Call this a close second
"I want to be rich enough to buy my emotions."
The room was full when Tom said that amid the recurring discussion of imagined lottery winnings. And the remark struck plenty as a pretentious one. I remember this black guy saying, "What you mean buy your emotions.' What kinda shit is that?" Beyond that the conversation descended into an indiscernible ruckus to my ears, because I understood exactly what he said and I was smiling ear to ear inside. Tom wanted time. The only thing I didn't like about that wonderfully turned phrase was that I didn't say it. Truth be told, I think everyone else was pissed they didn't say it too.
Timebomb Tom was always the smartest guy in the room - any room at any time. And by smart I don't mean Jeopardy smart, full of trivia and knowledge, speaking six languages. And I don't mean smart as in someone who has insight into one part of a situation and then goes on to think that's all there is to it, continuously squawking, "Can't you see? Can't you see?" And I don't mean smart as in someone who finds cleverness in lies. I mean smart as in a relentlessly open mind.
Timebomb Tom's favorite quote was "Truth is life", from Frank Lloyd Wright. But he didn't say anything, just observed. Frankly, I avoided the fucker, not wanting to hear what he possibly might say about me. I like to think I can stand up to anybody anywhere, but I can't. Aggressive women scare me too - they too are borne of independent thought. Bottom line is: when he spoke, I listened.
Knowledge of mere facts won't build you this
Rare was the conversation he'd let himself get sucked into. It was funny watching him as I sensed he had the same feeling watching us discuss the world as Einstein would have listening to high school students discuss quantum mechanics. Not that he was condescending. He got really excited when someone would declare a truth, egging them on to run with it. It was like watching a starving man devouring found food. Ultimately, I think Tom wanted each of us to discover the truth in ourselves.
From the light in his eyes at those times, you could see he believed that would save the world.
But in the marketplace of opinions, his was just one of many tossed into the ring where value was determined more by sensationalism than reality. Much more fun to talk about a flat income tax than ending greed. And so Timebomb Tom...seethed. (Only I call him Timebomb Tom. I have a bit of intelligence myself but if the others didn't see his precarious position then I'd let time educate them). And I wondered: what was the real truth Tom could not get out?
The first red flag went up when I noticed he hated being called smart. That look on his face, it was like someone had stabbed him. He didn't want to look like an idiot and deny the obvious, and he couldn't respond honestly because he was unable to get his own truth out, so he was stuck - like a knife in the belly. Then he'd just walk away without answering. That's when I said to myself: "Someday that boy is going to explode."
Ask a homeless person what he or she wants most and the answer (outside of a home) is privacy. How does the idea of shitting on public toilets for the rest of your life suit you? If you can stand it, good for you. Don't ask me to. So we all do what we can to get away. Since we can't own any space, we try to at least own some time. But that's hard to do when you can't ever find a safe spot. And Tom was in what he thought was a safe place when I fatefully overheard him.
Some spots people pass by never giving a second thought. Little corners of hiding or enclaves that homeless eyes are always on the lookout for, a hideaway to pause from the perpetual running. At first glance the row of overlapping evergreens looked impassible. But then I spotted a slight opening. So I figured that would be a good getaway spot for me, thinking most folks wouldn't see that opening and they'd be forced the long way around.
Apparently, Tom had had that same thought process.
Tom was lucky. He had a cell phone and having a contact number to give out can be a huge advantage. Even people with actual homes give out their cell as a main contact number. Makes one almost think one is normal - normal enough for phone sex anyway, as was the case here. I heard Tom talking on his knees in an unusual voice, that of an immature young adult hopelessly naive to the world. Then he started making strange animal sounds at the behest of the operator on the other end of the line. When he stopped, I could hear her laughing even from where I was.
She called Tom the biggest moron who'd ever called her as he told her wild tales of forced humiliation and chronic stupidity. He was very convincing in his role and suddenly it struck me: he was getting his truth out. I knew that - but didn't quite understand that. His stories were pure fabrication, wild tales that reached into his inner soul, dazzling the listener with his talent as a character actor. And here all this time I thought phone sex lines were just a long dead joke no one really used.
Now I knew Tom diverted his energies to the wind, forever hopeless to find a home, chronic like I am.
