At MP, he handed me this note the Wednesday after our conversation.
Isabella (Bella) — Hi…
🙂 Hoping that my letter will surely find you in the best of spirits…
I deeply enjoyed the bit of time we shared together. I’m really looking forward to spending more precious moments with u. I didn’t make breakfast @ Mission Possible Monday. I spent it @ The Angel House. I refreshed with a cool shower and coffee and glazed-doughnut. mmm—good! I thought about U alot!!! Mostly our fascinating conversation. I am, convinced beyond a shadow- of a doubt incessantly, and physically attracted to U… I want to let you know. Consider me your Hero!
Next time we meet I want to look you in your beautiful eyes and give you a hug, a big–tight hug.
Most of all… I want to conversate with you, you have alot that I want to learn from you. And hope that a truly great relationship can aspire between us, you and me.
I would love to call you – Bella – like Bella in *Twilight*— and I want to keep it like I’m the only one who calls you Bella.
I can’t wait to see you!!!
Again.smile,
🙂
&really miss you!Sincerely,
-Ramiro-
First, want to make it clear that I immediately handed this over to the Mission Possible staff, and they’re going to find him and talk to him. I’m safe! But a bit indignant.
I’ve been going to Mission Possible and CUB for months and talked with dozens of homeless people, and this is the first time something like this has happened. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. I should have gotten a hint when, after I took his picture, he asked me, “Do you think I’m cute?”
Mike told me from day one to be careful, not because homeless men are crazy, but because of the fact of my gender and youth, and I’m showing deep attention to people who rarely get a “hello.”
Still. Still, I was disgusted. This was so wrong. So wrong on so many different levels. What actually bothered me most was the way he tried to claim my nickname. Many people I know and love call me “Bella,” and no one—especially a man I met and talked with for exactly sixty minutes of my life—could take that from me. I never even gave him permission to call me by that name, let alone be the only one in my life who can use it.
Of course, I was bothered by the fact the he’d “thought about [me] alot,” but this is where it gets a bit tricky. I assumed that he’d thought about me in whatever sick way pedophiles might—might be an extreme assumption, but hey, an old dude I’ve met once pronounces himself ‘incessantly and physically attracted’ to me, when I gave absolutely no reason for him to feel so. Meaning, I was wearing loose-fitting jeans and a practically skiing-size jacket, no makeup, no attempts at beautification. I mean, why would I, when literally going under a bridge to serve homeless people?
Anyway, back to his thoughts. Maybe this is why thinking hateful thoughts amounts to murdering someone, and thinking lustful thoughts amounts to committing adultery. I likely overreacted, but I felt dirty. Let’s not get myself raped. Or anywhere near a ‘big, tight hug.’
It made me uncomfortable that someone was thinking about me, considering my eyes and being, unceasingly: when my thoughts hadn’t twitched his direction in days.
But here’s the flip side—I never realized that when I talk to a homeless person, and they’ve shared their life stories, regrets, hurts, and hopes with me, they’ve reasonably handed me a bleeding piece of themselves. Sometimes their thoughts will linger with me (usually not inappropriately), because while I’m freaking out about my next APUSH test or doing pliés at ballet, they’re finding a field to sleep in, or being beaten up, or eating a lonely donut at Mission Possible. And they’ll think about the girl they told everything to, and ponder the everything of their lives themselves. People have told me this—I’m not making it up: for one, Michael told me that he wondered about what happened to me, in the time between our first meeting and our interview at CUB. I’ve known that my conversations have an impact. But I never considered that I have a responsibility after we’ve interviewed, in continuing to exist and breathe and tell the stories I hear. I’m remembered, and it’s fairly my duty to remember them.
Ramero is an extremely friendly man with a fascinating story. He is. But I won’t be wanting to spend more time with him.
But besides being *slightly* freaked out by this incident, I learned a lot from it. Up to now, I’ve reflected a lot about what I’ve learned from homeless people, their effect on me. I’m learning to be aware of what homeless people learn from me, my effect on them. And learning to try to be compassionate. But assertive—firmly my own.
Thank you for reading!
-Isabella, 2/4/17
← Read Ramero’s Story
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