Portland Street Stories:

Sometimes there are people you can't forget...

Photograph by Thomas Legg, used with permission. Rest in peace sweet Thomas. Don and I love you, still.

Portland, Oregon.

Written August 18th, published online August 19th, 2014.

Are there people you know, who you’ve come across for years without really knowing them? People you could identify in a police lineup in an instant, because you’ve seen them so often? And yet you don’t know their names and have never spoken with them? We all know people like that. And I’ve known my share, right here in “keep it weird” Portland. Join me on a colorful retrospective, remembering some of the more interesting characters I’ve gotten to know, but didn’t really know, and yet cannot seem to forget.

HUGGY: Of the dozens of street people I’ve come across over the years, one man stands out in memory. I’ll call him Huggy. Huggy was a black drug dealer and pimp. I don’t know his real name and probably never will. I ran across him persistently for years, beginning in the early 1980s and ending only a few years ago. As a result, he became a familiar character to me. He always reminded me of Huggy Bear from the 1970s Television series “Starsky and Hutch.” This was mainly because he dressed the part of the wildly outrageous pimp, replete with colorful, patterned clothing and high heeled boots, to make him look taller of course. It seemed Huggy tried to dress the part of the role he was playing, and anyone could tell, he loved an audience.

Huggy had the pimp-strut down pat, with the shorter left-leg step, balanced by the longer right-leg step, moving forward in a kind of cool glide, or so he thought. What the pimp-strut did do for Huggy was announce who he was and what he wanted in an instant. What Huggy lacked in subtlety, he made up for in blatant bravado. He looked like any pimp you might see in any Blaxploitation film of the early 70s. He stood about five feet six inches tall and was muscular and wiry. He looked strong and capable, but clearly suffered from little man complex. He was loud. He yelled a lot. I began seeing Huggy in about 1980, in the Rose City of downtown Portland and invariably, when he spotted me, he’d try to pick me up.

One of my older sisters, Mary, had warned me years before about all the pimps who would hang out, outside the Meier & Frank department store on the west side of the building, on 6th Avenue. This was a long time ago in the late 70s and early 80s when there were four or five of them, at least, all lined up, trying to pick up girls for their stables. They were pretty bold and it seemed the police left them alone, which always surprised me because sometimes they could be a downright menace. The other reality is they led many girls, both white and black down a primrose path of slow, painful self-destruction. I loathed them for that reason. I knew what they did to the girls they sucked in. At the time, I had little understanding about their lives or how they had become pimps in the first place. That would not come for many years and only after I became much older.

My older sister told me that if you gave them “direct eye contact” they would come right after you, sidling up to you and starting in with the phony sweet-talk. She explained that the only way to steer clear of them was to avoid all eye contact. “Just pretend they’re not even there,” Mary told me. I always spontaneously remembered Mary’s advice whenever I saw Huggy. He’d be standing outside the Meier & Frank department store, trying to pick up girls and he’d see me. “Hey foxy lady, how you doooin?” he would ask, singsong, in his Mr. Cool attitude. I was fourteen at the time, five feet four, and about 115 pounds, 1980.

I’d ignore him and keep walking. After a few of these episodes, it became apparent to Huggy, that I wasn’t going to respond. His attitude changed then, from smooth Jive talker to snarly resentment. “What? You think you’re too good for me white gurrl?” Huggy would snarl under his breath. “Fat bitch!” was the sound off to my continued rejection. I’d laugh under my breath, not trying to hide my amusement, as I continued walking away. I knew what pimps were about and there was no way I was heading in Huggy’s direction.

After a few more years, I stopped seeing him on 6th Avenue by the Meier & Frank and started seeing him down on 3rd and Burnside, hustling down by the now demolished Cindy’s Porn shop. He’d be bossing around some white girl in her teens or early twenties or yelling at some young man, white or black, and generally one of his drug runners. He was usually angry they hadn’t gotten back “on time,” or that they were “holdin’ out,” on him and he wanted “ALL the money, man!”

I noticed every time I saw Huggy, on my weekly treks through downtown Portland, or if I was shopping nearby or transferring to a different Trimet bus to go to a ballet lesson, that he was either dealing with one of his prostitutes or he was trying to control the sales of drugs, to his benefit, of course. I often saw him doing blatant drug deals right down on 3rd and Burnside, outside the old Grove Hotel and not even trying to hide what he was doing. For years I saw him, every few weeks. He would be dressed like the stereotypical inner-city pimp, wearing a lot of black and dark purple, fake satin shirts and pointy black dress shoes, possibly Stacy Adams shoes. But no matter how fancy his clothes or shoes were, Huggy looked every inch the cheap, street pimp, put on display for all to see, strutting around, not able to stay under the radar for the life of him. Every so often I’d see police officers pull up to hassle him, and telling him to scram. Then he would deny he was doing anything wrong. “Its cause I’m black, ain’t it?! Its cause I’m black!” he’d yell.

Then slowly, over a period of time, I noticed that I didn’t see Huggy anymore on my weekly treks downtown. For more than 25 years, he was nowhere to be seen. Probably doing time in a penitentiary somewhere, but it was as if Huggy had just disappeared from the face of the Earth. Then in 2010, suddenly, there he was, across from Powell’s City of Books during the hottest part of the summer. Huggy was now in his early to middle 50’s and was getting around with a walker. He looked like he’d had a stroke and his legs didn’t work right. He was knock-kneed, with his knees bending into each other awkwardly. His arms were now weak and shriveled-but it was the same man. I recognized Huggy’s face instantly.

Only Huggy was no longer the man-in-charge. Now he was begging for spare change. I was stunned. The once loud, mean, big-city pimp was now reduced to begging for people’s pocket change. He was wearing a yellowing, dingy, white tank-top with oily food stains on the front. His slacks were a tan/orange polyester color and reminiscent of leisure suit slacks, popular in the late 1970’s. A matching blazer hung over the side of his metal walker.

I walked across the street and of course he didn’t know me. It had been over 25 years since I’d last seen Huggy, and I was no longer the thin, cute teenager I’d once been. How could he have remembered me? I looked like an entirely different person.

