If you will; picture the scene, tell me what it means.
The snow was falling so heavily that she was almost even with me before it became clear that she was wearing a hospital gown, and that the slippers matched.
It had come out of nowhere, this snowstorm. Didn’t last but a couple of minutes, half-hour tops; it seemed the perfect opportunity to take that walk to the library and retrieve the new book by Paul Auster that they had on hold for me.
The hospital is roughly seven blocks from where I spotted her. I juggled the various possibilities in my mind, trying not to stare, trying to catch the little details; slightly matted blond hair that had almost totally given way to white, id bracelet around the wrist, the fine network of veins on bare arms looking suddenly bluer as I thought about how cold she must be.
She looked at me with a frankness that all those supposedly sane people never quite manage. I turned to follow her movements, hoping only for another moment or two with the mystery, and there was the fire-truck. A lumbering red beast of a thing, already a fireman was stepping out, speaking.
“excuse me ma’am - ma’am could you just - ma’am - ” as she starts to run.
Not well mind you, not going anywhere fast, but definitely fleeing. Shuffling slippered feet over snow-covered concrete and turning her head to look back, blond-white hair snapping in wind thick with snow.
She was heading into a parking-lot that was fenced in, and the fireman followed slowly, his voice every bit as calm as you’d expect from watching all those movies where authority confronts insanity.
I acted without thinking, I ran around the other side of the building where I knew I could see. I probably could have gotten close enough to hear every exchanged word, to have captured the dialogue of this encounter. As it was I could hear murmurs and the unmistakable sound of the repeated -
“ma’am”
For me it was enough to watch them; her bare arm gesturing, his uniformed presence staying close. He was beckoning her towards the street and she was trying to make herself understood. All the moral I could ever want from the story was writ large upon her face, indicated in the way she stood and the movements of that thin blue gown in the cold.