Observations outside of Greyfriar's

Original post; 4/26/06

4/17/06
2:50PM

There's and older man sitting outside of Greyfriar's about two tables down from me. His motorized scooter has a worn American flag sticker on the side of it. The smell of his cigarette drifts over after the flick of his lighter. I don't look up. He came barreling out the door with a jarring bag-metal hitting metal-as if he needed to escape from some smoke-free prison. His neatly trimmed beard is at odds with his dark tan and worn clothes. His white polo shirt now more closely resembles a light beige from the dust and sweat he collects rolling around downtown. But I guess a razor doesn't cost all that much nowadays. But what costs money is a down jacket. Like a North Face or Marmot or something of the same vein. Why do homeless people always seem to have such good jackets? I've never seen a homeless person whose jacket looked like it let them down at night. Perhaps I've just seen the wealthy homeless and not the poor. He throws his half-finished cigarette on the ground behind him and rolls over to the door. After a moments pause he slams his scooter into the door and rolls back into Greyfriars-coffee cup in hand-in search of more creamer or sugar or loose change. His discarded cigarette flits around in the breeze over the dirt mound next to a tree trunk-nearly burnt to the filter. The last things I notice besides his straw hat are the oxygen tubes that I mistook for a chinstrap and the tank on the back of his scooter.