The Cart
Halifax, Nova Scotia
I dared the drizzle at an early hour. Walking by residential habitats and up along Quinnpool and north completing blocks and blocks of this boxes I finally landed my laurels on a porch-swing at the home of Manu and Satarupa. I swung and listened to my whispering mantra when in the stillness I heard an increasingly common sound of these times. It started with a rattle, obviously the wheels of a rickety shopping cart, grating over uneven pavement. I stopped swinging. I didn't want to disturb the oncoming man's business, referring to the fellow pulling the cart.
Bottles were inside a hefty plastic bag that was shaped to settle into the rectangular metal box. The street-light allowed me to see the operation of the man and his conveyance and goods (or bads) moving across the street at Willow and Clifton. He crossed the street, then passed by not noticing me. I must admit I was eyeing his paraphernalia more than the person who appeared hidden in his coat.
I then wondered what the man's rest-of-the-day would look like. Would he be making reversal trips like this during the night to early morning? Will he do his own recycling? Will he be getting coins/peanuts for all his endeavours and sort through that too?
I've seen this type of passing person before. I remember in Dallas while on an early morning trek seeing a wheel-chaired man pop out of a wrecker's yard carrying on his lap whatever little scrap he could.
A sigh of empathy came to visit me then, as I sat on the swing a little longer, now swinging again, and with some deliberation on my mind. Where will destiny take the man with the cart? And as I thought like this the clatter of the cart's contents became less pronounced as he moved further away from the ear's distance.
10 Km
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