He got up from his table and walked across the parking lot, threw his crumbs on the asphalt.
“The birds need feeding,” he grunted when he returned. Then he sat and smoothed the foil that had wrapped his sandwich. He got up again and brought it inside the deli where he had bought the food.
“Do they recycle the foil?” I asked when he came out, sitting again at his table. He shrugged. “Just the way I was brought up. Nothing should go to waste. People today, they wad everything up and throw it. I always bring it back in, give it to them.” A few moments later— “They say 'thank you' when they take it.”
He's old. Probably the same age as me, but he seems a lot older. Everyone going in and out of the deli appears to know him, has a word. “Hi, Gus, how's it goin'?” “Hey Gus, you good today?” He has a word back always. “Yeah, I'm OK.” “That a city truck you're drivin’ now?—How d’you like it?”
“Like it pretty good, Gus, have it about eight years now. “
My question about the foil had opened up a connection. “Where you from?” That was going to happen. My accent wasn't from around here. “Ireland,” I said. “Here visiting my son.”
He nodded slowly. “I always like to hear about Ireland,” he mused. Then went quiet again. After that, from nothing— “A great guy over there.” He pointed across the busy road to a building with a number of pickup trucks outside. “He started with a lawnmower, doing folks' gardens around here. Built it up to a big business with 30 people workin’ for him.” He pondered on the memory for another while, then added— “Pity he's not around any more. His sons run the place now. A great business.”
Then he was quiet again, in the rumbling from the trucks on the road beyond. And his memories. “Where you from?” he asked. I told him, again. “Always like to hear about Ireland,” he said. Then he went on— “Would have liked to travel. Couldn't afford it when I was young. Now I'm old, can't do it.” A few more seconds, then— “was up near Boston once.”
We watched a few more trucks rumble by.
“Where you from?” he asked.
