11/1/2008 Yesterday with Lee

After four days passed without seeing hide nor hair of my otherwise "in your face" neighbor Lee, I became concerned that he was in some sort of trouble. Fox and I went outside for our morning frolic and after digging in the sandbox for thirty or so minutes, we drifted into Lee's yard and made lots of noise.
Within thirty seconds Lee appeared in the doorway looking puffy and grey.
I told him that we wondered where he had been and if he was sick, and he said "Naw, I ain't been sick or nuthin. I've jus got heartache cuz a this girl a-mistreatin her little 10 year old son here at my house"

I have heard about this woman before.
Her son was born with some sort of thrush condition and was unable to nurse. Lee said he went fifteen days without breast feeding after he was born, then finally he took the baby to his grandmother who diagnosed the problem and immediately corrected it. That's the history from Lee's end.
So now, ten years later the baby has grown into a boy and the mother accepts no responsibility for the child's behavior or discipline. She verbally and physically abuses him and pushes him around, ignores him by shutting him up in his room with a video game console. Worst of all, she is trying to have the child diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder so she can involve him in an experimental drug study entitling her to compensation for his participation.
Lee has to censor the mother every time she comes by his house (to smoke or drink moonshine) by ordering her to stop abusing her son on the grounds that "I [Lee] don't allow NO fightin in my house cuz it's a sacred place"

That is some depressing stuff to be around! I completely understand why he feels so bad! He said he wanted to stop seeing this woman and forbid her from coming to his house, but he can't bear the thought of not being able to see the kid.

Fox and I sat and drank coffee with Lee for a half hour or so while discussing this issue (I drank coffee. Fox did not) and the conversation moved to happier topics. Lee was happy that his check was "a-comin tomorrow", and in an attempt to relate I added "Yeah- it's a good thing we get paid tomorrow too! We're nearly broke at the end of the month"
Although this statement was fundamentally true it was unnecessarily dramatic. We have a tight budget with little deviation. At the end of the month we sometimes have less that $100 in the checking account, but we are prepared and aware, so it's no big deal. No one has starved yet.
Lee proceeded to pull boxes of cereal and crackers from his cupboard and pile them into a plastic bag. He handed them to me and said "Lass month I got all this buy one get one free an now I'm sick of um so you take em"
The more I refused the more desperate Lee perceived me as. Finally he said "Girl, jus take em! I ain't gonna eat em!"
All of the boxes were unopened and had sharp corners, so I took them home, but before I left Lee exclaimed "Oh Yeah! An I got somethin else for ya!"

He reached in the freezer and pulled out a mason jar of amber tinted moonshine, opened it and poured two little shots. Then he poured half of it into a Dr. Enough bottle and handed it to me along with the shot.
I glanced at the digital clock on Lee's microwave and it was 10:42am. He handed me the big shot and I insisted we trade. I drank it and Lee explained; "this is scotch flavored moonshine. When they make it they use a certain kinda bark at the end to give it the flavor an color"
I agreed that it was very scotchy and that it would be perfect with a smoke, then adjourned across the street to my yard.
About thirty minutes later as I was giving Fox a snack Lee knocked on the door. He held out a white envelope, shoving it into my hand and mumbling something. I asked him what it was and he said "jus read it!!"
I came back inside and emptied the contents of the envelop onto the table. There was a rubber change purse crammed full of coins, mostly pennies, a note, five rolled tobacco cigarettes, and a government issue "food stamps" debit card.
The letter instructed me to go to the store, purchase a bag of potatoes using the debit card which held a balance of $2.75, the change which totaled around 85 cents, and my own money, then we would "split the spuds".
I suddenly realized that I was on the receiving end of Lee's charity.
I loaded Fox up and headed across the street to see if Lee wanted to ride to the store and get some potatoes.

We drove to the Grocery Outlet and bought a bag of potatoes which I contributed $2.05 towards. As soon as we got back Lee split them into two bags and told me that he was going to cook supper for Jason, Fox and I. I agreed and asked what I could do.
About 40 minutes later Lee showed up with a bowl of home fries wrapped in newspaper. He said "eat some now an save the rest for supper"
As soon as Jason got home from work Lee started bringing food over to my table including salmon cakes, fried okra, and cornbread. It was really good and I was happy not to have to cook supper.
After we ate Lee cleared the table of his pots and dishes, went home and we got Fox to bed. As Jason and I settled in to watch our new favorite show, Fringe, Lee knocked on the door. He wanted Jason to find out if "that spray chemical stuff, Free Breeze wuz on the stock market"
Neither of us had ever heard of a company called Free Breeze, so we just started googling.
Lee explained "it's like an air freshener spray, an they make candles, too"
"Febreeze!" I decoded.
"Yeah! That's whut I said" hollered Lee.
I said "I'm sure it's owned by Johnson Wax or Proctor and Gamble if you look on the stocks"
Shaking his head widely from left to right, Lee mouthed the word "ME" while pointing at himself repeatedly.
"I own that chemical! I bought it in Arizona right after them chemists made it on accident! I know it's doing real good cuz there's a commercial on for it almost every break!"
Jason and I didn't dare look at each other for fear of an explosion of laughter. Jason fiddled around a little bit more on the internet and then lamented that he wasn't able to get any stock information. Our dumb TV show was on and we were really trying to pay attention to it rather than focus on the ridiculousness Lee was talking.
As soon as Lee left we decided to try and diagnose Lee's condition using Wikipedia. The best explanation is he is suffers from psychosis with periods of mania.