With Quick Tears Like That

October 18, 2016

I’ve seen Sam from time to time in my train station, sitting on the ground. Next to him is a sign that describes his battle with depression. I decided to talk to him today coming home from work. He was smiling, deep in his bliss when I said hi to him.

I didn’t watch the show “Charmed” but there was one episode I did tune into where one of the characters (Piper? Prue?) had the power to feel everyone’s pain around her, empath‐style. Eventually the power increased; she was able to feel more people’s pain and it was too much for one head, heart, and soul to take on. Sam takes meds for his depression, but he’ll still take on all this pain. He doesn’t even know me or my mom but it moved him to tears when I told him that she died and how long it’s been. I felt as though I were inflicting pain upon him when all I really wanted to do was share and confide. His tears flow with the freedom that more confined and conformed folks don’t allow themselves to do.

I invited him to my church but people already invited him there, as he has the little invite cards at his side, along with other keepsakes. And he has a home. His dog Gigi recently passed away and so he has contempt for money grubbing veterinarians. I think of my Titi Janis who always seems to have a cat recovering from surgery. Sam is clean and coherent, and pretty friendly. I wanted to tell him that I know the pain of depression. But I didn’t bring up that memory of me carving the words “I will hurt myself” under that weird table next to my bed, a table I made out of an old wooden closet door. With a permanent black marker I would draw recurring art patterns (a fugue?) underneath and then that phrase which was directed to no one. Or maybe it was to myself, to a god, to my state of mind. It could have been a cry for help or warning to myself (or to someone or something), saying that if I keep this up, whatever this is, that I will eventually try to kill myself again. I didn’t go into any of that with Sam in the breezy train station with the after 5:00pm crowd passing us. I just said to him that he’s not alone. And he knew it. He said many people are very nice to him and Gigi always helped him ward off the police. He just hangs out there from time to time to keep from going insane. I would too as a teenager, mostly cutting school.

I went home that night thinking “Nah man, with quick tears like that? You need a tougher core if you’re going to survive!” Earlier that day the receptionist at my job was telling me about all the rude callers who phone and give her a hard time and I was saying that it happens with me too and that we just gotta be above it and distance ourselves from that. When Sam told me his name, he joked that it was like “Sam the Man” and I made him laugh by saying, “or like Uncle Sam!” Isn’t it funny how silly little jokes, if you even want to call it that, more like silly dialogue, can make even the most melancholy, pain‐ridden individual smile and laugh good‐naturedly?

He called out a thank you as I left and told me to get home safe.