I walk in the orbit of those who have the first nickel they ever earned. Some call us cheap, penny pinching and penurious. Others think we are demented. I see myself as frugal and parsimonious. I once lived for an entire summer on a daily intake of a coffee and a donut (25 cents) and two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches ($1.00). Water, of course, I drank to excess as it was free. This dietary budget was carefully organized because I was making the princely sum of $1.20 per hour so once the first hour was over, I was into cash accumulation. It made the day go by ever so much faster.
My inspiration for this behaviour was a guy named Tom Doornbos who used to deliver water by the bucket in Yellowknife. I once saw him sit down in the Yellowknife Inn and order a cup of hot water with two packets of ketchup. Into the water went the ketchup and instantly he had tomato soup at zero cost. I had a way to go to catch up to ol’ Tom. But mark ye! Tom died a multimillionaire and an ongoing inspiration to young cheapskates like me. My wife reminds me that my summer of peanut butter landed me in the emergency ward, but I remind her that healthcare in Canada is “free”, so I was no worse off financially for the wear and tear on my body.
I mention this story to point out that life, in many respects, is a series of encounters with the Tom Doornbos’ of the world. These types tend to be fascinating people by virtue of their willingness to march completely out of step and to the sounds of a drummer that the rest of us can neither see nor hear. Being an introvert, I am not a fan of “people” and avoid them as much as I can. However, I am quite a big fan of individuals especially when they are as interesting as Tom Doornbos. You just never know what stories people can tell you and hence the appeal of random encounters with them.
When I get past my fussiness about the generalities of humans it is possible to focus on the particularities of individuals, each of whom is an image bearer of God who obviously has a great sense of humour. If you don’t believe me, just sit on a bench at the mall for an hour and watch the endless stream of interesting looking people file past. Airports are even better for such activities, and I have the chronological equivalent of a PhD in such observations. Random interactions with these people, however scary they might be to us introverts, are often delightful.
Another northern guy that intrigued me was a Dominion Land Surveyor who had doubled as a judge in the Northwest Territories. To say that he was a legend is to understate the situation and rumour had it that he was the last judge in Canada to sentence someone to be hanged. He was a small man and had a permanent groove worn into his lower lip from where his pipe had hung for over 60 years. My one encounter with him was as a city worker mucking about in a swamp that he and his helper were making into a subdivision. I was locked in conversation with his helper as the judge set up the theodolite and we both missed the call, “Chain!” In surveyor language this means pull the metal tape measure tight so that a reading can be taken. The next call to chain was less polite, “Chain, go##am it!” and with a mighty tug my erstwhile interlocutor was pulled off balance and landed face first in the swamp. Of course, it was very funny, and I laughed only to be given a pithy and tart lecture from the distance of roughly 130 feet. You didn’t mess around with John Anderson Thomson especially as there was the possibility of the hanging story being true.
When I was about five years old, a friend of my brother was lodged in the maple tree outside our house. We called it “our” maple tree even though it was on the boulevard outside our yard and so, strictly speaking, belonged to the city. Nevertheless, it seemed odd that he didn’t sit in his own maple tree rather than ours. When I asked my brother why he was there I was told that “he is waiting for Marilyn Monroe”. Even in the 1950’s that was odd a thing for a kid from a small mining town in British Columbia to be waiting for. At the time, of course, the oddity of the quest was mostly lost on me. “Oh”, I said. I might have wondered about the latent sexuality of his quixotic wait, or I might have opined on the zero percent probability that his desires would be fulfilled in his Godot-like respite. But I didn’t. I was too young and besides, this guy tamed squirrels and so, to a five-year-old looking up into a maple tree, he was odd in a highly desirable fashion and if he wanted to wait for Marilyn Monroe then who was I to question the windmill at which he wished to tilt?
