Years ago, while exiting a Baton Rouge Subway sandwich shop, I noticed a group of men with ragged, dirty clothes and long beards and hair and one young woman on crutches with bandaged toes. They said nothing, and I walked by.
Then I went back.
“Are you guys needing something?”
Money for pizza, they said.
We talked more, and I learned they were living in woods nearby as the woman’s foot healed. They then planned to get to New Orleans to hop a train.
That’s how they lived. They’d hop a train and ride for a while, then pick up work or pander to get food, then hop another train. I asked why they didn’t hop a train in Baton Rouge.
“Baton Rouge trains go through Texas,” one said. “You don’t want to get caught being homeless in Texas.”
I gave them money toward pizza, thinking: “If I were young, I’d like to live like that … for a while.”
I enjoyed their story. As I walked away, one called out:
“Hey! Thanks for talking to us like we’re human beings!”
The final line of your writing struck me like a devastating chord deep within the chest. How many lives unfold in inhuman silence, beyond the boundaries of what we know and recognize! For such a profoundly heartfelt piece, the writer deserves nothing but love.