I am in the linens and children's wear annex of the UCLA Thrift Shop. I see the same homeless old lady I saw sitting by the 7-11, New Japan Restaurant, Subway complex with her dog (see "Snow White" entry). She is talking to Karen the shop clerk, who looks like a suburban mom but older. The homeless lady appears to know her too.
She tells her that someone has offered to wash her dog, the Maltese I'd brought food. She tells Karen she's afraid the woman who offered to wash her will steal her. I can imagine that; do-gooder animal welfare types have that impulse. I have it myself but I won't act on it.
This semi cry for help is my opportunity. The little Spike breed dog is health-compromisingly filthy. After hesitation, I feel the words rise up in my throat, “I'll wash the dog”. Karen who knows me from her crush on Isabel my Pomeranian, who often accompanies me to her shop, looks over. She endorses me.
I now have my hands on a Maltese. I've wanted that ever since I moved back to LA. I moved back here within a month of Spike's dying. Now my wish is fulfilled, just long enough to insure Isabel and I catch Typhoid or fleas or both. But we don't don't catch either, though I cut the dog's nails which are a week tops from growing into her paws. I scrape infected slime from her ears and a couple other orifi. She doesn't object to this post-radiation-exposure like cleaning. It's nice to be in a tub with a Maltese again though there is not enough water in California to clean us, my heart or her fur. I cuddle her in a towel then let her dry on my bed. She naps clean and cuddly for two hours, than I have to give her back to her mom.
I feel like scum for caring about the dog more than the old lady. Her name is Ginette. It makes me wonder about her parents; it doesn’t sound like they brought her up homeless. So I make plans with Ginette and wake her gently the next morning, where she's asleep in her Pokemon sleeping bag on the sidewalk. She hasn’t gone to the senior center yet on her own, so I do for her what someone should have done for me when I didn't do homework. I keep her company.
I walk her there and sit through her registration. There is free lunch, but it requires registration. She leaves me in charge of her copy of her paperwork. I have her social security number. I had to write mine on my arm when I was 16, till I remembered it. Thinking back on that I realize I am not of a Holocaust affected generation or don't have much Jewish identity. I already knew that.
I have to get home and write a shady dating article, but I first walk Ginette to the lunch counter and settle her at a table. She notices a group of senior citizen men finishing their sponsored lunches. She says one of them is cute. I tell her to look pretty and make friends. She looks at a loss by herself at her table. I grab a couple brochures about the center's programs and hand them to her to read. When in doubt dining alone, read! Later I ask her about the brochures. She says the monthly trip to the casino looks good.
No comments:
Post a Comment