I watched as the couple slowly walked through the street pushing their shopping cart filled with bottles and every type of item they could find that they deemed to be as valuable. Both of them were gone, they were on a high that was on a plane or dimension completely disassociated with earth or reality all together. But they were a couple and had stuck together. For how long they had been together only they knew. I often thought about the homeless population and how they lived and survived on the dangerous streets and on the cold winter nights. I always came back to the fact that they were once a baby like me but then at some point his or her life it went sideways either because they lost a job or a business or a marriage. Then for whatever reason they could never get it back on track and they slipped further and further through the cracks of society until they reached rock bottom. Some of the homeless population are able to get back on track and live better lives but for many when substance abuse came into play it was a downward spiral that couldn't be stopped. I once asked a politician about the frightening spike in homeless population and drug addiction in our city and he told me that there is help but you have to want to be helped. He also said that some homeless people just want to exist the way they are and not go back to the society that put them on the streets. 

Have you ever walked into a supermarket and gone to the washroom and on your way to the washroom there was a bulletin board which was posted on the wall. But it was not your normal postings. It was a posting of missing people in the nation. You then scan all of the faces and cannot but help feel a horrifying sense of dread. The people that disappear come from all ages, races, genders and backgrounds. You wonder what happened to them and where they were. 

A while back I had worked with a man who was in his late twenties and who had a very unusual and distinctive personality. His name was Reggie Dickout. At first he didn't say much to anyone. All he would do is observe people out of the corner of his eye and when you would turn to look at him he would look away. And whenever he would talk to someone he would never look at them in the eye; he would always look down at the floor. A couple of times I tried to strike up a conversation with him and everytime he ended it quickly, so I gave up on being social with him and kept it simple by merely saying hello. 

I was sitting in a coffee shop when he came in and I didn't know what to do. One could not help but stare at him. Others stared as well, what else could one do? He made his way through the entrance and proceeded to the till where he ordered a coffee and a doughnut. I continued to stare through the corner of my eye. Then like a bolt of lighting, like he had extra sensory perception he turned my way and gave me a hard stare for a couple of seconds. I turned away and looked straight ahead. I could still see him out of the corner of my eye and as he gathered his coffee and doughnuts. He then deliberately walked by me in a super slow manner and I could tell that he was staring at me and trying to bait me in looking back at him. He didn't say anything and moved on to the other side of the coffee shop.

In every type of sport from hockey to soccer there are people which are fans, but I dont think that they know that the word fan is short for fanatic which is a word to describe someone that is crazy. I have found that the name of the sports team seems to have a great impact on the fans and what they wear to the game to support their team. In the case of the sport of hockey there is a team called the New Jersey Devils who at one time were said to have been cursed to never win the Stanley Cup because of their name. But they eventually did win the Stanley Cup in 1996.