Snapshots

The men who live, temporarily, at the Mission where I work, survive partly with humour.

To relieve the monotony of eating chicken three (or more) times each week....

One of the places they scan first in the daily newspaper is the column describing people arrested the previous day...to see who they know. The staff do this as well.

The other day, one of those who has been there longer, big, ruddy cheeks and nicely-trimmed black beard, stocky, came wandering down the hall singing, "I feel pretty, oh, so pretty...." He was trying to convince another man to watch the live Sound of Music coming up on TV later that week.

The same man, reading an article in the paper titled, "Grow Unusual Herbs in Your Garden," chuckled and commented cheerfully, "I do that...well, I did," causing a chortle down the whole row around him.

The view from where I sit, these days....