Another unusual thing happened to me today, although I won’t invest it with any meaning. I on my way to a grocery store and a woman standing in front of a shuttered storefront said:
"Hello. A sunny day, isn't it?”
“Yeah, it is.”
“What are you up to?”
“Nothing. Just walking. And you?”
She replied, “I dunno. Things are kind of bad right now, but I'm surviving. How about you?”
“Kind of bad right now too, but also surviving.” I was not being sarcastic.
She laughed and after a pause asked, “Oh, do you need a girl?”
I laughed. “No. No, I don’t need that.”
After a few "well, take cares,” I headed off for the store again.
On my way back, she was still there. She said, "Hello, again." I said the same, and before I could say "well, take care of yourself" or something to extricate myself from the situation, she went on: "I'm in a really bad spot right now and really needed help." She asked whether I was sure I didn’t a girl, didn’t need a date
I grinned and said: “Nah, but I can give you something anyway.”
I pulled some money out of my pocket and gave it to her. (I knew what she would probably use it for, but maybe it would let her get what she was going to get by a bit more safely today.) She expressed thanks (not everyone does, I have found, when I feel like giving). She asked me my name (again, the archangel thing after I responded), what I did, how old I was. I told her. She told me her name, her age (57, but she looked ten years younger), and how her addiction to heroin is why she was there and how she couldn't go a day without a fix. She looked more like a hippie than an addict, except for some tattoos on her arm, although that really don’t mean too much these days.
We talked some more, and she acted familiarly, touching my shoulder a few times in a friendly way - how people sometimes do when, I guess, they need some (non-sexual) physical connection.
So then, after a bit more conversation, I asked: "Why don’t you register at the free methadone/suboxone clinic? If you've got heroin still in your system and test positive for it, they’ll give it to you.”
She answered, “No, I am going to go to a detox. I really gotta go to detox, but not today.”
The conversation wound down. She extended her hand, I shook it, and, with "good byes" and "God bless you," I went on my way.
I have to admit, though, that after getting back, I somewhat irrationally took a shower and changed my clothes. Maybe I am a bit haphephobic (just found that term searching on "fear human touch disorder"), but maybe it was just a normal dose of germaphobic.
— Gabriel Fenteany, October 12, 2015
