The Old Man

By: Leanne Pippin

©Copyright 2003

An old man stumbled along a cracked sidewalk fumbling with a small paper bag containing a half empty bottle of cheap liquor. His clothes were old, torn, and mismatched and his thinning grey hair and scraggly beard were long and unkempt. His parched skin was pale and wrinkled far beyond its years and his violet blue eyes mirrored a sadness burrowed deep within a much embittered soul.

Something wet struck his cheek and he stopped to lean unsteadily against an old out of service phone booth. Feeling tired and extremely heavy he gazed up through bleary eyes towards Heaven wondering if he had felt rain. Far above the grey sky was cloudless and held a few stars bright enough to penetrate the many street lights and smog above of the city. When he noticed another drop of moisture travel towards his left ear he realized that the moisture was coming from his own eyes and he wiped a dirty sleeve across his face.

Already too tired to walk back to the old train bridge where he was accustomed to sleeping, he chose rather to rest where he was for the night. He slowly slid himself down with his back against the side of the old phone booth and there stretched his legs out in front of him. Still gripping his bag in one had he fumbled in his pocket with the other and grasped an old tattered photo of two young children. The boy stood with his right hand resting on the girl’s shoulder who sat very proper in front of him. Both had straight dark hair and violet blue eyes that even under the street lamps resembled those of the old man, though happier and more youthful. Staring for a moment at the two, he murmured a prayer to himself, kissed the photo and fell into a restless sleep with his head nodding forward towards his chest.

It had been years since he had slept in a bed, not like the comfortless rescue mission cots he used occasionally during the winter months, but a real bed with warm cozy blankets and soft clean pillows. There had been a time when comfort was a thing he had taken for granted; “Easy comes, easy goes.” He often thought now, for although life had never been “easy” as one might say, it had never been without its comforts or its ease.

He had been an only child growing up and had known the love of good parents. Although, never wealthy, they had lived in much comfort and shared a strong family bond. His father had worked at an old steal mill bringing home a minimum wage pay and his mother had sold home grown vegetables part time from a corner stand and had given piano lessons to several neighborhood children for a small fee. He had been the pride of his parent’s life, their greatest legacy and when he had found and married a sweet young woman they felt their dreams fulfilled.
Only two years after the birth of his son his father had taken ill, dieing within months and his daughter was born the following year. His mother struggled to hang on to the family home alone but finally relented to the help when he and his wife and children moved in. He took a job as a manager at a local hotel and his wife began teaching at a nearby elementary school. His life was good then, yet time sped by so quickly.

When war broke out several years later and rumors of the draft became a personal reality, comfort for the first time became an issue. His first night away from his family, with his children then seven and five, was the most uncomfortable he had ever been, as a long grueling bus ride with a large stranger sitting next to him allowed no room for comfort. Once he arrived things didn’t improve much, for nights were restless on his hard springy cot and days were even worse, with agonizing physical labor and battle exercises. The only comfort he found was through letters from his family and a single photo of his children.

He was allowed a single week to spend with his family before his was to be sent off to war. It was to become the shortest week he would ever remember though he spent it as well as he could, savoring the comforts of home and family. Sadly he remembered mostly the tears shed at his parting, especially those of his mother. It was to be his last memory of her for she died in her sleep six months later while he himself was trekking through the thick wet jungles of Vietnam, tired, scared and extremely uncomfortable. He wasn’t even aware she had died for many more months to come, since letters from home were rare. It had become extremely difficult to send or receive letters from where he was and they soon ceased altogether. He was right in the middle of the worst of the war and saw and endured things that marked him forever. Comfort then had become a treasured memory, a long lost friend that he missed almost as much as his family.
He survived the war, though not entirely intact, for he was much hardened and the warmth he had once radiated had turned to ice, not to mention the limp and constant pain he would ever endure caused by a gunshot wound to his left hip. He was released from the army after he was injured and had earned recognition for rescuing several of his comrades from an enemy ambush, and given a Purple Heart.

