19 The Shrink

"Hello, Betty." She comes around from behind a weird little desk and shakes my hand. I stare at her nails. They are the color of the inside of a watermelon, which might be the best tasting thing in the world, that cold, perfect watermelon...

"My name is Dr. Abbott." She shuts the door behind me and sits down in a chair. Looks like I'm supposed to sit in the other chair, so I do.

"How are you today?" she says. Everyone says that, but I don't think it's a real question. I never know what to answer.

"Okay," I finally say. She shuffles through some papers.

"I see you're staying at First Christian Church ." Yeah, so what? I'm thinking. "Do, you like it there?" What am I going to say? That I don't like it? She looks at me for a while.

"It's okay."

"Would you like some water or tea?" Great, twenty questions.

"Uh, no. Thanks." I notice that this is a real comfy chair. There's a picture of a dog on her desk. A very ugly dog, with a torn ear. And some kids. There are way too many books in this place. Reminds me of the library.

"How are you feeling about things, Betty?" I finally look at her, the shrink. I thought they had glasses and wore suits. What does she want from me? I don't answer, but then time goes by and I can't stand it.

"Okay," I say. "Everything's okay." Except I suddenly realize I don't know where my cart is. I look around and start to get up.

"Are you worried about your cart?" I glare at her. How do they know this? I head for the door and she follows me. I'm getting that tense feeling.

"Shall we lock your cart up so you don't have to worry about it?" she says. I am stunned. What a great idea. I cannot believe it when she pulls a lock and chain out of her pocket. I take the lock and stand there, frozen that way I do.

"Let me help you," she says. We loop the chain around a pole and through my cart, then click the lock shut.

"Here's the key." She hands it to me. To me.

"Now, how about that tea?" she says. We go back into her office and she gets me some tea. I put the key on the table by our chairs so I can see it. Nobody says anything. After forever I take a deep breath. I'm either going to cry or talk. I start talking.

So what do I talk about? My cart. I tell her about my cart. Not that she hasn't already seen it, but she doesn't know what's inside. And it turns out I don't know either, not completely. I start by telling about the dolls. This gets me talking about Tanya because Tanya reminds me of a doll. And I talk about my sister because we had dolls. Then our time is up. We go out and unlock my cart, then I give her the key and chain and lock.

"Betty, you can keep it," she says. But I don't want to. I will probably lose the key, or someone will steal the chain. No, definitely not. She gives me a new appointment paper. Dr. Abbott on Thursday at 3PM. I put the paper in my pocket and steer on down the street with my cart. Good thing Welfare is already on my map.

18 Why Me?

I don't get it. Why do I have to go to the shrink? I been doing fine, causing no trouble, making my rounds. I saw that social worker girl talking to the Latte Heaven people. I thought she was just having a coffee like any old customer, but maybe Tony was right.

"Isn't that your boss?" he asked. We were sitting with our carts on the bench outside the coffee shop.

"Huh?"

"That girl." He tilted his head just barely, like it was hush hush. Finally I saw her, Eva.

"My boss?" I never thought of her that way.

"You better watch out," he said. I looked at her out of the corner of my eye. She paid, then sat down at a table with her coffee and spread out some papers.

"See?" Tony nudged me.

"See what?" I whispered, still didn't get it. Redhair brought her a pastry. All normal. Then Redhair sat down. Not normal.

"See? See!?" Tony stared at me. I stared at them. They were talking and looking at the papers, smiling at each other. Maybe they were friends? My stomach wasn't feeling too good.

"Yer in for it," Tony said unhelpfully. They were still talking as Tony and I stood up. I saw the skinny guy come over to them just before we were gone. Tony was shaking his head and muttering.

But nothing bad happened. Except that the next time I went to Welfare, she said I get to see the shrink and handed me an appointment paper like it was nothing unusual. Dr Abbott on Thursday at 3PM. I wish I said No, but I didn't.

Later everybody looked at me funny, like they knew. So what, bozos? I'm thinking. Big deal. I'm not afraid of a doctor, especially not a shrink. What can they do to you anyway?

Tanya used to love her shrink. Love, love, love. That's a bad sign. Whatever Tanya loves is not for me. Do the guys go to shrinks? If they do, they don't mention it. They talk about their probation officers though. Maybe a probation officer is a shrink for guys.

