Bye Simone, Love you Simone.

He never spoke a word to me, in fact it was widely recognized that he didn't speak to me...most the kids on the facility knew he didn't talk to me and I had acted like it was no big deal. In my presence he spoke about how he hated white women, how he thought they were arrogant, spoiled, and only liked to spend time with people of their own kind. He never said it directly to me, but it was clear every time I was around...I was the audience he was speaking of. If I ever aimed a comment at him like "Hello", or "Hey, how are you?" it was met with a blank stare and a look away...I was clearly talking to a brick wall and my gestures were all met with failure.

Photo By Allen Wyler

I wouldn't be being honest if I said it didn't bother me at all, although I smiled and for the most part let the comments roll over me or through me, or whatever the hell you are supposed to do when someone hates you and pretends you don't exist all at the same time. Plainly, it sucks...to feel that anything you do or say, or simply your very way of being is not enough.

I was leaving the facility the other day and starting walking out the door after my round of good byes and heard someone say "Bye Simone, Love you Simone." I didn't think too much of it, as the "I love you's" have gotten more frequent in my time at the facility....but my heart still gets a bit twitterpated when I hear it. I turned around to see what young gentleman I should bestow a smile and a wave at as I headed out the door. I looked around, and there he was...the silent serpent that had spewed nothing but venom towards me for six months. I tried not to trip over my own foot when I turned around, or make a big deal, or say "I love you" back, or "thank you..." Which I've learned is even worse...as one kid once told me smilingly "dat's coold Simone, dat's cold." It was a frozen moment where I caught a beautiful wild leopard peacefully drinking water from a still pond, and didn't want to spook it as it might run away...or attack me. So I swallowed, nodded and smiled and then went out the door.

"Bye Simone, Love you Simone." The words rolled around in my head like marbles as I left...the first words he had ever spoke to me in six months. It was shocking for two reasons, one: that he noticed I was leaving...noticed my presence, and that it had some how impacted his life enough to say good bye to me when I left. The other was that he loved me. In what way, in what time, on what planet had he come to love me? Obviously it was a planet I did not understand in the slightest, but I'll take it I said to myself. I will take that damn love...and know that everyone comes to trust, love, and grow in their own time, and it's perfect. It's all gloriously perfect.