She’s better to her dogs than a lot of people I know who have dogs. She’s a reader. Big thick books, hardbound. Not sure the genre, but I’d guess the Brontes or de Beauvoir, or Gibbons’ “The Rise and Fall…..”
She was blonde, and looked somewhat homespun, like originally a country girl. She now sports a new look. Still, a good eye for fashion. Also, quite a few tattoos. On her right arm is what looks like a big fresh scar, like a healing from a burn. Did she remove a tattoo maybe?
The makeover is Rebecca gone post-Punk. The toenails and fingernails are freshly manicured and polished. The fingernails had designs on them. Maybe she’s an out of work fashion coordinator who's got an expensive rent down in Tribeca? Really.
Whatever it is, now she sits pavement and begs with the phony sob story. I don’t know why. It could be several things. It could even be that she’s deeply troubled and can’t take care of herself in any other way. Whatever it is, it’s an act.
When I first came to New York as a kid out of college in the early 60s, there were panhandlers on the street. It wasn’t new then either. There was one guy on the Upper East Side whom you’d see in various locations, always walking briskly, except to stop you suddenly, and ask for a quarter.
Beer-bellied, clothes stained from dirt and wear and weather, he was ruddy-faced, bright-eyed, and a jolly personality. He’d first give you a quick monologue out of Shakespeare, or T.S. Eliot. And always with a smile. You’d give him more than a quarter simply because he’d made you smile with his words. Receiving the gift, his eyes would light up as he accepted. He’d thank you and be on his way. Cheerio. To the nearest ginmill. But you knew that when you first saw him before he spoke.
In the mid-70s, there were people down and out everywhere. They remained in numbers visibly through the 90s. The problems were thought to be drugs, alcohol, mental health. When Reagan was President and cut budgets on state care for people who were mentally disturbed or impaired, there seemed to be even more on the street. This went on until Giuliani became Mayor, and eventually the streets seemed to be vacated.
I felt sorry for the verbal troubadour who asked for a quarter. I knew his fate was out of his hands, at least for the moment. There were hundreds more all over the city in that situation, although hardly as engaging. The Bowery was well-populated with them. Women too. There are more women out there now -- from the gypsies wheeling their strollers, and the quivering, barely clothed African-American girl who sits, half crouching against a church wall, looking like she’s dying of consumption; and any minute. Except she’s been at it for years, so you know it’s not fatal, and very possibly very lucrative.
I don’t doubt the desperate need of many people because I personally know a lot of people who are close to that, and have jobs. But the main difference between the 60s, 70s, 90s and now, is that now it looks like a lot of these people are just workin’ it. No one has to participate, of course, if they don’t like what they see. But now I often get the feeling that what we’re seeing is post-modern panhandling, the Business School model. Well-educated, healthy resourceful people who see it as a revenue stream. Money talks and nobody walks.
This creates a terrible dilemma for all of us, because it’s a symptom. The first time I saw her, I was worried about her, about the health of her “unborn child,” and the little dogs. I gave her twenty bucks. No big deal; it didn’t leave me without. But then she turned out to be a false alarm. In a world where many feel increasingly gamed by those who are making it up for their own personal gain. It’s a social epidemic. Which leaves the question: What will be the cure? |
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