As I ambled by, Huggy begged for spare change, “You got a little change miss?” he asked sweetly. I stopped, fascinated, and reached into my coat pocket. I continued looking right at him, smiling kindly, almost willing him to remember me but he didn’t. He looked at me with a blankness that told me there was no recognition in his mind. It was impossible not to pity him. He was a shadow of his former self.

I dropped a couple of dollars in quarters into his hand and he thanked me in a pitiful way, with a small smile and a nod. I smiled in return and said what I always say when I give spare change, “No problem. You take care now.” He seemed tired and very sad. Poor Huggy, I thought to myself. He was so very changed. And the huge span of indifferent time that stood between us, loomed in my mind. God, had it really been over 25 years since I’d seen him last?

Huggy then turned his attention to the next person behind me, begging them for spare change. They ignored him and continued on their way. I remember walking away and feeling the deep conviction that crime can never pay. Just look what it had done for Huggy. He was now disabled, penniless and a beggar on the street. I saw him three more times after that, standing across the street from Powell’s City of Books, with his walker and little bag of dingy belongings at his feet. Each time I passed him, I gave him money and a smile.

Eventually, he simply stopped going to that corner and I haven’t seen him since. The lesson of Huggy’s life remains etched in my mind, unequivocal and exacting in its brutal simplicity and complex in its deep social connotations. Huggy probably did the best he could in his life but he did make choices and from the look of it, those choices may have ruined him.

Huggy is someone I cannot forget.

MURIEL: The next street person that often preoccupies my memory was a blond woman I came to know, named Muriel. I know Muriel’s first name because I asked her, but I don’t know her last name, that I never learned. She was the wife of a violent convict who ended up doing a long stint in prison for armed robbery. I’d seen them together maybe three times before he was shipped off. He was a tall, good looking Portuguese man and very stern. He was the boss and he communicated that very effectively in his body language and demeanor. He seemed constantly unhappy and an angry suspicious scowl adorned his face at all times. Muriel adored him and was like an obedient puppy whenever they were together, fetching him coffee and doing whatever he asked of her, quietly and contentedly. Occasionally, he would look over and smile at her, as they sat drinking coffee. She was someone he could count on, someone he could trust. He cared about her. You could tell. To anyone else, including me, he glared with suspicion and contempt.

I started seeing Muriel around 1997, when my young daughter began Kindergarten in a nearby school, a private Catholic school, on scholarship where I thought she would get a good education. Muriel hung out at the McDonald’s on 19th and Burnside, across the street from the Fireman’s Memorial park in SW Portland which was directly across the street from the Civic Apartments, where one summer before I got to know her, I saw Muriel climbing out of one of the first floor apartment windows, and then chatting with another woman who I’d seen prostituting herself on Burnside street.

Muriel stood about five feet ten inches and easily weighed 170 pounds, but because she was so tall, she also looked quite thin. Her usual outfit was jeans, sneakers, tee shirts and an oversize camouflage Army jacket. Muriel had shoulder length, golden-blond hair and light-blue eyes and was very pretty, but often stood bent over, looking down. Long before I knew her name, Muriel reminded me of my older sister Margaret. She was about the same age, being around eight to ten years older than me. Because of her resemblance to my older sister, whom I hadn’t seen in almost 15 years and missed terribly, I was constantly fascinated by and curious about Muriel and found myself trying to catch her eye. I was curious about her and wanted to know her story.

Muriel had a quiet dignity and grace that I couldn’t help but admire. After her husband was shipped off to prison, she would go to the McDonald’s and drink coffee by herself for hours, sitting in the booths and looking out the windows with a blank expression on her face. I knew she lived nearby, perhaps at the Civic Apartments or perhaps even the ACE Hotel, which was only down the street and much less expensive, and I knew that she struggled, but despite all that she never once spare-changed anyone that I saw. She never begged for money from the other patrons. That always impressed me somehow. She would come in with her handful of grimy coins and buy a coffee and a small burger, sitting quietly by herself at one of the back tables, out of the way, sometimes rubbing her hands to warm them from the constant Portland cold.

Sometimes Muriel would make up her face the way prostitutes do, with bright fuchsia lipstick, too much foundation, and too much blush and black eye liner. She would then sit on the steps of the McDonald’s, warming herself in the sun and wait to get picked up. The cars would drive by, and if the man wanted Muriel, he would do a quick honk and then sharply turn North to park a block up. She would get up and quickly walk to the car, casually getting in. She generally didn’t wear any make-up, not even clear lip gloss. It was only about once every month or so that she would make up her face and sit on the front stairs of the restaurant. Sometimes the police would come around and harass her. She’d deny she was prostituting and say” “I’m not doin’ nothin! Why are you always pickin’ on me?”

All the regulars who frequented the McDonald’s knew Muriel was an occasional prostitute and eventually, one of the old-timer patrons warned me about her. “She’s not someone you want to talk to. People judge others by the company they keep,” he told me confidentially. I smiled, trying hard to disguise my contempt. I was in my early 30’s and knew the score, but still his presumption offended me. I already knew Muriel was a prostitute but I saw nothing at all wrong with saying hello to her or acknowledging her in a kind way. And it was none of his business who I spoke to.

Eventually, after we’d smiled at each other a few times, while waiting in line to make our orders, we started to talk. Muriel seemed oddly shy and awkward at first and I could tell she was self-conscious about her bad teeth. Though she was only in her late 30’s, the teeth in her mouth were brown and rotten and it was obvious she was embarrassed. In time, I realized that though Muriel was streetwise, observant, tough and alert, she was also uneducated and struggled with literacy, having few if any marketable job skills.

But Muriel was also childlike, innocent and hopeful and I found that I liked her even more because of that. Her hopefulness had a resilient quality to it that I could only admire. Finally, over time, I asked about her, her name, if she had family, how she paid her rent, where she lived. Muriel seemed flattered that I was interested in her and told me she’d grown up poor, and had a younger sister. “We’re like the same person,” she told me proudly one afternoon. “She’s my best friend.”

