by Chris Markel

Created on: March 24, 2009

It was still dark. The sun wouldn't be rising for another hour. A freight train wailed from the west side of town giving a lonely greeting to the fifty-six year old man as he walked out into the damp, chilly, air. He closed the medal door of the large concrete building. In the 1960's the building had been a warehouse for Tillie Lewis Foods when the canary was across the street. Now the building was being leased by the Salvation Army for a winter shelter to house Ralston's homeless during the cold winter nights. The rain had been frequent and heavy for the season in northern California and, according to rumors, if it continued the Salvation Army would extend its opening through the end of April, maybe to the beginning of May.

Dan Reid pulled at the collar of his olive drab army coat to keep the cold, damp air from crawling down his neck. He readjusted the strap of his backpack that was digging into his slightly throbbing right shoulder. The aching recalled four years of college football-a time of youthful strength, confidence and near reckless determination. The complete opposite of how he felt now walking across the wide, puddled, graveled driveway towards the adjacent dark empty lot between him and D street. It had rained hard the night before and he would need to be mindful of any tiny lakes hidden by the knee high grass in the dark, guarding against stepping in them and soaking his Nike's. If his socks got wet he wouldn't be able to exchange them since last night was the shelter's weekly socks exchange.

The predawn work traffic was heavy, headlights glaring and tires hissing against the wet asphalt of 9th and D streets. He made it to the corner and managed to get through the wet lot without any catastrophes. He had gone to the corner in case there was a patrol car in the waiting traffic. He could not afford a ticket for jaywalking. The cops in Ralston were notorious for giving them out to the homeless.

When the light changed, Reid crossed D Street, then proceeded towards the ally way, between 9th and 10th streets. His destination was north to the Greyhound station, on 9th and I, where he planned on giving himself a quick sponge bath in the men's room. There were no showers at the Winter shelter and it had been a week since his last one, before he left Kathy and Mike's apartment. Last night, warm and snuggled under the
clean sheets and blanket, he smelled destitution's musty, grimy, odor on himself. So a sponge bath was the second thing on his to do list.

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