Mary Pezzulo: The lady lived in my car
Lived #Lived
There was a woman living in my car last year. I’d been in an accident a few hours from Steubenville where I live. I was trapped with a car that would never drive again, but I couldn’t even scrap it because the title was at home on my desk. My friend Holly, whom I’d been visiting, let me have the wreck towed to her place until I figured out what to do.
The used car market being what it is, it took a solid month to find a new car and come back with the title to dispose of the old one. Meanwhile, Holly befriended a homeless lady who lived in the neighborhood. The lady came by and said hello every so often, and Holly would bring out lunch so they could eat and chat on the porch.
That was how she found out that the lady had recently been kicked out of the place where she had been sleeping.
Holly didn’t have a way to get the lady a room, but she did have a car that no one was using. The car would never drive another inch, and would probably catch fire if anyone turned it on, but it could be locked from the inside for safety. The side airbags made a nice privacy curtain. She made the lady promise not to do anything illegal in the car, and explained it was just for the short term, and then handed her the key.
When I showed up to scrap my car, I found that the lady had made it into a cozy nest with flowered secondhand quilts. She’d been sitting in the front seat, crayoning in a coloring book Holly gave her. She popped out like a jack-in-the-box when she saw me.
“I’ll be out in just a minute,” she said, “Just lemme get my stuff!” “Take your time,” I said, feeling as if I was going to hell for taking my car back.
She chatted as she packed her bag. She promised she wasn’t on meth, she only picked at her skin out of anxiety, hence the coloring book which was a much better outlet. She didn’t dare go to the shelter, but she had found a picnic bench nearby which would be almost as good as the car.
Holly realized the lady was in her socks, and ran into the house to get her a pair of boots.
Somehow, during the conversation, I mentioned I was Catholic, which fascinated her. “I read the whole Catechism once! My sister said I shouldn’t have done that. She said, ‘Now you’ve sinned twice, because you have knowledge.’ Do you think that’s true?” I didn’t have an answer for that one.
I didn’t know what to do except to ask around to my friends, who pooled resources to have a tent, a coat, and a sleeping bag rushed to her with overnight shipping. At the last minute I threw in a new coloring book and pencils. But where was she going to pitch the tent in the middle of a big city?
One way or another, over the next few days, the homeless lady found a friend who was willing to let her stay at her place through the winter if she could get her own mattress and a fridge for the apartment kitchen. Holly asked around her friends and found those things. The lady lived through the winter, which is all you can ask for.
“Life is a series of temporary measures,” said Holly.
The lady still comes by now and then, to visit Holly’s porch. One day she brought Holly two discount-size bottles of cheap bubble bath, as a “thank you” gift. Holly didn’t know what to say. I said it reminded me of Mary Magdalene pouring perfume over Jesus.
I’m not the best Catholic, but I think the Kingdom of Heaven is mixed up in this somehow.
Mary Pezzulo is a writer in Steubenville, Ohio. Her previous article was “Faces of eviction: A day at the museum with children facing homelessness.”