I thought back to my own younger sister who had once said the same thing to me: “Its like we’re the same person!” my younger sister had confessed to me one afternoon in 1994 as we sat on a couch in her living room, talking about the old days. Instantly, I understood Muriel’s connection to her younger sister, by virtue of my own complicated love for my own younger sister.

I had seen Muriel with the much shorter dark-haired woman a few months before. The woman looked similar to Muriel and I had wondered at their relationship, guessing they were probably family. They had been quiet and inclusive with each other, shunning any other distractions, as they talked in one of the back booths of the restaurant. The younger sister seemed to be the one in charge and I could tell they were trying to score some heroin by snippets of their conversation that I overheard. Muriel smiled and laughed when she was with her sister and it was clear she acted as her younger sisters protector, due to her much larger size. The younger sister acted as the brains, though, making most of the plans and decisions. The dynamics of their relationship were as distinct as night and day and so was their loyalty to each other. I could tell Muriel would have defended her younger sister with her life if she’d had to.

After Muriel and I had sat together and visited a few times, drinking coffee at the McDonald’s, (usually after I dropped off my daughter to school) she would beam a smile whenever she saw me approaching, as she stood on the front steps of the restaurant in the early morning. Of course, I knew why; I was a decent respectable woman, with a small child I was raising and I thought enough of Muriel to say hello and be kind to her. I treated her like a regular person and not a pariah.

Now, instead of being invisible to all the other patrons, someone respectable was talking to Muriel. It seemed to mean the world to Muriel and she held her head a little higher after we’d talk or sit together, chatting and drinking coffee every couple of weeks. Sometimes her street friends would observe us together curiously, watching and wondering about why we were sitting together. Her pride at sitting and talking with me was touching and sad at the same time. She would beam that smile at me as I walked out the door, smiling and waving back at her. “I’ll see you later, Muriel!” I would always say cheerfully. She would nod her head eagerly and wave, beaming that smile. It was hard not to be touched by Muriel. She was straightforward and honest and didn’t seem to have a mean bone in her body.

In time, I told her my daughter attended the private catholic school nearby, next to St. Mary’s Cathedral and that it was a good school, and I was glad to have her there, except that sometimes the “rich people” could be condescending to me and that could get tiresome. I wanted her to know, I was not one of those people. I was just a regular person. Muriel then told me she had attended a catholic school, too. I leaned forward as she told me this. “Really? What was it like?” I asked her, knowing somehow it wouldn’t be good. She told me: “The rich kids were always so mean to me. My clothes were dirty a lot and the nuns would whip my hands with the stick, when I didn’t do what they…” She lowered her head in embarrassment. I felt instantly sad for Muriel. I could see it all.

To make Muriel feel better, I told her of my own experiences in private catholic school. I told her about how my own family had been “low-income” and how differently we were treated as a result by the Nuns and the principal. She listened intently and nodded her head with an open expression on her face that told me she was amazed and felt a sense of connection with me. This was something we had in common and she wasn’t expecting that. It was clear she felt better after my admission and even surprised that I too had been abused by elitist, neurotic and unkind Catholic Nuns who used their power to commit reprehensible acts, telling me I would “burn in hell” for being late for lunch in the basement cafeteria. That they would abuse, in a myriad of ways, the helpless children from struggling, at-risk families, who needed compassion, protection and guidance the most had always angered me. I told Muriel that most nuns were unhappy and disturbed and that being nuns was all they could hope for. She nodded her head eagerly in agreement.

I felt sad for Muriel. I could see it all, the poverty, the struggle, the unfair treatment, and the loneliness she had experienced as a child. “Some of the kids would pick on me and I’d just start punchin’. I’d just start swingin’. I got sent to the principals office a lot. Then they kicked me out.” I asked what grade she’d been in when that happened. “About forth grade,” she responded blankly. Once again, I felt sad. Expulsion in forth grade. Wow.

Muriel confided that her mother was a chronic alcoholic and that she had married several times. She went on to tell me that “a couple” of her “stepfather’s” had abused her when she became a teen and her mother had chosen not to believe her when she told her of the sexual abuse. Finally, she’d been forced to run away when she was 16. Once again, I could see it all.

She told me she had had a child, a blond blue-eyed daughter named Shelby, a little girl that her mother was raising. “She’s not the best one to be raising her, but who else will? They took her away from me… cause of drugs and stuff…” her voice trailed off. I found the best way to respond to Muriel’s confidences was to look at her with compassion, nod my head and not say much. She knew I would never judge her, because I knew all too well how hard life could be and what solution could I offer her? Her life was already laid out. Nothing I could say or do would change anything for her, and we both knew it.

After about 18 months of seeing Muriel on a regular basis, I stopped seeing her for awhile and wondered where she was. After I’d drop off my daughter to school, I would come to the McDonald’s on 19th avenue for coffee. After a few weeks, I found myself asking a couple of the old timer patrons, “Have you seen Muriel? Do you know how she’s doing?” No one knew but they told me they’d seen her around the neighborhood and that she’d be back. “Muriel always comes back,” one of them scoffed. I looked at the woman coldly and turned on my heel.

A few weeks passed and finally I saw Muriel in her favorite booth, by the window in the back. She had lost weight. I walked up to her with my coffee and four cookies, two for her, two for me. She looked blankly at the cookies and accepted them without comment, taking the white paper envelope and setting it near her cup of coffee. “How have you been Muriel?” I asked quietly. She was silent for a long time as she looked up at me blankly, without emotion. I slowly scooted into the booth, becoming slightly uneasy. She looked at me as if she was wondering who I was and seemed dazed and uncertain, as if she didn’t know me. Then she snapped out of her stupor, seeming to recognize me as her sometime friend and coffee partner.

“My sister died a couple weeks ago,” she told me bluntly in a terse whisper. It seemed it was hard for her to push the words out of her mouth. “We were trying to get some…stuff. Well, you know and I let her go off with a new guy she met. I shouldn’t have let her go. I shoulda said no. I shoulda told her: “you need to come home with me to the room!” but I didn’t. She od’ed and died right there on the bed. I know its cause he gave her too much. He killed her. That fucker killed my sister.”

