Waiting in the Rain

            On Saturday it was raining when I rode over to the food bank. I found out that I was behind the Guyanese man whom I’d spoken with at the other location about world issues back in the late winter. I think he was the only one in line with an umbrella. Ahead of him was a woman with a toy poodle that was lying and shivering inside her shopping cart with pages of newspaper on top in a futile attempt to keep the rain off of the dog. When the Guyanese man stamped his food the dog growled and barked at him and its caregiver told him not to tease the beast. He assured her that he had only been knocking the water from his shoes. Ahead of the woman was a guy with an electronic cigarette that he kept pulling out of his pocket to puff on. Apparently he works or has worked in some capacity in the film industry, as he was dishing to her about Donald Sutherland. He claimed that the star has been drunk in every single movie that he’s ever done and that he will pass a bottle to anyone that gets close enough. He informed her that production companies warn their employees to not encourage Sutherland’s behaviour by participating with it.

            My Guyanese companion was as chatty as ever. He bragged about owning a racing car, a Harley Davidson motorcycle and a fancy bicycle brand that I’d never heard of, all while living in a rooming house. He told me that he owns property back in Guyana and that he could make a lot of money there if he were willing to kill people for a living. Then he complained that the rain was bothering his arthritis. I suggested that yoga is good for keeping arthritis from being too severe. He mentioned Ali’s Roti Shop here in Parkdale and I shared that I’d bought some roti there recently, frozen it and mailed it to my daughter in Montreal. He declared that the best West Indian food in Toronto is at his aunt’s place, “Pam’s Caribbean Kitchen” at 912 Bloor just west of Ossington.

            The woman in line behind me had gone up to the front and came back down the line telling everyone that we could start going inside. I was suspicious because this looked exactly what had happened the week before and in that case everyone that went inside had to come out again. But the line moved and so I moved along with it, until, sure enough, once we were close to the door, everyone that had gone inside had to leave and so the line had to back up. This time though we managed to get the line to actually reverse itself rather than to scrunch up around the door like it did last week. The line would move back a bit and then I called out that it had to go further. It took some coaxing but we were able to return approximately to our original positions.

            A couple of people blamed the woman behind me but she insisted that she’d been told by one of the volunteers that the line could all head downstairs. I asked for her to identify who had given that permission and she asserted a couple of times that it had been the “Negro guy!” Then she stormed up the street, swearing in a West Indian accent, “We’re not stupid!” The guy in front of me laughed and stated that she was a typical Guyanese.

            He told me a bit about Guyana. I always keep thinking that it’s an island in the Caribbean but it’s actually an English speaking country on the mainland of South America.

            An older man came up and tried to convince us that he was originally ahead of the Guyanese man and behind the woman with the dog, but that he’d left. Nobody remembered him though and so he went off to stand by the side.

            The food bank was a little more organized this time around. Once they started letting people in, about twenty minutes late, there was someone at the front door in phone contact with the basement so she would know when to admit more clients. There were no confrontations between food bank volunteers and PARC or Tool Library people this time around so that was a good thing.

            Once I was inside the food room it didn’t take more than five minutes before I go a number and started getting my provisions. My Guyanese companion hadn’t realized that they were going to give out food right away. He’d thought that he would be going home first to bring back a bag, but he improvised with some empty boxes they had. He fortified one box by shoving another inside of it.

            In the dairy section I got two half litres of 2% milk, and I chose a tub of smoked salmon cream cheese over six small containers of fruit bottom yogourt. I also received six eggs.

            For some reason the vegetable lady was handing out the frozen ground meat along with the potatoes, carrots and onions. She had turnips as well but I hadn’t used the one I’d gotten from her the week before.

            From the shelves I got a 1.5 litre jar of Hellmann’s mayonnaise, a bag of gourmet multigrain tortilla chips, a handful of granola bars, a few peanut butter eggs, some fruit roll-ups and six packages of yeast (though no flour to go with them for bread). There were a fair variety of canned beans and I took a tin of chickpeas. There is usually a shelf with a choice of canned tuna and peanut butter but not this time. They had a shelf with a bit of canned fruit this time and so I grabbed a container of mango pulp, which I expect to find disappointing but it’s hard not to be tempted by mango. From the cereal section I selected the Honey Nut Cheerios. From the soup shelf I picked a litre container of chicken broth.

            On the way out I explained to the bread lady that I go through bread very slowly these days, so I still had some from the week before.

            All in all, once the line began to move, the food bank ran more smoothly than the week before. But if they continue to have the outdoor line-up on the main street, especially in lousy weather, they are going to have an unhappy and tense group of clients.