I know there are shrinks in lockdown. Oh, no! What if I'm going to lockdown?! I've never been out there. I stare hard at the appointment paper. No, this appointment is at the Welfare office on Townsend. The lockdown ward is at the hospital somewhere else. Calm down, Betty. Calm, calm, calm. I am being so calm that I crash into Marianne's cart.

"Whoa there, podna," she says. Wow. I haven't seen Marianne in a long time.

"Oh, sorry." I back off and stuff the appointment paper in my pocket.

"What ya got there, hon?" She sits on the bench like she owns it.

'Oh, nothing," I say as I sit down beside her. Marianne is huge, not fat but tall and strong looking. She has confidence. Not that wild confidence that Cal has. Marianne is more substantial. When she goes off, it's more like she curls into a ball and hides inside herself. Haven't seen that in a long time. I'll bet she knows about shrinks.

"Oh, that's a good thing," she says when I show her the appointment paper.

"It is?" Marianne starts tidying up her cart, something she does a lot. Her cart is small and always looks suitable. The wheels never squeal or get jammed, and nothing falls off.

"You bet," she says. "It means you're worth looking into." This does not sound good to me. She pats me on the hand. "Every time I've done the shrink, I get a job or into a house. I even got my hair done once." She pats her hair and looks around in a glamorous way which makes both of us chuckle. Mary Ann has been out of here a few times, so I believe her, even the hair part. But what has this got to do with me?

"Hmmm," she squints at the paper. "Dr. Abbott...I never can remember the names." She gives me back the paper. We notice some of the guys approaching. I copy Marianne as she goes into her pose: head up, hands on knees, foot touching the cart, eyes shut (almost).

"Booduh! Booduh!" they start chanting when they see us. I would never get away with this on my own, but I'm with Marianne. They pass on by and the chanting gets fainter until it's gone. "Boodah, boodahhhhhh ..."

17 My Map

I have a map, a very important item. I don't know why it's important, but it is. Oh, yeah, because I forget things. I just do. Last week I forgot where that church is and it took so long to find it that I didn't get any dinner. That was when I decided to make a map. Because of my cart, I don't travel great distances. You wouldn't think I'd need a map, but there you go.

First thing I had to figure out was what places to include on this map. I made a list.

Betty's Important Places

• That church
• The news stand
• Latte Heaven
  
• The train station
• The culture garden
• Jewel Market
• The library
• Downtown Park
• The welfare office
• McDonald's
• Tony's secret place
• St. Mark's
• City Park
• The fire station

That's about it. My world.

Next I had to figure out the streets. There are two big streets here: Main and Townsend. They cross each other. Main is where most of the businesses are. On Main, there are trees and benches and trash cans and streetlights and pigeons. Main is good for hanging out. Townsend crosses Main about halfway down. At one end of Townsend is the train. The other end goes out past City Park and who knows where else because I've never been that far. Cal says it goes to the freeway and then the Grand Canyon. I guess he knows.

All my landmarks are somewhere connected to Main or Townsend, so how do I get so lost? I decide to draw my map on the sidewalk with the colored chalk I found at the playground. Pink, green, blue. Making a map sounds easy, but it's not. I would hate to do this for a job. But I need this map, so I don't quit. I'm busy drawing when I hear footsteps stop behind me. Uh oh.

"My, my, what have we here?" Mike. I stay very still and hope he has something better to do.

"Hey, look!" Oh, shit. Gary. He points at my drawing. "That's Jewel Market!"

"Cool!" Jack too. Of course. I'm doomed anyway. Jack hunkers down, picks up the pink chalk, starts drawing.

"Me too!" says Gary, giving Jack a shove. Pretty soon there is a naked woman in my map.

"Check this out!" Gary draws a giant stop sign with the blue chalk, writes GO in the middle of it, then laughs like a hyena. Jack adds a few clouds and stars. Then some kids come along with their mom and a dog.

"Look, Mommy!" They point excitedly at us. "We wanna draw!" They leap on the green chalk that I have abandoned.

"No, no, kids," the mom tries to stop them. But I tell her it's okay. The mom and I stand there watching while the kids add trees and a moose, maybe. They are good drawers, better than Gary.

"Here, kid," Jack says, handing over some pink chalk. "Put some spots on that cow."

"It's a horse!" the little boy shouts. Everyone laughs. Then he draws pink spots on it anyway.

"And these are the fishies," the little girl explains proudly.

"Yeah, dead fishies!" Jack gleefully gives them exes for eyes. The little girl whacks Jack on the arm and everybody laughs again. Soon there are ocean waves around Main and Townsend and a big pink sun at the train station. This is looking way better than my real life.

