This morning, someone was going to jump off the bridge on Main Street into the Genesee River. Or maybe they were going to wade into the river. I don’t know the details.
When I arrived, police officers were taking down their yellow tape. I was coming up South from the library, Margret Atwood books in my bag. I saw two cop cars on the other side of the bridge blocking traffic in a mirror image to the two in front of me. A large police wagon was making a k-turn in the other direction.
There weren’t too many people around. I walked up to an Indian man leaning on a railing and asked what’d happened. He seemed to have been there a while.
Someone was under the bridge, he said.
In the water? I asked.
No. They were saying they were going to. But they didn’t.
So they were rescued?
Yeah, rescued. But you know, it’s a shame. Life is too precious. Tomorrow isn’t something we can miss.
Hmm.
He went on. I was reminded of Charlie Chaplin’s character in City Lights. The moment he tried to convince a very drunk, wealthy man not to throw himself into the river:
“Tomorrow, the birds will sing”
Chaplin says — in a title card because it’s a silent film.
The man and I chatted more, pausing to help direct a guy to the traffic court: me giving the old directions, the man giving the updated address. I’d been out of town for some time. I’m still getting oriented.
The man invited me into his bodega for a coffee. We chatted more.
No one ever feels they have enough. He says. No billionaire, no one.
Enough of what? I asked.
Exactly! He said. Enough of what?
His phone rang. I looked around the shelves at items from my childhood: single-serving cereal boxes of Fruit Loops and Apple Jacks, Sour Patch Kids and Sour Punch Straws.
I said my thanks and left for the bus station. A scene had played out on the bus before I got there. Someone had been in distress. I was confused and mixing the scene I'd left with the scene I’d entered. When I managed to clarify the difference, a new conversation started.
The bus drove past the bodega. I spoke with a woman who shared that she had seen a teenage girl rescued from a bridge two streets up from Main years ago. Said the girl had looked deeply troubled, discarded her clothes and was hanging from the side before the police could bring her up and wrap her in blankets.
Said she, herself, was a case manager now, but had worked for over twenty years at treatment centers and halfway homes as a counselor. Said it was a burnout job, counseling, and that you have to know yourself enough to know how to distance yourself from the people you’re helping.
She pulled the string to request her stop. The bus driver said to a passenger wearing an oxygen tank that it wasn't sunny outside; it was a stormy sunshine. I looked out the window and saw what she saw. And I wondered what sort of weather tomorrow would bring.
When I arrived, police officers were taking down their yellow tape. I was coming up South from the library, Margret Atwood books in my bag. I saw two cop cars on the other side of the bridge blocking traffic in a mirror image to the two in front of me. A large police wagon was making a k-turn in the other direction.
There weren’t too many people around. I walked up to an Indian man leaning on a railing and asked what’d happened. He seemed to have been there a while.
Someone was under the bridge, he said.
In the water? I asked.
No. They were saying they were going to. But they didn’t.
So they were rescued?
Yeah, rescued. But you know, it’s a shame. Life is too precious. Tomorrow isn’t something we can miss.
Hmm.
He went on. I was reminded of Charlie Chaplin’s character in City Lights. The moment he tried to convince a very drunk, wealthy man not to throw himself into the river:
“Tomorrow, the birds will sing”
Chaplin says — in a title card because it’s a silent film.
The man and I chatted more, pausing to help direct a guy to the traffic court: me giving the old directions, the man giving the updated address. I’d been out of town for some time. I’m still getting oriented.
The man invited me into his bodega for a coffee. We chatted more.
No one ever feels they have enough. He says. No billionaire, no one.
Enough of what? I asked.
Exactly! He said. Enough of what?
His phone rang. I looked around the shelves at items from my childhood: single-serving cereal boxes of Fruit Loops and Apple Jacks, Sour Patch Kids and Sour Punch Straws.
I said my thanks and left for the bus station. A scene had played out on the bus before I got there. Someone had been in distress. I was confused and mixing the scene I'd left with the scene I’d entered. When I managed to clarify the difference, a new conversation started.
The bus drove past the bodega. I spoke with a woman who shared that she had seen a teenage girl rescued from a bridge two streets up from Main years ago. Said the girl had looked deeply troubled, discarded her clothes and was hanging from the side before the police could bring her up and wrap her in blankets.
Said she, herself, was a case manager now, but had worked for over twenty years at treatment centers and halfway homes as a counselor. Said it was a burnout job, counseling, and that you have to know yourself enough to know how to distance yourself from the people you’re helping.
She pulled the string to request her stop. The bus driver said to a passenger wearing an oxygen tank that it wasn't sunny outside; it was a stormy sunshine. I looked out the window and saw what she saw. And I wondered what sort of weather tomorrow would bring.