A Winter Night

Mark usually spent the afternoon in the library then caught a ride home with me when I finished work at six.  He lived about a block away just off the Woodstock Village Green.  That night, it was snowing, so I drove slowly down the unplowed main street. Streetlights and the reflective quality of the snow made the Village Green area look bright.  Very few people were about, and a peculiar quiet had settled in. There was no wind.  The snow just fell in huge fluffy flakes. I parked the car across from the green. 

          Mark said, “Look at that fellow, on the bench”.  

I looked at the snow-covered man sitting quietly on the bench and said, “I’ve seen him in the library--a new guy. He must be freezing”.

          “Yes, yes, I know him.   We have argued because he looks in the same trashcans I do to find food.  I have my territory.  Everyone likes the cans near the pizza place, so we all look there”.

          I said, “It’s dangerous. You could get sick”.

          Mark replied, “I am careful.  I can tell when food is bad”.

          I dropped the subject because an argument about food would cause Mark to close down.   I regarded the man on the bench.  He was not brushing the snow away.  He was just sitting facing the street. He looked large, but maybe he was wearing many layers of clothes.

The car heater was blowing cold air, so I turned off the fan and said

 “ Go see if he is still breathing”.

          “He may know a way to generate heat from within,” Mark said.  Then, for a moment, he was silent as he rooted around in the pockets of his jacket.  He was dressed in the same layers he had worn all winter.  Mark’s water pipes were frozen, so he did not wash.  His unruly gray and black hair was tucked into a dark woolen cap. I thought of the old tale of country people who sewed themselves into their long underwear in December and didn’t change until April. 

Many assumed from appearances that Mark was just a crazy street-person. I knew, though, that Mark had grown up in Chicago, had a law degree from Northwestern and had traveled extensively.  However, in my opinion, he was unprepared for his present life. I taught him how to fortify the foundation of his house for the winter and mend the floor where the raccoons came in at night, but plumbing and heat were way beyond my abilities and dumpster diving was beyond my ken. Mark’s landlord never fixed anything.

          “Do you think we should get him some coffee or something?” I asked.

          Mark ignored my question and continued to look in his pocket until he found a small round stone.  “Do you have a pen?”

          I handed him the black marker I kept in the car.  Mark, a practicing Buddhist, wrote his mantra, OM MANI PADME HUM, on the stone in Tibetan letters, opened the door, crossed the street and went to the snow covered man on the bench. He gave the sitting man the stone.  I could see them converse. The man smiled, accepted the stone and tucked it into his clothing.  After a minute, Mark got back in the car.

          “I feel like I should do something,” I said. “ It’s just too weird. The snow is slowly burying him alive”.

          “He says he is fine. The police will come by from time to time to bring him coffee”.

          “His face is still showing, but, other than that, he and the bench could be one big snowdrift”, I said.

          Without replying, Mark got out of the car, closed the door, and, as was his habit, he tapped twice on the car roof. While walking towards his house he turned back for a moment and gave the thumbs up sign.  I waved, turned up the heat that was, at last, filling the car and started for home.