"And here comes the tidal wave!" Out of nowhere Mike tosses a canteen full of water all over the sidewalk, the drawing, our feet. We stare at him. This is the kind of stuff that makes me float away. The kids look like they are about to cry.

Suddenly Jack jumps up and starts dancing around in the water. "Mayday! Mayday!" he yells. Then Gary makes police siren sounds and sings yo ho ho extremely loud. The kids can't stand it and they start giggling and splashing. The dog runs around barking. Me and the mom just stand there, being happy I guess. I can't figure out why Mike also looks happy, after wrecking everything, but he does.

In a while, the mom takes her family home and the guys leave. What a mess. I decide I better put my map on a piece of paper, which I do, and now I have a map. No pink sun, but I like it anyway.

16 Coffee Shop

Having a good place to sleep makes a big difference. In what, I'm not so sure, but something. I think it's about feeling safe. Even though there were a bunch of us sleeping in that church room, it wasn't like sleeping in the park where you could get jumped or your stuff stolen at any time. That makes you sleep with one eye open, which is not restful.

Today I feel almost perky, sort of Tanya-ish. No, more like Cal. Both of them do the mood swing thing. Bipolar? Manic depressive? I forget. But Cal doesn't mutter or twist his hair until it falls out or try to dance with strangers. Plus, he has that room at his parents house where he can go any time. He invited me over once, but we couldn't get past the big sliding gate with the security camera. He tried to interest me in climbing over the wall, but no way. I'll bet he sleeps like a prince in there. Prince Cal.

Hey, since it's so early and since I am in a relatively jolly frame of mind, I think I'll cruise Latte Heaven and see if any of the handout people are working. Very quiet at this time of morning. No cars. Dew on the grass. I hear some chirping, no doubt the little brown birds up at the crack of dawn to start working.

Oh, look. The redhaired woman is there. My lucky day. Guess I'll wave at her. And there's the skinny guy too. I feel a feast coming.

"Hi, Betty." Redhair unlocks the glass door. "Come on in." I leave my cart outside on the sidewalk, unconcerned about thievery, or at least somewhat unconcerned. Safety is relative anyway.

Skinny guy and Redhair are bustling around getting the place ready to open. I settle at my favorite table, spread my fine patchwork skirt with my hands, and tuck my hiking boots under. The boots kind of wreck my fashion statement, so I'm glad that the skirt is long. Well, it's long on me. In fact, it's so long that sometimes I get tangled in it and trip, which pisses me off. The skirt came from the hippies, at least that's what everyone says. This pisses me off because it didn't. Or maybe it did. Okay, I don't know why this pisses me off.

Skinny guy brings over a tray of yesterday's pastries. They save these for us, so I feel entitled. I choose a croissant and a bran muffin.

"Butter?" he asks.

"No thank you, my good man," I say in a snooty voice and flick my napkin into my lap. They both laugh. Even I laugh. Redhair brings me a pretty blue cup of hot something.

"This is the super coffee," she whispers. "It expired yesterday and we get to use it up." I'll bet it's that $6 a cup stuff. Wow, she even put foam in it. Maybe some of that churchiness rubbed off on me and God is dropping goodies my way. The sun gleams on my table, and on the bushes in Perry's Park across the street, and probably everywhere. I pretend I am on vacation, having a morning snack at a quaint cafe. Mais oui!

Hey! When did I learn French? Un cafe, s'il vous plait. Oh, shit. Ou est le chien? What is this!? I don't have a dog, or a cafe! And where's my cart!? I get up too fast and spill my coffee. The table is wobbling almost as much as I am. I see the cart all safe, and try to settle down, sit gently down, not panic.

"Everything okay, Betty?" Redhair mops up my spill and puts a new napkin by my plate. She also puts a hand on my shoulder. I take a few deep breaths, pull back the tears, and poke at the bran muffin to show her I'm fine and she can take her hand off. Now. I know she's being nice but I'm fine ...

The door opens and people in bike riding outfits come in, take off their helmets, and sit too close to me. I quickly wrap up the bran muffin and put it in my pocket. I leave the croissant behind, and head for the door.

It feels good to be back with my cart. I wait while the light changes a few times. Still no cars around. I'm cold now. Skinny guy suddenly appears.

