The California Bum

There was a homeless man who routinely slept at the bus stop near our home. He had a good spot. It was a building with a sheltered corner stoop. His area was a full 6 or 8 feet across, so he had room to stretch out if he wanted to. He had wild grey hair and a bushy grey beard. He always wore a military green overcoat, slacks and tennis shoes. He had a small bag with him at all times. He used it as a pillow, and I guess it held his spare clothes. The stench coming off of him was terrible. I never understood how someone could appear so content with such filth all over him. About once a month he'd catch a shower someplace. We could tell because his beard would be clean and he wouldn't stink for a while. Every morning he'd be over at the food trucks, scavenging expired edibles; and every night he'd be sleeping at the corner bus stop. Everyone called him the California Bum, and he had been a fixture in the neighborhood for more than 20 years.

He was one of the "safe" homeless, meaning he wouldn't talk to himself or attack anybody. He never did anything perverted, unlike some of the other bums in the area. I never saw neither alcohol nor drugs around him. He seemed sane and capable of working. It was a mystery as to why he was homeless.

Every once in a blue moon, my sister and I would make some toast with peanut butter and take it to him. We'd get up really early on a Saturday morning and sneak down to the bus stop with our gift wrapped in a paper towel. Feeding the bum was scary and exciting. We weren't suposed to go anywhere near the homeless, they were dangerous. We also didn't want anyone to see us. Being nice to a neighbor was fine, being nice to a bum marked you as a sucker. Getting caught would have opened us to all kinds of victimization from our neighbors. Yet another one of those unwritten rules we had to live by.

We fed him anyway. It was a way of thumbing our noses at the neighborhood. The California Bum was our local landmark, and we didn't want him to move away. As long as he was around, no other homeless person could sleep on his corner. It was important to keep a pervert-free space nearby.

I don't know how well I can convey the value the California Bum held for the neighborhood. We were proud of him. He was something that made us unique. Half the South Side knew about the California Bum. I had friends spend the night just so they could look at him. It was one of those things you'd treasure. "I saw the California Bum... I saw where he sleeps!" Had a lot more power than, "I saw him on the bus... he sat near me."

He disappeared for a month or so in '85. We were worried that our bum had died. A scraggly woman took over his spot, and she would scream at you if you got too close to her. She didn't mooch food at the trucks, she just kind of set up housekeeping at the sheltered corner. She rarely left it and her trash would spill out onto the sidewalk. Everybody resented her. That place belonged to the California Bum and no one else. She was an evil encroacher with no right to be there. The kids would fling trash at her, just to get her going. She'd yell and scream and threaten, but she wouldn't leave the corner. It made it easy for the neighborhood kids to victimize her.

I don't know how our bum got his spot back, but one morning he was sleeping out there again like nothing had happened. I wish I had been awake to see him kicking her off his turf.