My Peeps

February 26, 2007 - 3:30 PM by Stephanie

City living includes a concept I like to term “my people”. “My people” is the community we build within our neighborhoods, districts, arrondissements, etc. – the people we meet and greet on a regular basis that don’t include close friends or family.

In San Francisco, my people included Hong Lee, an obsessive compulsive schizophrenic who lived in a group home next door to my regular cafe hangout (owned, incidentally, by two brothers from Ramallah).

Hong was lively. While collecting cigarette butts from the pavement (his obsessive side), he could be counted on to joke about someone’s outfit or hairstyle. My peeps in San Fran also included the flower lady who had beeeeaaautiful blooms and homeless Eugene who always asked for two dollars – not one.

Now that I’m back in Tel Aviv, the tone of my peeps has changed. So far they include the supermarket guy who calls out war dates/national tragedies in a loud chilling stream (much to the chagrin of Friday morning aisle strollers) and Eliezer.

Eliezer is an 80-ish, partially blind retiree who coffees at my “satellite office” each and every day. Eliezer and I share the newspaper – Hurry up with the front page section he scolded this morning. Read it before you get onto that computer thing to talk to the entire world. We also discuss glaucoma specialists, poetry – he showed me some of his writing – and we sometimes talk politics.

Peeps like Eliezer are essential when family is far away.

Share with others