"Here you go, Betty." He hands me my coffee in a to-go cup with the sipping lid. Oh. Being nice. I watch him as he side-hops around the bikes, through the door, and back to his work. Redhair is bending over the coffee machine. Bike outfits knock against each other like balls on a pool table, everything very slow and quiet.

15 Sweaters

Sweaters are very important out here, at least they are for me. Sweaters serve two purposes. The first one is obvious: keeping me warm. That can be a challenge depending on the weather. But the second is maybe even more important: sweaters make me bigger. When you're a small person, especially if you're a small female person, others tend to push you around, or get too close in your personal space. Sweaters make me seem bigger than I am, even to me. Maybe not exactly scary, but big, which makes people think twice.

My favorite sweater is a dark blue cable knit with an anchor. I usually wear it on top of the yellow turtleneck and the orange cardigan that I found by the swings in the park. I know that orange one belongs to some kid, so I always wear it under the bigger sweaters. That way no one will see it and maybe recognize it. Would I get arrested if that kid's mother saw the orange sweater on me? I never thought of that. Anyway, it's not usually visible.

I have this half sweater that has very short arms and a rhinestone button. It's not warm at all, but it is powderpuff pink which makes me feel girlish. I don't know why that's something I'd want to feel, but there you go. Sweaters are not always logical. Tanya gave it to me, I think. She might want it back, but too bad.

In cold weather I usually wear some sweatshirts too, and the green Duffy's Pub shirt which is quite thick. I'm not sure if sweatshirts count as sweaters, but I guess so. I don't like them as much. I trade sweatshirts a lot, but I usually hang on to my sweaters, even that rainbow sweater that Marianne talked me into trading for the doll she was so in love with. That was a bad trade. The rainbow sweater makes me sneeze because of the yarn, but now I'm stuck. Maybe some day I'll find a sucker to trade for it.

I found the gray sweater coat in a Goodwill donation bag over by the mall. Jack says it makes me look like a Raiders fullback, which is just what I had in mind. I sort of stole it because the Goodwill truck was closed for the day, and that bag of clothes was going to get all damp, and maybe the sweater would be stolen by someone who didn't need it as much as I did. I would never have enough money to buy it at the Goodwill. When I get into my Needy Person head, I can rationalize lots of behavior that I know is not right.

The only time I ever got in trouble for stealing was about a Hershey's chocolate bar, when I was 9. But that was different. Then I had money, or my parents did, and I could have got that candy bar by legal means. Now I don't have money or parents. What's it called Goodwill for if they don't hand out some? During warmer weather like now, I keep the sweater coat in the bottom of my cart. But if I get stuck at night, it makes a good blanket. Hey! There's a third reason why sweaters are important: as sleeping blankets.

I wonder how many sweaters I have? Better count them.

I've been thinking about that red windbreaker again, the one that Tony got. A windbreaker would work quite well in this warm time of year, plus it would make me look huge when it puffs up with air.

But no. That red is just way too bright.

14 Church

Maybe this is not such a great idea after all. What is this place? I thought she said it was a church, but this looks more like the apartments I lived in when I was young. Or was that someone else? Oh, yeah, Aunt Ella in that pink apartment house, with the Birds of Paradise. I wonder what happened to Aunt Ella?

"Come on in," some guy is saying.

Oh, look, there's Gary, shaking hands. Shaking hands? Certain situations just don't fit with certain people, and shaking hands does not fit with Gary. This is creepy. Oh, no! That guy is walking over here. Oh, shit.

"Hi, I'm Reverend Rick," he says. I float away on his big white teeth. He takes the ticket out of my hand.

"Welcome, Betty," he says looking at my ticket. I say nothing. "Ah, Eva sent you over." I look at him a little. Where's his preacher outfit? Preachers don't wear Hawaiian shirts.

"Would you like some help with that?" He starts pulling my cart. Argh! No! But, but...think, Betty. He's being nice. Nice. This does not stop my heart from pounding. I clutch the cart and halt. He looks me in the eyes.

"It's okay," he says. "We're just about to eat." I ease up on the clutching and go along with him.

Nice. This can be my mantra for a while. Nice nice nice. I'll just keep thinking about that nice bed.

"You will probably want to be able to see this," he moves my cart through the door and pushes it to the side. I am suddenly hit by a tidal wave of noise, then by a tidal wave of smells. What planet is this anyway?

"The Samoans are cooking tonight, from our congregation," he explains to the bunch of us who are staring and blocking the door. "Come in."

