Mercury Rising #6, April 1992
by Steve
Yesterday I was standing-by on Turk trip ping out on all of the Tenderloincharacters when I noticed that the bum sleeping there on the sidewalk wasresting his head on an ancient beat-up Zo Bag.
'Wow, a fellow messenger on hard times," I thought, and proddedhim awake to hear his story. (The hand-to-mouth nature of this job oftencauses me to dwell on the possibility of sleeping on the street.)
"Hey, man, who did you work for?"
He opened his eyes slowly, propped himself up on an elbow, levelledhis gaze with mine and started to speak; his voice was gravelly, and hespoke rhythmically, almost singing:
'Many is the time I've straddled a bike, off to make a delivery butthere were days I rode the wind, once called Hermes, before that, Mercury.
In Greece I leapt from cloud to cloud, holding messages urgent; wingedfeet carried me aloft. over battles and fields verdant.
From Athens I ran with lightening feet. first on land, then in the sky;I was the gravy dog of yore, always flying high.
Time changed, though, and the economy went into a slump; no one thencould read or write, Europe was a dump.
Messenging was put on hold, hip young people became pages; the timewere poor for communication we were caught in the dark ages.
Time passed, I knocked around a bit, and found myself in Frisco; I gota bike and learned the streets (I had to ride, 'cause in the days of disco,I'd been too into coke you wouldn't believe what I've put into this noseand on one of my flings I pawned my wings, so I had to pick up a bike,a cheap one, but one that would go), and I became a messenger, the onlyjob I know."
I couldn't believe that I was talking to Mercury himself, and that hewas a Bum sleeping off the booze on Turk Street. What happened? Wouldn'the be the best messenger ever?
"Hey man, so why aren't you working now?"
'Well... I was used to the open sky, not the traffic, the tracks, andthe hills; when a ped ran out, or a bus went by, out of fright I'd almostspill.
And when I lived in Greece, we set our belongings down without a carehere I left my bike unlocked on the street. and when I came out it wasn'tthere.
I turned to booze to calm my head, it was the only way I avoided thedread of losing another bike, or getting hit and left for dead but ridingdrunk I lost packages, ( and he started to get choked up, forcing out hiswords ) and finally even Aero had given up on me, I was riding like a lumpof lead, now here I am, a bum," he said.
What could I do? I gave him my lunch, a cheese and onion sandwich, andwas about to buy him a cup of coffee, when I got a call to get back downtownand grab a hot filing. I started to apologize to him, explaining that Ihad to run, when he raised his hand and fixed me in his gaze.
"Messenging is truly the oldest profession. You mustn't forgetthat. You are carrying on an ancient tradition. Go do the filing rememberthat Mercury, the God of Messengers, will be watching over you."
I turned to unlock my bike, and felt a slight breeze on my neck. No...couldit be? I looked back, expecting him to have vanished, to have flown awayback to Greece or somewhere else, maybe; but he was just limping away downthe sidewalk, eating the sandwich and muttering. I made the filing in plentyof time, flew through traffic like usual for the rest of the day, and layin bed last night, remembering the dude's rhymes, and wondering if he reallyis just an old bum or what.
Who knows, but damn that was cool meeting Mercury. It’s not every jobthat has a god watching out for you.
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