Then something happened I truly hate: one of those out-of-body experiences where all control is lost. It was one of those rare moments where one gets a wholly honest glimpse of oneself, like it or not. And sure enough as he was closing up his phone, I knew the first thing Tom was going to do was turn around and look right at me. And yet even knowing that, I could not move or tear myself away. I was frozen, waiting to get caught.
I've analyzed it afterwards, curious as to my own motivation. Was the fact I heard him just something I could not hide? Did I so secretly want to see the look on his face I couldn't pull away? Was it because I'd latently hoped to be his friend I decided to suddenly jump in with both feet? All I can really judge it by is his own reaction: incredulous at first, then softening and unreservedly accepting. Jesus, I wish I could have seen the what had to be an understanding look on my face that gave him cause to react like that.
"It's all I've got," he nervously explained - as if he need justify himself to me in this hellhole world. Tom went on to say even though the stories weren't real, the feelings were, concluding with, "I'm a broken person, useless to the world." As a broken person myself I knew what he meant: he could care less about the world, he meant useless to women. Then he reached his final confession: "I'm know people think I'm smart. How do I tell them I'm actually the biggest idiot in the world when it comes to what counts?"
Another famous zinger from Tom I store away as my own accoutrement was his mocking of the job selection for the homeless: "You can have any job you want - as long as you don't want to live." He'd said it on the sly, knowing not everyone would appreciate it. With that background I sat down on the grass beside him as he told the story of his incapacitation. Guess he figured the cat was out of the bag or that maybe he suddenly realized his need for someone - anyone - to understand.
He told me last January he was working as a "lunch processor" - assembling school lunch items together encased in plastic wrap. I said, "Oh yeah, where you freeze your ass off and wear a stupid hair net." Like wounded war veterans, we need say no more on the war, Tom noddingly smiled. The supervisor there was a woman named Michelle. Tom had fallen for her like a ton of bricks. But he'd been trumped by his uselessness and he began to slowly sabotage the relationship until finally she got so fed up with him she cut off the lines of communication.
How to get her to reject you
"I just thought - if you call it thinking - that if I got her to reject me she'd never get the chance to see the real me." Tom is too smart for his own good. "What am I going to do? Share a phone sex session with her? What's really bad is she brought out the best in me. I was a different person with her. Which is the real me?" Tom wasn't really asking me, but himself - I think for maybe the thousandth continual time.
Tom's final doom came when a group of torn items slid down the conveyor belt to him. Who knows what happened, could have been done anywhere along the way. But like a conspiracy of the universe, Michelle arrives just after Tom gets the items. She looks at them, then looks at Tom and lights right into him as if he were the cause of their shitty state.
"Basically, she was saying I was shitty. I couldn't deny it and she took my silence as an admission of guilt, thinking I did it to make her look bad. Hurt like hell her chewing me out like that for something I didn't do - would never do. She still thinks I tore those items up just to piss her off. But I felt too guilty to contradict her even though I knew she should know the truth. Now here it is a year later and it's still eating on me. Can I die now, please?"
I stood up. I sensed he was nearing the end and if not, I couldn't take hearing him anymore anyway. This was waaaay too uncomfortable for me and my own sins of omission. In the comedy that is the human story, I felt the need to make Tom feel smart. I play these foolish manipulative games in helpless idiocy. Plus, I just wanted to get away.
Some things are just too awkward
"Well, have you tried talking to the counselor about this?" I instantly regretted saying it even though I knew my emotional motivation for it. Who knows, maybe I was channeling Tom. I saw the initial reaction in his face: Fuck no, I wouldn't talk to that idiot! But then I saw the wheels begin to turn, taking into account I'd been his friend here and whatnot until finally he processed his thought as, "No. Would you?"
I started laughing, probably more than I should have but it was such a relief from the tension I couldn't stop. Tom laughed a bit too, just happy to see I agreed with his opinion of so-called "professional help". Shit, it was only personal moments like these that ever helped anyone. (Most of us just play act we're better to please the authority figures.) All I had left was this painfully lame dismount: "You hang in there, OK?"
Again, I watched him process my words. What you really mean is you want to get the hell out of here. Yeah, me too. He tersely waved me off, me being unable to help him with his pain. But that walk back through the evergreens was etched upon my pounding heart, our meaningful words lost and unrecorded, my ears pulsing with the sound of a ticking time bomb as the heavens above gathered dark clouds of its own storm, and whether true or not I took that as a sign that at least God had listened.
That long cool woman had it all
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