Often the more interesting people inhabit the margins of our society and I have found that the homeless guy barking at the cars going by is much less disturbing if you smile and say hello. I remember one young guy panhandling from a seated position by the sidewalk as I rushed towards work. He was pale and pimple-faced, and my attention was drawn to the toque that he wore even though it was the middle of May. The toque was not just an affectation, though, because it was one of those lovely spring days following a cold, rainy spell and the temperature was just above freezing. Can a day in which the temperature is just above freezing be “a lovely spring day”? The cold and rain confused things. He was holding up a sign asking me for money because he was apparently hungry and on his way to another city and a few coins would make all the difference – according to the sign. His rheumy eyes, pale skin and thin smirking lips told me a different story and I steadied myself to push past him. What he said as I walked by was noteworthy; “I just want to write like Dostoyevsky.” “Well, don’t we all?” I thought to myself without giving much thought to how utterly strange a comment it was. This chance encounter has since haunted me and from time to time, I remember his thin frame and think, “He is right. I too want to write like Dostoyevsky.” Wouldn’t it be something if one day he is kicked out of jail and writes a series of remarkably insightful stories that perfectly capture the human condition. I will gladly buy them all.
I once had an encounter with a rather stocky and good-looking young man in New York’s Central Park. Central Park, of course, is home to the world’s most interesting weirdo’s and this guy was right up there. He sat behind a sign which said, “Laughs. $2.00”. I stopped and looked at his sign and finally asked him what it meant. “If I can make you laugh, then you owe me $2.00”. “OK, you are on,” I said, without calculating the exchange on my Canadian dollars. He proceeded to tell me the most ridiculous jokes, none of which were in any way funny. He seemed to be getting increasingly frustrated with me as I stoically remained unmoved by his silly attempts at humour and finally, I called on him to stop as this was obviously not working. I think I called his comedic ability into question and suggested that his sign was based on a false premise possibly bordering on dishonest advertising. At this he shouted, “Well then obviously the problem lies with you and not with me.” This I found to be very funny, and he smiled beatifically at my laughter… and then held out his hand for my $2.00. I usually hate to part with my money especially when it is nominated in US dollars, but on this occasion, I was happy to hand it over. The exchange felt as though I had been part of a Monty Python sketch and that, I think, is enough to put it in the win column.
Similarly, I was accosted crossing the street near where I worked by a young indigent who could have, and perhaps should have, been working.
“Hey buddy! How about giving me two bucks?”, he called out.
“Two bucks?” I thought. Whatever happened two bits? “Why don’t you get a job and what are you going to do with the two bucks?”, I responded.
“I’m gonna get drunk of course!”, he said and laughed.
I was so struck by his honesty that I laughed too and gave him the tooney. It was worth it to have him clap me on the back and offer his thanks. That was probably the wrong thing for me to have done but sometimes honesty must be rewarded.
Australians are among the funniest people I know - a trait they share with Newfies who are the funniest Canadians in my view. I used to have a very good Australian friend who would have me laughing within five minutes of meeting up and the laughter would not stop until half an hour after parting. He once told me a story about solo prospecting in the Great Sandy Desert of Australia with only an old sheep dog as company. The dog had the unusual propensity of traveling on the roof of the truck and would slide down the windscreen from time to time to look in and ensure that his master was still navigating from within. His description of the dog, with ears pinned by the wind, suddenly blocking his view was beyond hilarious.
When he was engaged to be married to a young Peruvian woman, he listened to a long harangue from his future father-in-law who assured them, in Spanish, that he would not provide a dime for the wedding. When the harangue was over and his bride-to-be sat in embarrassed silence, he turned to the stuffed kangaroo that he had bought her and said, “Right Skippy! We’re not wanted here,” took his fiancés hand and together they walked out on her bewildered father robbing him of the opportunity to establish dominance over his soon-to-be son-in-law. The wedding was a smashing success paid in full by the happy groom.
