Last evening as I filled the trash can, one of our neighbors across the alleyway hailed me.
“Better lock your doors tonight,” she said. “The police chased all the homeless people away from the riverfront, and they’re roaming the streets.”
Instantly I was possessed with a vision from “Night of the Living Dead,” with the homeless taking the place of zombies lurching through downtown, terrorizing fair citizens and releasing David Camm from prison.
Things became a bit more prosaic after the initial rush. How did she know about the police sweep? Had a homeless person approached her with the words, “now that we’ve been rudely chased from our nests beneath the K & I bridge, we’ll be testing neighborhood doors in search of possible entry and the seizure of your couches and armchairs.”
If you’re homeless and have no place to call your own, where do you put the things you steal?
My revised opinion of my neighbor is best left unrecorded.