I felt so sad for Muriel. As I leaned forward, I quietly whispered: “Oh Muriel, I’m so sorry! I’m so sorry!” A part of me wanted to touch her arm, to show her how much I empathized with her but I knew that would have been crossing the line. Muriel was a private person in her way and had I touched her then, as we sat in the booth, I would have crossed an invisible boundary. I stayed on my side of the booth and just looked at her with as much compassion as I could muster. Muriel looked back at me in her empty bereft way and said, “We were like the same person, you know? We grew up together. I always looked after her. We were like the same person. And now she’s gone. Just like that.” I stayed with Muriel for another half an hour listening to her disjointed, melancholy recollections and then she said she had to leave.

As we stood up to gather our purses, I approached her and timidly patted her shoulder, looking up at her. Muriel had the quiet ease and confidence of a tall woman. Nothing rattled her much and she smiled at me in an indulgent way, like a big sister, as I stood there with my hand on her shoulder, trying to gather my thoughts. “She’ll always be with you Muriel, in spirit, you know? She’ll never leave your side,” I said. Muriel looked at me and smiled her sad smile, acknowledging that she knew I was trying to be a comfort to her and that she appreciated it; But I could tell, she wasn’t convinced. Her sister was gone and that was all she knew. I felt my words drifting into the atmosphere, meaning nothing. Muriel smiled at me one last time and then turned and walked out the door.

After that encounter, I stopped seeing Muriel for a long time. Years passed and I didn’t see her. My daughter transferred to a different school and made new friends and we moved on with our lives. Then around 2007, I saw Muriel downtown standing at the crosswalk on 3rd and Burnside Street. There she was, tall and wearing a new, pretty blue dress, which was unusual. I walked up and said, “Hey Muriel, how are you? I haven’t seen you in so long!” She turned and saw me, smiling. She seemed to be the same weight but was strangely bloated. And her face had changed. Where once she had pretty, even features, with a full mouth, now her nose and mouth had that tight, pinched look of a longtime methadone user. She seemed happy, though, almost delirious with happiness and I wondered if much of that was chemically induced.

Muriel told me she was no longer living in Portland but was coming to town to meet her mother at the Alexis Restaurant for dinner. She told me she had an apartment and didn’t have to worry about paying rent because she was on disability now. The Alexis was a nice Greek restaurant on 2nd and West Burnside and a popular local attraction. She seemed genuinely happy as she showed me her new jewel-hued, bright blue dress. “What do you think?” she asked me, turning from side to side to give me a better view. “Its really nice!” I told her standing back and nodding my head. “I hardly ever wear dresses. You know me. Jeans and pull-overs!” she said. I felt happy for Muriel. Her good cheer seemed infectious and genuine. “How’s your daughter?” she asked me, trying to be polite. “She’s good. Growing up, getting bigger” I replied.

Muriel and I talked for a few minutes longer and then she had to say goodbye. She smiled that beaming smile at me, waved and stepped into the street, walking across Burnside. I stood there on the street and didn’t move. I watched her as she crossed the street, disappearing up the stairs, leading up to the Alexis restaurant and I said a short prayer for her, asking God to “keep Muriel safe all the days of her life and comforted in the palm of your hand.” It was good to see her but somehow, I knew I’d never see her again after that, and I never did.

Muriel is someone I cannot forget and will always live on in my mind.

KURT THE SKIRT: The next odd street character I recall and still run into is Kurt. His nickname is “Kurt the Skirt.” I was told this by a thrift shop owner near Yamhill street, who runs a vintage shop. He had come into the shop to look at skirts. And of course, he was wearing one. With his man shirt, man shoes, man socks and man jacket, Kurt was an anomaly. I first started seeing Kurt the Skirt in about 2006. He wore women’s skirts but never seemed interested in going all the way. He was clearly mentally ill, often talked to himself and was constantly on the streets hanging out, though he also seemed too clean and organized to be truly homeless. “What’s up with that guy?” I quietly asked the woman behind the counter as he walked out of the vintage shop, having purchased nothing. She laughed. “Oh, that’s Kurt! Kurt the Skirt!” She and another woman giggled. “He comes in here to buy skirts,” she offered brightly, by way of explanation. Once again they giggled. “He hardly ever buys anything, though.”

We spent the next few minutes wondering why he wore women’s skirts. “I wonder if he lost a bet?” I ventured. The two women giggled again, and I felt guilty pleasure at making fun of Kurt the Skirt. Kurt can often be seen digging through downtown trash cans and sometimes in the hot summer, he will take off his clothes and walk around with his skirt hanging loosely from his hips. One day, his skirt came dangerously close to falling off his hips and part of his penis could be seen, as he stood near City Hall on a hot summer day.

I felt outraged at his hideous nakedness and aware that my anger was “old lady-ish” as my younger sister had once called my style of home interior decoration. But still I was angry, because there were small children walking by and Kurt the Skirt was basically exposing himself, I called the nonemergency number and complained that “some kind of homeless guy wearing a skirt,” was exposing himself and children were nearby. They said they’d get right on it, and as I got on my bus, I hoped they would fine him for his carelessness. Kids didn’t need to see some guy in his late 50’s exposing himself with his limp penis hanging out for all the world to see, for Christ’s sake, I thought.

For over five years, my teen daughter and I saw Kurt the skirt, in his grubby clothing and his every present skirt, usually a floral print or other busy printed fabric that clashed horribly with his other attire.

Then out of the blue, Kurt stopped wearing skirts.

You will find Kurt the Skirt downtown at any given day of the week, in grubby blue jeans or khakis, talking to himself, not bothering anyone, digging around in trash cans, loitering and wearing pants. The mystery of Kurt the Skirt continues and I have yet to solve it. Perhaps he really did lose a bet.

