Eulogy to Butch.

Mr. Butch died yesterday.
I'm taking it pretty hard. So unfortunately, this won't be as well written as it could be.

Mr. Butch used to haunt Kenmore Square before BU swallowed it whole.
This was back when the Rathskeller and the Deli Haus were still there. I was working at GNC at the time. On the nights I closed by myself, he used to stand outside and guard the door, and then he would escort me to the train to make sure nobody messed with me. In return, I'd hook him up with smokes, eventhough he never asked for them. Little J, he used to call me. People were afraid of him because he was a kooky homeless guy and was always half in the bag.
But he was a truly good human being.

He would always come in and shoot the shit with me and my co-workers. Everybody working there at the time was a college student, with the exception of me and my boss, Roberta, who was in her 50's and a Wiccan high priestess. He loved to talk about the stuff everyone was learning in class. Him and Roberta would really get into it, because they had similar mystical ideologies. GNC would not be happy to know this, but when he'd come in, Roberta would close the store and we'd go down into the basement and smoke. Those were some wild, crazy fun times in nutrition land.

There was one day in particular that sticks out in my mind when I think of Mr. Butch; it was a Sunday morning. I had just broken up with my boyfriend the previous evening and I was a quivering mess of feel-bad that morning. I opened the store late. The registers went down. Everything was going wrong. I was barely keeping it together. He stumbled into the store looking for some work to do, so I gave him some money to wash the windows, as per our usual arrangement. While he was doing this, I just broke down sobbing. He came over and we talked about it for awhile, he sang me a song and it made me laugh. He really had a way of making you see what was really important in life. Then a customer came in and I had to help him, but while I was tied up with this shmuck and his stupid problems, Mr. Butch went to the Seven Eleven, and when he came back he brought me a flower and a candy bar with the trifling amount of money I had paid him. Mind you, this guy had nothing. I was pissed that he did that, and I insisted that he take more money, but he wouldn't. He just said, "You got a great mind, Little J. Someday they gonna love you for that." And back out onto the streets of Kenmore he went. I still don't know who he meant by "they". Boys? My co-workers? The world? Dunno.
After he left, the stupid shithead that I was trying to sell protein drinks to made a nasty comment about how Mr. Butch smelled. I kicked him out of the store. True story. He even came back a few days later to complain to my boss, Roberta. I didn't care, and Roberta, who was coincidentally the district manager, didn't care either. She kicked him out too.