thenitch

Stopping at the usual red light I always seem to hit after my 12 hours of hard customer servicing, I happen to glace over at the mush of people waiting for the bus no less the 5 feet from where I'm parked. I've glanced over at these same people nearly every night and never take much notice to them. All very down trodden people, trying to stay safe in their own bubble until they can make their way home. Tonight, though, was different. There was a man around my age, looking the way we used to dress in high school wondering around the outskirts of the bus awning. He looked like he was entertaining himself while waiting with the others. What caught my eye was his shoes. One of his rather clean looking white sneakers had no shoe laces. I chuckled to myself,
"This some new style I missed? The 'I got one of my shoe laces stolen' look."
As I finished this self amusement I saw the man reach down to something on the ground. I couldn't help but hope that he was picking up some recycling. The light turned green as the man gathered whatever the discarded food remains had been and shoveled them into his mouth before replacing the trash to its previous resting place.
Only a block away, I hit my usual second stop light of the night and turned down the bumping music I had once found energizing and now was irritated with to watch a woman cross the street in front of me. She would have looked much like someone's healthy, loving grandmother. With light blue Bermuda shorts, matching button down top and that signature short, white curly hair. She would have, only for the fact that she was pulling at her elderly locks in nervous frustration and walking around as though the world was shifting front to back and then left to right. Her mouth gaped open but no words came out. She then grinned like a Cheshire cat, but had tears in her eyes.
The light turned green. She continued down the street.
Finally reaching the last light I knew would be red, I turned my music off to contemplate all that I had seen. Are those people always around here and I just never see them? Am I one of those self absorbed people who deny the existence of a lower living?
Then I see a figure I'm familiar with. The male/female prostitute that works this corner. He is a She, but it all adds to the allure. I take one second to really take a look at this creature before making the long, stop light free way home. Because I know this light only lasts a short while, I don't feel odd staring completely at the human. There were things there that I had never seen, though I had looked a million times over the past months. Lines of sadness, drug addiction, abuse and desperation. The body was neglected to feed the minds nagging disorder and it showed in the way it was selling itself. The mind had no more use for this body and it was for sale, at a very low price.
The light turns green and I know I will soon be safe in my "high up on the hill" living area.

If all that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream, are these people's life's nightmares?