4/24/2008 Compassionate-Lee

Last night Jason, Fox and I went to the Mellow Mushroom with his GIS class and ate pizza. Earlier in the day Lee had mentioned wanting to "get up with my old man" about something, and I told him that Mondays and Wednesdays were his late days.
Right when I pulled the car into the driveway, there was Lee. Since Jason had been at school all day long and I had met him in town we were in two cars. When I exited the car Lee said "hey girl come 'ere for a minute; i've got somethin for ya".
Curious as all hell, I grabbed Fox's hand and headed across the street to Lee's. He went inside and came out with a plate. A plate of ...........



fried shrimp! Naturally!
Jason had pulled in the driveway and was coming towards Lee, Fox, the plate of shrimp and I, and the look on his face was priceless! Such confusion.

I guess shrimp isn't such a strange gift, but something about it coming from Lee is strange. Plus I know he doesn't have tons of money. The other night when Brad and Kelly were here I was going to the store before it got too late and Jason asked me to pick up some beer for the four of them, and Lee said "shit man I ain't got but eight dollar!" Then more reluctantly he suggested, "I guess I can throw in a buck". We all broke out in laughter, uninhibited. A dollars worth of beer; That's just funny. Plus we would give Lee all the beer just to keep him hanging around. Whenever he comes over we offer him food and drinks, but usually he "just ate".

If we lived a few blocks away from the ocean a gift of shrimp would make total sense coming from Lee. He would be the strange old guy who bicycled to the bridge over the intercoastal waterway and fished every day, bringing with him a cooler bungeed to the bike frame.

One thing about Lee is that he is resourceful. Shrimp just isn't a resource here.