today is a brand new day
A few weeks ago, we were all eating lunch at the shelter, when the doorbell rang. One of the interns answered it, and came back in the room saying "there's a woman at the door....she says she needs help....I don't know who she is...." and looking kinda confused, so I offered to talk to her. Because really, you can't just come to the door, anyone who needs help has to call into the hotline (the location is supposed to be confidential, so how can you just show up???) but I could tell the intern didn't want to just say no to this lady. So I went out there and found a woman on the porch, already talking before I even asked what she needed, with a monologue of "I need food I need something to eat and I heard you can get it here but can't you help me because don't you know I"m hungry?" or something like that. I got as far as "well, umm, you see..." and she started screaming "WELL UM? ARE YOU F-ING KIDDING ME? I COOKED POTATOES IN YOUR KITCHEN, BITCH!" and at this point she started stomping around in little circles on the porch, clonk clonk clonk, pointing at me and screaming "I COOKED POTATOES IN YOUR KITCHEN. YEAH! HOW DO YOU LIKE THAT?" and just as she was stomping herself away and on down the street, she turned back, looked over her shoulder and yelled "AND I SAW YOU SMOKING MARIJUANA!"
Now, Quickel is always telling me that I assign too much insight to crackheads, but I was kinda understanding what she was saying. I took that to mean that, at some point, she must have lived in the shelter, and probably very well did cook potatoes in the kitchen (not my kitchen, though). And I take the last part to mean - you think you're better than me, cause I'm a crackhead, but I know all about you and you're a pothead. Its not literal, she definitely never actually SAW me, because I live 1.5 hours from work, and I've never done anything of that nature anywhere near where I work. Or with crackheads, or generally people I don't know. But still, a good point. I was standing there thinking "goddamn crackheads" when she checked me with that remark.
So today she came to the door with the same little routine, muttering before I even opened the door, saying "I need to get me something to eat and I know you give out food and I need to get me some of that food and doncha know I'm hungry?"
I said "excuse me, but weren't you here 2 weeks ago, and called me a bitch? and stomped all over our porch screaming about potatoes and saying ugly things to me?". And she looked right at me and said "that's in the past, maam. Why did you have to take it there?" True that. I'm still not giving her any potatoes, but I think she might be onto something there.