LAURIE: The first time I saw Laurie was about 2004, spare-changing in downtown Portland. Laurie is a short, heavy white woman who resembles Charles Laughton to an incredible and memorable degree. She has reddish hair, shoulder length, sparse and thin, with a square face, small eyes and a large, loose mouth. Laurie still hangs around downtown Portland but now I’ve noticed she’s in an electric wheelchair and gets around that way, having lost the ability to walk.

Laurie begged for years near City Hall, with a sign that said she was looking for a room for the night, or was in the process of “getting housing.” Many of her signs read, “Moving to an Apartment in a week. Need deposit money.” Only she never seemed to move into the mysterious apartment. Her need for “deposit money” went on for years and years. I gave her spare change when I could but eventually I stopped giving her money when it became clear she was simply conning people. What she really wanted was money so she could buy booze. I first saw Laurie when she was not particularly overweight, but in time she began to pack on the pounds and became extremely overweight, with a bloated unhealthy look to her body and face.

As the years went by, Laurie began to exhibit the distinct walk of a chronic alcoholic. Because of her years of alcohol addiction, Laurie suffers from acute Wernicke’s Encephalopathy, or “Ataxia.” This is a pathological deficiency of thiamine or what’s commonly referred to as vitamin B1. The condition manifests itself in an “unsteady stance and gait,” which is due to permanent damage to the cerebellum from alcohol abuse and addiction. The alcohol abuse depletes the brain of essential co-enzymes needed to help with motor functions. Ataxia shows itself in how the person walks. They lift up the front of the feet and place them down toe to heel, in an awkward and very distinctive fashion. Their walk is noted for its lurching quality and unfortunately, this condition is permanent and irreversible. This is also commonly called “the drunk walk” by doctors, nurses and police.

For a few years, I stopped giving money to Laurie, because I would not encourage her addiction to booze. During this time, I began to see how her face was changing, as happens with so many homeless street people. She went from a woman relatively my own age to looking as if she’d aged thirty years or more in just a matter of months. Her face became red and bloated, with rough coarse skin and then of course, she slowly lost all of her teeth. She became more and more angry, sarcastic and insincere, scowling and leering at people who didn’t give her money when she asked.

Eventually, Laurie started hanging out near the McDonald’s on Main street, in downtown Portland and begging for money, “for food.” I hadn’t given Laurie money in years, but one day, I took pity on her and gave her a couple of dollars. After that, when she asked me for money, I offered to buy her food, which she generally accepted. Finally, I asked what her name was. “Laurie,” she told me. Now she had a name and when I’d pass her, I’d say, “Hello Laurie!” She’d smile and wave, giving me the “Oh, its you” smile. A reluctant, semi-hostile acknowledgement of me, like a resentful sister.

Bottom line, Laurie was smart. She knew that I knew she was a con and I wasn’t going to fall for it anymore. I would give her money once in a while but only if I could spare to part with it, which was not often. Once as she was waiting outside the McDonald’s I asked if she wanted some coffee and their two-cookies-for-a-dollar-deal. She said, “Sure!” brightly and happily, but when I came out, she had gone. Someone had probably given her some money and she was off to find another bottle. I chuckled, went back inside and drank the coffee and ate the cookies while I studied for a class.

The last time I saw Laurie, she was begging at the PSU Farmer’s market. This was sometime in early 2014. She was holding up a sign, claiming, “Needs deposit money for a new apartment.” It made me smile to see that her old con had not changed over the years. That apartment sure was taking a long time to get.

Tears were streaming down Laurie’s cheeks and she was shuffling from foot to foot, wringing her hands in grief, blubbering and snorting. She held up an old, tattered cardboard sign, begging for money for that elusive apartment she was always searching for. But no one was giving her money. No one was falling for it. She’d look around, to see if anyone was noticing her and stop crying for a few seconds, or to wipe her nose. Then she’d get into character and start weeping again, with renewed vigor. A performance worthy of a Hollywood Oscar, but for her tell-tale pauses, to look around and access the people around, hoping to catch an eye.

I walked by with my husband, keeping my head down, as Laurie stood to our left. I didn’t want her to see me. She would have been embarrassed and perhaps even angry if she saw me, and I knew it. Because there were so many people around, it was easy for me to hide among them. As I walked by, I remember feeling mesmerized at her ability to weep on cue. It was such an obvious con that a part of me admired her. She was shameless, relentless and would probably do anything to get a bottle. I felt sure that at one time, she’d probably been arrested for prostitution and any number of other petty crimes. However, Laurie’s days of being attractive to most men were long gone. Laurie was without a doubt one of the most unattractive women I’ve ever seen in my life. She was also a character and an Oscar winning actress who perhaps in another life, could have been a Kathy Bates of sorts.

Laurie is also someone I cannot forget.

The Mentally ill Jesus Men: There are two of them. They walk with sleeping bags or blankets billowing behind them, looking almost like robes Jesus might have worn. They are thin, relatively tall white men in their forties. They have beards and they both remind me of Jesus. One of them reminds me of my mentally ill older brother, Bernard.

And they walk. They walk all over the city, as if they have some kind of hidden agenda, as if they have a destination they will never arrive at. They are always walking with purpose, with dedication, with constancy.

One of them troubled me consistently. For the purposes of this essay, I’ll call this man Howard. Howard was profoundly mentally ill and reminded me of my schizophrenic older brother Bernard. Howard was blond and thin, with a jaundiced color and quite skittish. He stood about six feet tall and probably weighed 170 pounds. He carried his belongings with him in a tattered bag, always in a nervous way, looking over his shoulder. His jeans often looked as if they might fall off his hips and he was always under-clothed in the cold winter weather. Howard seemed to live in a constant state of fear and my heart ached for him every time I saw him. I thought to myself: “There but for the grace of God goes Bernard, my brother.” He was so alone in the world and every time I saw him, I thought how he should be in an institution somewhere. Anywhere but on the mean streets of downtown Portland. Surely, someone could take care of Howard?

When Howard saw me those first few times, on fifth Avenue, he was too shy to ask for money, so I stood still and just looked at him and smiled, knowing that if I did, he might approach. He walked up tentatively and in a tiny whisper asked me, “Can you help me with a little money?” I gladly pulled out four dollars and handed it to him with the gentle deliberateness extended to a wild baby deer. He approached fearfully, took the money, smiled his appreciation and ambled off.

