Power Tester

I am sitting with Robin in the park. I have made myself comfortable on what more or less seems a safe surface; it’s not the wood chips lining the park or his bags. Isabel is sniffing around his bags for food.

I'm here again with a stamped envelope to mail the letter he's going to write his family. I did some research; his 88 year old mother may still be alive. There’s no evidence she isn’t, and his 64 year old brother more than likely’s alive. The internet shows them both at the same address. Initially I'd found a phone number and Robin was going to phone home, but he hasn’t so now I’m pushing for a letter.

He hasn’t written it again and is instead showing me his battery tester. It’s quite cool. It's a "Multi-Meter" and can test not just batteries but cords and adapters. He demonstrates. I ask him how he managed to hang on to it last time the police took him to jail (for vagrancy) and the city threw out his stuff.

It seems too cool to be a dumpster find, not that Robin hasn’t scored winners. He gave me an old wooden thread spool after I requested he be on the lookout for them (so he wouldn’t bring me another prom dress). He also found me a pretty decent grammar reference book and an unopened bag of cotton cosmetic swabs.

Presents from Robin. Note the collar for Isabel.

He confides he actually bought the tester (I assume with his VA benefits). It worries me because his possessions are building up again and I anticipate a police raid of his crap, like the way my mom used to raid and throw stuff away from my messy room.

Robin’s told me his father, a physician with the Air Force (I looked him up, he flew missions AND  worked in aerospace medicine in WWII), used to hoard things. He had countless fascinating items which he kept fantastically organized, but when the family moved back from Germany they were about an elephant over the allowed weight limit so he made Robin and his brother get rid of possessions while he held onto his.

Robin has inherited this hoarding problem along with a desire to micro-organize his belongings. He won’t go into veteran housing, which he’s more than qualified for now as a senior citizen. He was surprised  to learn he's a senior citizen. He asked, “Am I?” Time flies when you’re on the street for 20 years. 

He doesn’t want to “crawl to the VA like a beggar on my hands and knees", which he feels he will be if doesn’t first have his stuff organized. But then the police take his stuff and the process begins anew. Last time they took (threw away) a book he’d had since childhood, apparently one of the very few to make it back from Germany.

I ask Robin exactly why he needs a battery tester, then I realize. It’s obvious. He lives outside. Batteries are important to him like they are to people in post apocalyptic fiction. A lot about homelessness is like post apocalyptic fiction. Homeless people have “camps”, where they set up and live individually or as a group. Robin camps alone but in the vicinity of other campers, who alternately are his social life and the bane of his existence. Despite this accepted homeless glossary word, he denies he’s camping. His military minded father used to make the family go camping and they hated it. Mom and kids would rebel and they’d go rent a hotel room when the camp grounds were too awful. 

Isabel and Robin having a moment at his previous camp, under the 405 freeway.

So I pull up Wikipedia on my phone. Robin has never had internet but I have introduced him to Wikipedia, because I knew he’d love it, in an attempt to lure him into VA housing and greater society. I point him to a passage in the Camping entry which mentions that what the homeless do could be considered camping. “Had to find that, didn’t you?”, he says. I say yes. Anyway, as I’m admiring the Multi-Meter and thinking if I'd been raised a boy I'd already know about cool things like it, some plain-clothes police come by. They flash a badge but that doesn’t mean much to me. I figure they are just here on a friendly visit, lots of people visit Robin, but they want to know about me. 

It’s a young male and female officer. The young male officer asks my name. I’m tired of telling men I don't know my name then having them say hi to me for the rest of my life, so I don’t feel much like giving it. So, while remaining perfectly friendly, I ignore the question. He chats inconsequentially for a few minutes then he asks for my ID. I tell him I don’t carry any, then politely overlook that he’s asked about it. He pushes it and gets out a little pad and asks for my “information”. I don’t even know what information he wants, but I tell him no.

He says, “I asked politely”. I tell him it’s not ok to ask for it, since I’ve done nothing wrong. He thinks for a minute then says, “You’re loitering”. I point out, “It’s a public park”. He says, “But it’s after dark”. It’s about 5 minutes after dark so I ask him, “When does the park close?”. His partner goes off to look and comes back and doesn’t say anything. Apparently the park hasn’t closed yet.

He next asks if any of Robin’s vast array of crap is mine. Nothing here's mine but the ever present Pomeranian on my lap. The officer then says, “I was polite. I asked your name first”. I say, “Shove it, I don’t have to tell it”. He looks confused. I say, “Really, a white girl holding a Pomeranian?”. It’s not that I think I’m above it; I just want to point out his weak profiling. Also I want to show arrogance; I’m not big on subjugation. Robin finally interjects, “She’s not homeless”.

The male officer says, “but I haven’t seen you here before”. That, of course, would be because I don't live here. I say, “I’m here talking with Robin. Am I not allowed to talk with the homeless?”. In fact, I know other people talk to the homeless but don’t look quite so comfortable doing it and generally aren’t sitting on the ground with them. But I’ve always been comfortable sitting on the ground. It’s what the homeless and I have in common, that and not much money. But I usually have enough money to put towards rent.

Robin's pal on a bad day. He can't speak intelligibly
but he smiles and shaves, usually.

The female officer goes off to chat with Robin. In what appears to be a friendly conversation she informs him of his various violations, the shopping cart is one, and his potential tickets. But she doesn’t give him any. I point out to my plain clothes officer that it might have been smarter to have had the female officer ask my name. He sighs, “Yeah, I know”.

“It’s not going to fly to just ask people for their ID”, I tell him. I can imagine that homeless people are beaten down and used to it, but regular people are going to be bothered by it. “Really?”, he says. I say, “Yeah, police state”. We debate how he might better go about it in the future. We somehow dissolve into a conversation about Clint Eastwood’s politics. He has long ago given up on seeing my ID.

The female officer's now finished talking with Robin and is giving my officer the, ‘Is it ok to come over?’ look.  So I give him my hand and he helps me up. I say, “Hi, I’m Rebecca” . I give his partner Isabel to hold. She’s been looking at my tiny dog longingly. It’s probably a grey area where police protocol is concerned, but she can’t resist her. Then they say their goodbyes and take off deeper into the park. Robin turns to me and says, “Well, he bungled that. I knew he’d have his hands full”.

I see it simply as I’ve made a new friend. But I also see that I’m stupid. Another person wouldn’t have gotten away with it, but another person wouldn’t have said, “shove it”, to a cop.