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I’m walking down Jefferson Blvd. near South Central and this homeless guy walks up to me.
“Hey young blood, check this out.”
I reach in my back pocket for some change as I say:
“Yeah, what’s that.”
“You think the world’s divided in half?”
“Physically or philosophically or… or what, what do you mean? It’s divisible in half physically, yeah.”
“Check this out.”
“Okay.”
“People say the world's divided in half, there [are] Elvis people and Beatles people, right?”
I keep looking at him.
“Right?” he asks again.
“Uh-huh, yeah.”
“Okay, people say the world divided in half, there the have and the have-not, right?”
“Uh-huh.”
“People say there pinball people and video game people.”
“Yeah.”
“Check this out, all there is, the half of the world, the way it’s divided in half. It ain’t no Elvis and Beatles, it ain’t have and have-not, it ain’t pinball and video games. Well… maybe it pinball and video games. Ha ha ha ha ha. You know what I'm sayin'?”
"Yeah."
He points at me and a big smile leads into:
"Pinball, right?"
"Right."
"Ha ha ha, I knew it. Me too. Ha ha ha..."
He keeps laughing, then:
“But serious, here it is: there’s the half of the world in front of me and there’s the half behind me.”
He uses both arms to display the air in front of him:
“In front of me…”
He half turns and uses his arms to present the air behind him:
“…and behind me.”
He smiles at me.
“Ya see that?”
“I think so,” I nod.
“I think you do.”
He holds up one index finger to emphasize:
“I used to have a car before it got stolen.”
He smiles again.
“Here you go, man,” as I had him some change.
“Thank you, good, good, very nice.”
I walk about a quarter of a block and turn around just in time to see him toss the change into a planter box in front of the B of A.
Originally Printed 4/13/05
Fire Off A Comment


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J.J. Oblivian Los Angeles, CA Age: 27 I'm in a gang called California.

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