So we do. It's an old fashioned multi-purpose room, with a stage. Makes me remember the fourth grade. L

ittle kids start bringing us food. They wait politely for us to sit down, so we do. My little kid spills some food on my skirt, but I don't care. He is so cute. It's easy to tell when a little kid is being nice, which is usually. The food is another story. This is weird stuff, not macaroni and cheese, that's for sure. Tastes good once I get past my usual fears.

I watch the preacher roaming around. He's weird looking for a preacher--- bushy gray hair on brown skin. Maybe he's Eva's dad. Naw. Or, maybe he is. You can't tell anymore about that, with so many mixed up races.

"Hey, Betty." Gary sits down across from me.

Oh, no! Where's my cart? I panic until I spot it, then shift my seat so the cart is in my line of vision.

"Good stuff, huh?" Gary grabs my grapes.

"Yeah," I say. Gary is okay without the rest of them.

"You staying here tonight?" he asks.

"I guess."

"Mike didn't get a pass," he says. This is not a surprise to me. I wonder why Gary did.

"Remember that food fight at St. Marks?" he asks. We laugh a little. That was funny. And stupid.

"Mike got the blame."

Again, not a surprise. Mike is the loudest, therefore the most often caught. Spotlight = blame. Gary looks dejected without his gang which makes me even happier to be only with me. It's not just that Gary's particular gang is mean, though they are, but gangs in general are not to be relied on. They can do a disappearing act at any time. Even worse, they can decide you don't belong any more and kick you out, or forget you. I can do without that.

"It wasn't all Mike's fault," says Gary.

He offers me a breadstick which I take before he can pull it back. You'd think Betty and Gary are best pals just looking at us from across the room...like that preacher is doing. Reminds me that it's probably time to go check my cart. Instead, I sit and listen to the drumming. There's so much going on all around, like a big circus with me in the middle. Or a dream, a good one. In a while the kids bring us cupcakes with pink icing on top.

"Now yer talkin'!" says Gary who disappears his cupcake in two bites.

I lick the icing off and then wrap my cupcake up for later. Ally-oop into the old pocket with the breadstick.

Oh yeah, I can do this gig, no problemo.

13. Social Worker

A fine day for the social worker, I say.

No, it's not, I also say.

Just shoot me are my final words on that subject.

But no, I actually have to talk to the social worker today, a very unfavorite part of my job here.

"Hey, beats having a parole officer," Jack says every time I complain. I don't know about that. I might prefer a parole officer. They are tough and mean and get right down to business. Being busted for busting parole might be better than being cared about and empathized all over. She can't even empathisize me. She's a 27-year old college graduate who grew up in San LaLa and drives a blue Toyota. I saw her in her cute little tennis suit at Community Park last week. I hid behind the dumpster.

Guess I better go to my appointment.

I hate that mental health building. Not because it's old and drafty, I sort of like that. It's the orange plastic chairs that get me. Oh, and the very huge problem that I have to leave my cart outside. Sitting next to crying kids is no picnic either. But if I don't go, she comes and finds me and then I have to go anyway. Or she does our "session" in front of everybody, which is horrible just thinking about. Well, okay, she never did that, but if I don't go she might.

Her name is Eva.

I think she's some sort of Mexican. Eva Prettybrowngirl. No accent. I never heard her speak Spanish. Might be a Philippine girl, or Hawaiian. Or just very tan. I see her through the glass partitions, talking of course. That's what they do, social workers, they talk. She uses her hands a lot. Maybe she's Italian. No, they yell more. This one never yells, but I always feel that I am disappointing her. I answer her questions, which is more than I do for most people. I cooperate. I even appreciate what she does. I think they especially try to look out for us women. There didn't used to be so many women out here. It's the mental hospital crowd that has filled out the ranks. And drugs. Somehow alcohol seems to be more of a guy thing on the streets, but drugs is an equal opportunity amigo. However, this is not a very rough town, not in comparison to the city, so we are mostly no worse off than the men.

She's waving at me. Ugh, time to take my medicine.

Hey, that was not bad at all. Here I got all worked up for the grilling and instead she gives me a pass for this church I never heard of. Some special deal, with food, and a bed. I am happy to convert for such splendor, but she says I don't have to. Yeah, sure. If it looks like a church, and it sounds like a church, I say it is a church, and all churches want to save you and have you join up. But hey, a few Hail Marys are okay by me. What could it hurt?