When the mounting graft to pay his fines for not having a valid driver’s license became intolerable, he decided to take the Peruvian driver’s test. Rather than study the driver’s manual he communicated via an earpiece with a friend waiting outside the examination room. He would read the questions and his friend would tell him which of the multiple-choice responses was correct. His retelling of the story had his audience in tears especially when he got to the part where the examiner pulled the pin on the whole charade. Cancer took him too soon, but he leaves a legacy of sore ribs and wet cheeks.
At one job, the route from where I parked to the office where I worked took me down a long alley and I often met a group of homeless guys sheltering in the warmth of the oven exhaust fan from an adjacent restaurant. Over time we would recognize one another with a nod, then “Hey Bud”, then short conversations. I once asked the most regular of the huddlers why he didn’t just get a job and avoid the hassles of living on the street and wondering where his meals would come from. I will never forget his response,
“Murray, you get out of your warm bed every morning and hurry downtown to be chained to a desk all day. I get up from my warm bed in the drop-in center and I have the whole day ahead of me with the freedom to enjoy its new adventures!”
Dave (not his real name) had a poetic twist to his thoughts, and I often wondered what brought him to the point of living in drop-in centers, but he did have a point. I think I said, “shove over then” and he laughed.
Years earlier I had a long commute to my workplace that took me past a recycling center that preferentially hired young men and women who were mentally challenged. As things happened, they came off work just as I passed their building on my way home, and they would emerge from it in a flood of laughter and conversation. The fifteen or twenty of them would engulf me and I would be carried along completely unselfconsciously (to them) until we all arrived at the train station. As with the homeless guys in the alley, over time I got to know several of my fellow travellers as they acquainted me with the sexual politics of the recycling center. Quitting time became a highlight of the day. The amount of teasing, kidding, and flirting among my new friends was unlike anything I had ever experienced with other groups and, whatever their other challenges, enjoying life was not among them. They must have been a lot of fun to work with.
Prison, of course, is prime territory for scouting out interesting people and, but for the horrific circumstances that led them to incarceration, many of those I met could have been stand-up comedians. I may have previously mentioned the guy who claimed that he felt most free when he was in prison and this resulted in laughs all around until suddenly everyone stopped and said, “I know what you mean, Bro.” It was a jarring realization for all of us. One guy that was a regular at our meetings showed up one week after an unusual absence with two black eyes and a sheepish grin.
“Dude, what happened?”
“Well, I was in the gym working out and I didn’t like the music that the others were listening to so the next day I told them it was my turn to pick the music and they didn’t like that so we had some words.”
“Words don’t give you black eyes.”
“Yeah, well they gave me a prison minute.” A prison minute is when two guys hold a third guy so that a fourth can pummel him unchallenged for a minute – and not a second longer. He was beaten to a pulp and wouldn’t rat on those who beat him so spent two weeks in solitary confinement.
“Are you angry with them?”
“Nah, I had it coming. I shouldn’t have made a big deal out of the music. I forgive them.” Forgiveness. You don’t hear that word in prison very often. I was really impressed.
To bring this full circle, I was recently walking in the mall when a young, pretty girl in a cosmetic shop caught my eye and hauled me in. With breathless wonder she assured me that her concoctions could trim 25 years off my face and make me an even bigger chick magnet than I already clearly was. Actually, I have forgotten the details of the pitch and this may be me expressing a desire rather than a memory.
You will recognize the scam though. Older guy flattered by pretty young thing gets taken for $150 worth of useless vanity products. She was from Israel and had a lovely accent as she kept up a constant chatter and fired questions designed to pique my vanity. The application of wrinkle removing cream and stuff to remove brown blotches made absolutely no progress against the ravages of my life, but it was surprisingly fun. She seemed hopeful when I thanked her for the random exchange with another of God’s creatures but was disappointed when I said ixnay to the cosmetics.
“I am old, and I am happy to be so. There is no point in trying to make a silk purse.”
I don’t think she understood what I meant, but I left happy. I should have told her about my first nickel.