Perhaps she's not on medication. It hasn't worked for her, or she doesn't care for the side effects. Maybe she has a place to go tonight, somewhere indoors to sleep, or maybe not.

In any case, the rigors of her life are momentarily unimportant. She's out enjoying the late-fall sun and warmth. She's in a whimsical mood.

When I was crossing the street to come home a short time ago, I passed right by this woman. Something about me caught her attention. She sidled up and peered into my face for an instant, then she followed me for several paces, muttering. I was hoping she'd fall away again but instead she grabbed my arm and demanded to know my name.

"Please, I don't like to be touched," I told her. She rasped an apology and I walked on.

There are two things this incident calls to mind. The first is the Western frontier. At the point the West became civilized, people unable to live according to society's rules no longer had the "wild" as a refuge.

The second thing the crazy woman brings to mind is the peculiarity of the contemporary phenomenon, in New Age spiritual circles, of the "vision quest." You pay a lot of money and go to some lodge in the desert, to sweat out your demons out and "realize God."

The people who live on the fringes all the time, like this woman, are the real "shamans."
6:27:34 PM    comment []