Hiding in plain view

Tuesday December 17, 2013 1038

            At work yesterday I went into a very familiar patient’s home to find an occupational therapist visiting the patient already, so I sat back to wait my turn.  I was not in the home more than ten minutes when the physical therapist showed up. 

            “Come on back to the party. Did you bring a dish to pass?” yelled the patient when she knocked on the door.  So now in a small room we all gathered.  It was the patient (an elderly woman), her caregiver, and three professionals talking in the room about the lottery.  There was joking, laughing and dreaming.

            “If I won 580 million dollars I would donate a good portion of the profits to the real homeless people.”  The therapist spoke up.

            “As opposed to the fake homeless?”  I said to hide the words that were forming in the back of my throat.

            “Yes, those that are trying, but just need help.”  I do not know what the rest of the conversation entailed.  I simply wondered if she even saw me.  I am the invisible hiding in plain view. 

            Is it because I hold down a job?  Is it because I maintain clean clothes?  I try to maintain wrinkle free uniforms, but lets face it when I had a house I couldn’t pull that off.  Is it because I have an education?  It is because I drive a decent car?  How am I supposed to act so I can be seen?

            When this adventure began The Goat Man and I were told that we could not go into a shelter together because they do not take couples at all! Anywhere!  They had a shelter spot for him, but because I had no small children to look after I would have to remain on the streets. 

            I thank The Goat Man with all of my heart that he chose to stay with me.  He was there to hold me last winter in 22 degree snowy weather.  I held down a job then too.  I held down a job through chemotherapy because I didn’t have a choice.  Those that I had counted on to spend their lives with me had left me.  But The Goat Man held me to keep me warm and spent the last few dollars he had to feed me.  He took care of me when nobody else would.

            A book signing for The Unconventional Dwarf took place last weekend at Sci-Fi City in Orlando.  It was a moment of success for me.  I am not a person that gets very excited about much.  I feel satisfaction when I get an A in a course.  I had my own private moment alone in the bathroom each time a diploma came in the mail.  I have never walked in a formal graduation.  I keep trudging along and no one seems to notice.  The book signing was no exception.

A photo of the Thalassic Dwarf.
I believe another contributing author,
Malcolm is the artist.

            Always the square peg trying to be crammed into the round hole I made a weekend for me to celebrate and everything went wrong.   My hand did not grow tired signing books, the interview left me with no answers, and photos marking the event on Facebook and twitter do not show my presence.  It is a monumental moment in my life, my career as a writer, and my dreams and I am invisible hiding in plain view.

            Because I am not a member of some fantasy community or play fantasy games is my writing less valid?  Does my writing achieve something different than the rest of the contributing authors?  Are my dwarves less because a middle-aged nurse developed them?  If I looked more like a typical nerd would I fit in?

            The Unconventional is a term about breaking free from the molds of society and becoming individuals and independent beings sharing the same space.  Is it possible that I am not a gamer because I didn’t fit the mold when I was younger?  That I was perceived to fit into a different mold and despite my rebellious nature this square peg fell through that round hole?

            I walk through this world watching it with a perspective of the invisible.  I see humor.  I see signs of our cultures demise. And I see scary things.  I see people when they do not know they are not alone.

            The other day sitting in the YMCA watching some TV on the Internet (because we no longer have a place to watch TV the old fashion way.) A man at a table next to us answered his cell phone, talked for a minute, and then looked at The Goat Man, holding his phone out, and said, “They want my credit card.  Do you have a credit card I can use?”

            The Goat Man and I had a big night out on Friday before the book signing.  We went to a very small bar in a very small town, ate a really good burger, and watched the elderly karaoke.  It was like a four-hour extension of the scene in The Wedding Singer where the elderly lady began to rap.

            And today, we watched a man (I would call him a boy, but I think he looked that young because I am getting that old.) come into the room with an attitude with his body language, his actions (he grabbed a chair with his foot and loudly pulled it away from the row before sitting down.) and with his words.  He said he did not want to work, but the manager came with an apology and sent him to work anyway.  The room was full of at least two-dozen able bodied and willing men waiting for work.  What is wrong with our culture?