We have a number of interesting characters in our new neighborhood… so far Megan and I have discovered Barefoot Broom Lady and Drunken Patrick. Drunken Patrick will eventually get his own post, but Barefoot Broom Lady is today’s subject.
Barefoot Broom Lady is a woman who wanders the Willy Street neighborhood with a broom tucked under her arm and (as you may have already guessed) wears no shoes. She seems to be a neighborhood fixture. I saw her the first day I was walking around the area looking for apartments for rent, and many times afterward. Megan has run into her into her at the laundromat, and dutifully reported to me that she smells bad.
As I was walked to the hardware store today, I saw her industriously shoveling snow in front of Grandpa’s Gun Shop. (Seriously. There’s a store called “Grandpa’s Gun Shop.”) As I approached, I couldn’t help but stare directly at her feet. It was well below freezing, but she was still barefoot. I couldn’t believe it. She was either oblivious to the pain or the nerves in her foot had already been destroyed by frostbite.
I stared directly at her feet as I walked by–amazingly, her feet didn’t appear to be frostbitten. Even after being outdoors presumably all day, her feet were of normal flesh tone. There was none of the blue-black coloring that one would expect from severe frostbite. The toenail of her right big toe was pure black and her toenails needed a trim–but other than that, her feet looked relatively normal.
I went into Ace and purchased two window insulation kits. On the way back, I started to feel guilty about not offering to help her. After all, the St. Vincent de Paul was on my way home, and they have shoes for sale. I could spend 15 minutes and $10 and she’d be far better off for it. What if her feet got so severely frostbitten that they had to be amputated? Could I live with myself knowing I could have prevented that?
The other side of my brain argued back. It’s been shown by feral children that the human body is more than capable of dealing with such harsh temperatures with no protection. Temperature tolerances are learned, not inborn. Buddhist monks spend frigid nights meditating high in the Himalayas, clothed in only a thin robe. They generate such incredible internal heat that they actually melt the ice and snow that they sit on. Maybe this woman is crazy or focused enough that she can do the same. So I don’t need to help her… I can just take the easy way out, avoid her, and let her be. She’s fine.
Bullshit. She’s a nutter, and she needs some kind of help.
Dammit.
I continued walking down the street, and found her not far down the way shoveling the walk for the Willy St. Coop grocery store. Her familiar broom rode atop a snow shovel as she pushed the slush from the parking lot crosswalk. Never having had a skill for diplomacy or tact, I came straight out with it.
“Aren’t your feet cold?” I asked, trying to sound nonchalant.
“You only lose a third of the heat through the tops of your feet than you do through your head.” She replied immediately.
I was momentarily taken aback–this was absolutely true. I wasn’t sure what I had been expecting in response, but it certainly wasn’t a reasonable scientific fact. Nevertheless, I sojourned on.
“Ok,” I said, still failing to sound casual, “How come you’re not wearing any shoes?”
“Oh, I can’t stand the way that sweat freezes between the toes. Not worth it.”
“Oh.” I replied, unsure how to respond. Fortunately, she continued the thread of the conversation for me.
“I stopped wearing shoes in protest of strip searches,” She continued, as though we were merely discussing the weather. “The shoes are the first thing they make you take off when they strip search you.”
I nodded dumbly, wholly unprepared for the conversation I was now engaged in. I suspect my mouth hung agape. It’s not that she was terribly nonsensical… BBL was surprisingly lucid and approachable for a barefoot homeless person of debatable sanity. Quite simply, I’m not a good conversationalist, and I’m easily confused when the topic turns to something I’m utterly at a loss to discuss. Among these topics are first-hand accounts of strip searches.
“I don’t think it’s right that anyone should have the right to strip you naked that you’re not married to.”
My brain, by this point, had stopped processing any new data. As much as I may have wanted to listen to anything she was saying, it was simply rejected outright in favor of desperately churning over the question What the fuck can I possibly say in response to this?
After she concluded her statements on the the evils of strip searches, I nodded in agreement with… whatever she had just said.
My mouth forged ahead where my brain was still unready to go.
“So… you don’t want shoes?” I asked, stupidly. This was really the crux of my conversation with her. If she said yes, we’d go to St. Vinnie’s and I’d buy her some shoes, or boots, or slippers, or… something. Whatever her crazy broom-toting heart desired. If she said no, I could walk away with my conscience assuaged, knowing that she didn’t want shoes and that no amount of rational arguments could persuade her otherwise.
I have no recollection whatsoever of what she said in response to my question. None. I believe my brain was still attempting to formulate some sort of cogent response to the topic of strip searches, because it was certainly making no attempt to record whatever it was that she said next.
Since I immediately turned and walked back down the street towards my apartment, I can only assume that her response was in the negative, and that she neither desired nor missed shoes.
Even so, the next time I see her on the street I want to offer her a pair of shoes on me at St. Vinnie’s. I don’t want her to lose her feet because I didn’t know how to offer to buy her some footwear.