Now, my guilt at his lonely existence could be assuaged for a time. Now, he could walk to the McDonald’s on Main street, where he could loiter for a few hours, eat a burger, drink some hot coffee and have some peace and maybe a little warmth for a while. I stopped seeing Howard a couple of years ago.

The last time I saw him, he was on the bus mall, in late 2012. My husband Don and I passed by and Howard saw me. He remembered me. I was the nice woman who gave him money sometimes and made him feel okay about it. He approached and offered his humble, quiet request. My husband, not knowing said, “I’m sorry, I can’t help you.” I then turned to my husband Don, as we took a couple of steps forward and said, “Hold on a minute, Don. I know him.” I turned and walked toward Howard and pulled a five dollar bill out of my wallet, handing it to him with a small smile. He smiled back and I knew he was genuinely grateful. He always gave me direct eye contact and if eyes could smile, Howard’s eyes smiled, in a sad, knowing, haunted way. I never saw Howard again.

Howard is also someone I cannot forget.

The other Jesus man puts on airs. I still see him around. He’s a totally different character and every time I’ve seen him, he was walking. His feet are often swollen and must be painful, but he continues to walk, always walking forward. He also wraps himself in blankets that billow around him like the trains of a long and beautiful gown, but I’ve never seen him ask anyone for money.

Once when I saw him ambling by in the park blocks near SW Jefferson street, he passed me and stopped for a moment. I was reaching in my bag for my cell phone when I noticed him. He’d never asked me for money and I thought it was strange. He was clearly mentally ill; that I knew. As he stood there scratching his thin belly, reddened with bites, I also knew he was more than likely infested with various parasites. As a result, I kept my distance, but I thought I’d make it easy for him and so I asked him: “Do you need any money? For some food?” He looked at me, then looked up at the sky thinking about my question for a moment. He made me wait. With the timing of a Shakespearean actor and with utter seriousness he said; “No, I’m fine right now. I don’t need any money.” He then ambled off without a word. I smiled and chuckled to myself. You just never could tell with the homeless or the mentally ill, what they might say or what they might do.

He too, is someone I cannot forget.

Christopher Robin Peraza: I first saw Christopher Robin Peraza about three weeks before he was murdered August 24th, 2000 by his mother’s boyfriend, Robert Keith McCann, aged 27. I had gone to the St Vincent DePaul’s charity, on 27th and SE Powell Street, for assistance with an overdue electric bill that I was having a hard time paying. As I sat in the waiting room of the cramped back office I saw a tall, thin, blond woman walk into the room with a small toddler trailing behind. Christopher Robin was only three-years-old at the time. He was an active, happy toddler who appeared to be a biracial, Mexican/Caucasian child. The woman was followed by a tall, very handsome white man, also with light blond hair.

They seemed an odd couple for the simple reason that the man, Robert Keith McCann was so handsome some might call him pretty and the woman, who appeared a bit younger, was painfully horse-faced and unattractive. She had a prominent jaw and very large teeth that protruded from her mouth. Her teeth were so large, she couldn’t properly close her mouth. But she did have a lovely willowy figure and beautiful wavy naturally blond hair, as she stood there in her tank-top and cutoff shorts.

They had an appointment and I watched as they walked to the locked window to ask for help. They wanted a stroller, so it would be easier to get around with the small boy. They were homeless and the middle-aged woman behind the counter had seen them before. She scolded them for being homeless yet again. “You know that child deserves better than this. How many times have you been homeless Beriane?” the woman asked the young mother accusingly. Beriane Vidal said nothing, but the young man bristled. “We know that Ma’am!” McCann said tersely. “We’re doing the best we can!” he added quietly.

“Where are you living this time?” the social worker demanded of the mother sarcastically. “We’re living in a tent in my father’s backyard,” Beriane responded, embarrassed. “In a tent? Why is that?” the caseworker asked. “Well, my Dad won’t let us come in the house. He says I steal, but I don’t do that no more,” Beriane protested. The caseworker clicked her tongue in disapproval, turned around and went to look for the stroller. For the next ten minutes, Robert Keith McCann and Beriane Vidal sat on the dirty floor in the corner making out. He reached for her groin and started to probe, trying to get his hand inside her jeans. She giggled and said, “Wait, we can do that later, I promise.” There was a lot of heavy breathing and panting. I sighed and turned away. It was as if I wasn’t even there, and I found their blatant groping and loud kissing tedious. It was then that the little boy began fussing. He came over and wanted his mother’s attention. She cooed at him, trying to get him to calm down.

Robert McCann was instantly dismissed as Beriane Vidal tried to care for her small son. McCann got up and walked to the window. He was angry. I watched him turn around and focus on the small boy. He glared with complete hatred at the small three-year-old, now being coddled in the lap of his mother. The expression was such a concentrated hatred that it contorted the young man’s otherwise handsome face. It was odd and I felt an instant unease for the child. I wondered what might happen to him if this man, who clearly was not his father, hated him this much. I silently said a prayer in my mind, to St. Francis, asking that he might look after this poor child, hoping that maybe somehow my prayer would be answered. It was not. My prayer accomplished nothing.

About three weeks later, I saw the TV news announcing the boy’s disappearance. He went missing for 16 days, before he was found, in the hottest part of August. Instantly I remembered the trio’s faces and their names.

Who could forget the little boy who’s mother had named him Christopher Robin?

On the day of August 24th, 2000, Robert Keith McCann slipped into the tent where Beriane Vidal and Christopher Robin Peraza were sleeping and silently lifted the boy up, carrying him away. He walked with Christopher Robin on his hip to a nearby abandoned house in Gresham and then proceeded to torture him for over two hours. He was drunk and angry. He believed that the boy “interfered in the relationship with the boy’s mother,” as later reported by the Portland police. By the time Christopher Robin was deceased he had been “slapped, beaten on his head and face, burned with a cigarette, cut with glass, strangled with a belt and thrown down a flight of stairs.” When his little body was found, it was horribly decomposed and battered. A woman who had called PPB repeatedly, to tell them of an abandoned house in the area that they should look at was ignored. She called several times to tell them of the vacant house where homeless people were seen coming and going, but the police did not take her seriously. In the end, the house the woman had told the police about was in fact where his broken body was found. His funeral at that time had to be closed casket.

