looked ancient. Drugs.
I believed her when she said she was a Waterloo grad.
A fellow university grad. A fellow human being. And there was nothing I could do to help her. Just tell her to move along.
