18 March 2020. Doug the Artisan-Man at the Yarn Store Window on Solano, Night.
After 9 o'clock, on the first night of Shelter in Place. (These pretend-tender names.) The street is largely empty, although there near the Chinese place is a familiar foursome--Alesia and David and Michel and Gabe, walking towards me, four in a block, almost in formation. Parents in front, the two sons behind. I'd encountered them the night before, just three...
Farther along, I see a figure standing in front of a shop window. It's Doug, the artisan-man, who sits during the day with pliers and wire and tin-snips, bits of aluminum can, folded soda bottles, dissected and reassembled into spinners, windmills, zig-zag whirly-gigs—all then mounted on straws or sticks of wood, and attached to lamp posts, signs, nearby trees.
Always alone, and a little mad, he appeared here on Solano maybe seven years ago, a presence on the street. Red children’s wagon someone gave him to haul his gear, piles of cardboard and black pastic bags, somewhere his materials and tools. I always made some kind of acknowledgment--we're both artists, after all, but his life, so different. Hard to fathom. He needed a regular bathroom once, asked me to help. I was sure the copy store would agree, but to my surprise, the manager (also a friend) immediately said no. "Insurance issues..." This was painful—I remember that he took on an aggressive tone (maybe even with himself) to make it stick. Out of character…
But last night we were all out of character. Cold (unusually so for March), and a certain grimness in the air—no one quite knowing where this virus thing will spread, or how...
I passed in silence, this time--but saw Doug again the next night, too. Near the bushes next to Church on the Corner. This time I turned back and immediately asked, Can you use a twenty? To repair the previous night's passing. Or maybe to repair everything. And unlike himself, he stood there, looking down towards the sidewalk from out of his huge hooded jacket, and simply held out a hand. I saw his palm and fingers, soiled, probably cold, too, even if he's more used to this life on the street. (Can anyone really be used to it?) I gingerly placed the bill in his palm--all this precarious social distancing... And I was afraid.That troubled me.
I turned to walk on, but then heard him say something. (In encounters past he would always ask if I wanted a token of his craft.) Nevertheless I waved him off--again feeling bad about it—realizing in almost in the same moment that his words were an attempt at connection... No doubt what he really needed most...