Thinking back to only a few weeks before I wondered why and for what purpose I had been there. Why had I been there to see this beautiful little child, only to find out later he would die in the most horrible way possible. I thought of Christopher Robin Peraza for months following his death and my heart ached for him and for his mother Beriane Vidal.

Christopher Robin Peraza is someone I cannot forget.

Kyron Horman: When I first heard the news of Kyron Horman’s disappearance June 4th of 2010, it took me a couple of days before I recognized the father, Kaine Horman and it clicked in my mind that he was the man my daughter and I had seen in the Plaid Pantry near SW 87th and Canyon Road about eight weeks prior. Kaine’s prominent nose and shaved head were what reminded me. As I have an exceptional memory for faces, as soon as I saw Kaine Horman on the Television screen I instantly remembered him. After Kyron Horman’s disappearance, I came to learn that Kaine and Kryon had lived nearby, a couple of miles away in SW Portland.

Only weeks before the boy went missing, Kaine had taken his son to the nearby Plaid Pantry on 89th and Canyon Road in SW Portland, two blocks from our home. My daughter and I had walked into the store around dusk to see a father with his young son. Kyron was a small boy and he wore very thick glasses. He was so sight disadvantaged that even with the glasses on, he kept bumping into things in the aisles He walked by me several times, not seeing me and bumping into candy and potato chip aisles. He was wandering around when his father, who was near the counter, called patiently: “Come on Kyron, come on, son.” I remember thinking, what an odd name Kyron was, and as my daughter and I had already gotten our things, we were approaching the counter to pay.

Kaine Horman stepped aside to let us go first, but I said: “Oh that’s okay, you go ahead.” Kaine Horman smiled and said, “Are you sure?” I remember he seemed tired and sad. I laughed and said: “Yeah, you go ahead, you’ve got your little boy to deal with.” Kryon was still over near the Twinkie aisle and Kaine had to call to him again. That was when my daughter and I once again noticed how patient he was. Kaine Horman seemed like a very good father. We noticed it instantly, with his gentle approach and the kind timbre of his voice. “Come on Kyron, we need to get going now,” Kaine called once again. That was when my daughter and I looked at each other. Our eyes locked, and we smiled.

Kaine Horman seemed like the best kind of father. Patient and kind. Kaine’s love for his son Kyron was so apparent that my daughter and I exchanged the: “Awww he’s a good Dad,” look, that women sometimes give each other when they see a really good father being patient and kind. Kaine Horman bought his purchases and took his son’s hand and they walked out and got into a large SUV and drove away. Several weeks later, I heard on the news that Kyron Horman had not come home from school. I knew the school was close by but it was not until I saw Kaine Horman that I realized that these were the same people my daughter and I had seen in the Plaid Pantry on 89th and Canyon Road only a few weeks before. After more than ten years missing, Kyron Horman’s whereabouts remain unknown and he is presumed dead.

Kyron Hormon is someone I cannot forget.

The Teen-aged Indian Girl: Of all the people I cannot forget, the little teen-aged Indian girl bothers me the most. Why? Because I might have been able to help her and I feel that I didn’t try hard enough. For the purposes of this essay, I will call this Native American girl, Susie.

I first began seeing Susie when my daughter was about 10-years-old, in 2002. Susie was15-years-old at the time, though maybe even younger than that. She wore a long beige felt coat with the back hem falling out and seemed to favor light colored clothing, like tan, beige and white. I saw Susie for several years, on and off. She always walked with her head very high and I could tell, she tried with her appearance.

The first time I saw her, she was walking very quickly, in her tattered clothes and coat. She had long dark hair and light skin, which was clean and smooth and devoid of any cosmetics. She appeared to be a Native American and white biracial girl and she was very pretty, in a chubby-cheeked and childlike sort of way. But Susie had a way of looking from side to side, as she was walking, as if she was frightened. Her fearful attitude told me let that she was probably homeless. I often saw her downtown and she was always in a hurry. At the crosswalks on Broadway or near Burnside street, I would see her as she hurriedly walked across, often with her arms crossed defensively in front of her. On more than one occasion, I tried to catch her eye. The mother in me was distressed by Susie’s situation and I wanted so much to help her. Something just told me she was homeless.

I knew Susie was alone, afraid and only a child. But Susie would never look at me. I once said “hello” as I walked with my daughter to our bus stop, but Susie ignored me, or perhaps she just didn’t hear. I wondered about Susie and thought of her regularly, saying prayers for her sometimes, wondering if prayer even makes a difference and remembering all the prayers I had said in the silence of my mind which seemed to make no difference at all. Does God exist, I wondered? I wanted to believe in the saints and in Angels, but would any of us ever know the answers to these questions?

I knew I should try to at least speak with Susie, but I was often so busy with my own life and obligations, that I didn’t make that extra effort. I hoped she would be okay and since she never seemed to want to connect, or even look at me, I didn’t push it. There were many times when I could have reached out, when I could have made that extra effort to be heard by her, when I could have directed her to services or perhaps just been a friend to her, given her advice, counsel or simply been someone who would listen, inviting her to coffee in a café or lunch.

Over the next 18 months I continued to see Susie hurrying from place to place in downtown Portland. I noticed that her felt coat became more and more tattered and ragged. She lost weight and her rapid-fire walk slowed to a considerable degree. Now she meandered. Then I stopped seeing her for over a year. She, like so many people I’d seen before in Portland, just seemed to fall off the face of the earth, as if disappearing into a mist, falling into the darkness of a cold, hard city, unclaimed and unwanted.