Returning home was little comfort for he had forgotten how to feel it. He had become numb inside. His dreams haunted him and although the war was over he fought it still inside his head. Each day was a struggle and he no longer enjoyed the things that had once given him so much pleasure. He would often try and drown the pain and incessant images from his mind with alcohol only to find that a drunken stupor only increased their potency.

Not understanding his melancholy moods and his over drinking his wife and children began to pull away until there was no hope of holding together the fragmented pieces of the once happy family. His wife finally divorced him and took his children later remarrying the Principle of the school where she worked.

He was unable to hold any job for long and soon lost the old family house his father had built along with any pride he may have still retained. He no longer had anyone who cared for him for even his children had taken his strange personality changes personal and had become bitter to his name. Though I guess they never knew how he still searched for comfort in the single photo he had of them or how he still prayed nightly for their safe keeping. So now here he was sleeping against the old phone booth with a bottle of liquor and a tattered old photograph his only possessions.

When the old man awoke the sun was blinding in his eyes, his head pounded, and his neck cracked painfully as he lifted it. He licked his dry, split lips and his tongue felt heavy and cottony. Looking down he noticed the photo still in his hand and slid it gently back into his pocket, then taking a quick swig from his bottle to moisten his mouth he drug himself to a stand. He winced with pain as his wounded hip snapped into position and scuffled down the sidewalk aimlessly. Squinting in the sunlight, lost in his own mind, oblivious to the activities going on around him he stumbled off the side of the curb to cross the road. Almost immediately tires squealed and a horn blared but he never heard it for all had become quiet and very still.

A young teenage girl stood beside a freshly dug grave looking lost and very out of place between the few men in military uniforms. She was dressed casually and looked rather frazzled and disorganized. She cried softly to herself as she listened to the impersonal speech that was given in honor of the old man during his graveside funeral. Behind the speaker an American flag lay, draped neatly across a mahogany casket and a line of uniformed men with guns stared stiff and blankly waiting for their cue to fire a 21 gun salute in honor of the deceased. No one that the man had ever loved or cared for was present and his funeral seemed formal and cold; emotionless except for the young girl.

When the ceremony was over and they had begun to lower the old man into the ground the speaker approached the young girl and asked her what her relationship had been to the man. He was taken aback when she stated that they had shared a space under the old train bridge and that he had told her many stories about his life. She told him how he looked out for her and taught her how to survive and how on the cold winter nights they would scramble to the mission for shelter and a warm meal. Suddenly turning pale and quiet she stepped to the edged of the hole as the men begin to throw dirt upon the casket and took out an old tattered photograph of two young children. She had found it lying in a small puddle near where the old man had been killed and had kept it in hopes of giving it to one of his children when they came to say their goodbyes. They had never arrived and she had found it hard to bear that this man; who had been some ones baby once, cared for and so well loved and comforted; and who had been a father pacing the floors late at night with his cranky newborn trying desperately to comfort it and had taught his son to tie his shoes and catch fish and ride a bike, and had spun is daughter around in a dance, tickled her nose with a feather and hung flowers in her hair; this man who had lost much of himself fighting for his country and his family and who had saved the lives of many men; this man who had been a friend to a lonely young girl; how could this man be forgotten; how could his family have abandoned him to suffer and die alone the way he had? This man she thought deserved so much more and with a sob she tossed the picture onto the casket and remained there until the hole was filled. “Remember him” she thought. “I will remember him.”
Today the old man’s grave is marked only with a small, plain, concrete plaque and the roots of an old Oak tree have warped the ground next to it leaving it slightly elevated on one side. The grass around and over it are well kept but no flowers are ever placed there. Squirrels scurry across often scrounging for nuts and birds sometimes perch there but no one else ever visits. In his small corner of the graveyard the old man seems forgotten, but in one mind he never shall be for I was that young girl and he was a lonely old man and if nothing else, my friend.

Poverty
By: Leanne Underwood / Pippin

In his lonely world where dreams don’t come true
Stands a lonely man with silver hair and eyes of violet blue.
His hands are old and his heart has grown cold,
Changed by the wheels of time,
And in a crackled voice every day he begs
“Sonny can you spare a dime?”