To be sure, Susie reminded me of the Indian girls I’d grown up with in NW Portland in the early 1970’s. She reminded me of the Indian girls who’s parents were alcoholics and who beat them — but children who still offered me a smile and friendship when we were young enough, resilient enough and deluded enough to pretend that bad things weren’t really that bad, even when they were.

After I had stopped seeing Susie for almost 18 months, one afternoon I was walking north on Broadway and I saw Susie looking out one of the windows of the Stewart Hotel, which was above Mary’s “All Nude Revue” Club, a strip joint near Burnside Street. I was stunned to see her, casually looking out one of the windows that face east, the second to the corner window, on the top floor, the third floor of the building, above a mini-mart store simply advertised as MARKET.

I was walking North on Broadway heading to the Powell’s Bookstore when I saw Susie leaning out the window. The window opened up fully and the flat of her palms resting on the windowsill as she gazed out, presumably either sitting on a chair or perhaps on her knees, as she looked out the window. Susie’s face was much thinner as she gazed out the second top floor window with a blank, expressionless look on her face. I had never once seen Susie smile. Not once. She was probably about 17 or 18 at this point. I walked slowly, and continued to look at her, still stunned to see her living in one of the shabby, pest infested rooms of the Stewart Hotel. Finally, I had to look away and I continued to my bus stop and tried to forget the image of Susie with her hands resting on the sill of the open window, leaning forward and looking out blankly toward the Eastern sky as if the sky held the answer to a mystery, her face so empty of emotion, hope or any form of life.

A few weeks later, as circumstance would have it, I was headed to the Powell’s bookstore once again to buy a college textbook that I needed for a class. I hurried North trying to get to Burnside. As I looked West, I saw Susie standing in the front doorway of the Stewart Hotel. The long flight of stairs was visible behind her and made me think of a dark pit, into which she had fallen. I knew about the Stewart. I knew the kinds of people who lived there and I knew what they did.

Susie was made up in a garish makeup which was all wrong for her coloring and her racial background. With red-brown lipstick, garish green frost eye shadow and a foundation make-up that was far too light for her skin she looked like a child, playing with her mother’s cosmetics. Susie had lost at least 25 pounds and was now thin and gaunt. Her jeans hung on her slender legs loosely.

In an instant I knew that the city of Portland had consumed little Susie. She was now a prostitute and a drug addict.

I walked by, with my heart sinking and a lump forming in my throat. I felt culpable and complicit in what had happened to Susie. I turned around, to gaze at her again and as I continued walking, I couldn’t help but notice just how Susie’s face had changed. Once again, though I was within feet of her, she didn’t look at me. I don’t know if Susie had ever at any time known I was ever there. In all the times I’d run into her, she had never looked at me. Not once. She had always looked beyond me or through me, but never at me.

Susie now had a look of anger and hostility on her face. Her mouth was fixed in a gentle curling snarl. Her eyes glared with hatred as she looked out into the street. A young white man in a business suit walked by her and she spoke to him quietly, beckoning him over, her voice faint and indistinct, dying quickly in the wind. He continued walking and didn’t respond. She was a prostitute and a drug addict now. Without any doubt I knew that and the reality of it felt crushing to me.

My throat felt tight and I bit my inner cheek. I would wait till I got home. I would contain my sorrow that Susie had been consumed by the flames of the city of Portland until later. I would put it aside and try not to think about all the people in her life and all their ill will, bad intentions, selfishness and lack of compassion. I would try not to think how they were all complicit in her destruction. I would wait to let the hot grief of her life spill out of me until I was home and safely alone.

Later, after my day was done, when my husband and daughter were both asleep, I walked into the empty living room and sat on the wheat colored sofa. I leaned back and sighed. I was exhausted, but I could feel the pain rising up.

The door to the balcony was open and a chill wind blew in. It was late September and just starting to get cold. Fall was on its way. I leaned forward, rested my elbows on my knees, hung my head tiredly and slowly and silently began choking out bitter tears for Susie.

I wept for the little nameless Indian girl I should have reached out to, but didn’t. When she was first homeless. When she was first on the streets. When she might have been helped. Before she was corrupted by the parasites of the city of Portland. Before she was taken in by those people who would only see her youth and even-featured beauty as a commodity to use to their advantage or as something that might satisfy their base appetites and despicable selfish desires.

I wept for Susie and how I had allowed her to be consumed by the fires of this world. I wept in shame until my head ached and my heart felt like it was breaking.

Susie is someone I cannot forget.

* This essay represents only a fraction of the street people I’ve known in my life, and concentrates on those people who for one reason or another truly captured my interest. If you would like to help the homeless in Portland, you may contact people with The Portland Rescue Mission and donate money, food or clothing or your time. Everyone deserves a second chance and this is a good way to help those who need it most.

By Theresa Griffin-Kennedy

Theresa Griffin-Kennedy: I am freelance writer of creative nonfiction, a poet, fiction writer, history writer and contributing columnist for The online Portland Alliance Newspaper, the news website GoLocalPDX and the literary online magazine Live Encounters. I have been published in Pathos Literary Review, Street Roots Newspaper, and with Portland Monthly Magazine. I’m a social activist fighting for social change through writing as a social act. I paint abstract with mixed media and volunteer as a writing coach. I am the author of a book of poetry, Blue Reverie in Smoke: Collected Poetry: 2001–2016, and a book of short stories Burnside Field Lizard and Selected Stories, which was a finalist for the 2019 Next Generation Indie book award for Regional Fiction. both published through the Indie publishing company, Oregon Greystone Press. In 2021 my first novel will be published, Talionic Night in Portland: A Love Story, also by Oregon Greystone press, and The Lost Restaurants of Portland, published by The History Press. Learn more.

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THIS INTIMATE PERSONAL ESSAY, COPYRIGHT 2014, MAY BE REPRODUCED OR DISSEMINATED ONLY FOR ACADEMIC USE IN A CLASSROOM SETTING, PERMITTED UP TO AND INCLUDING WEB BASED OR ENHANCED CLASSES WITH APPROPRIATE ATTRIBUTION GIVEN TO THE AUTHOR THERESA GRIFFIN KENNEDY.