The autobiographic vignette below was originally titled “Annie”.  I wrote this passage in the early months of my (attempted) PhD in 1998. My doctoral research focused on educational inequality and the lessons taught by the “formal” and “informal” curriculum at schools in hard places. This story talks to the lessons I learned from an extraordinary neighbour. I have changed the name of the people in this story

On the peeling brown painted steps of Annie’s front porch, Bonnie and I sit and watch the sun as it disappears behind a mirror image row of public housing homes. Sitting between my legs Bonnie grabs my arms and crosses them in front of her chest. We hug tightly. Although it is less then two weeks before Christmas the breeze is cool and the air temperature has dropped quickly. Caught in summer attire –shorts and a t-shirt- I try to tough it out.

“Are you cold?’, Bonnie whispers.

“No”, I offer unconvincingly.

“Liar”, she jokes as she rubs my goose-bump riddled arms

“Annie said she’d be here by now”, I mumble from between chattering teeth.

“You really are cold”, Bonnie hugs me even tighter. We remain embraced until Annie’s beat-up blue Torana pulls in the driveway.

“What’s going on?”, Annie asks as she reaches through the driver’s window and awkwardly opens her door from the outside.

“Waiting for you”, Bonnie and I offer in stereo.

“Where have you been?”, I continue.

“Oh, long story”, Annie mumbles as she turns her back to the breeze and lights a cigarette, “Are you two love birds going to help me unload this shit or what?”

Bonnie and I jump to attention and approach Annie’s car. The back seat is full of groceries and Christmas shopping all in odd bags and boxes.

“Um, I hope you’ve got the kids in the boot, because there is no way they would fit in there”, I joke.

“You know I don’t let the kids sit in the back when they got all that room in the boot”, Annie plays along, “No, they’re with their Dad- and you know the boot doesn’t open.”

I glare sideways at Annie and point towards the Christmas presents, “So he paid child support then?”

“Nope! Haven’t seen one cent in ten years, so why should this Christmas be any different”, Annie remarks matter-of-factly.

“Then who paid for all of this then?”

Annie feints a cough, taps the side of her nose, and doesn’t speak.

I look at Bonnie and tilt my head still confused as to the source of the goods on the back seat. We begin unloading and cart the sea of loose items in the house. It is only as Annie and I cross under the porch light that I see her wince in pain.

“Geezus, what’s wrong?”

“Same long story”, she offers on the move.

“Are you alright?”

“I’ll live – you know, I always do”, Annie shrugs it off and marches to her car for the final time.

“I’ll put the kettle on”.

Well into the night, and long after Bonnie had returned next door for bed, Annie and I chat in the lounge. Like so many evenings before she shares with me the defining episodes of her short life: childhood deprivation, drifting out of school, low wage entry level work, early marriage, young motherhood, emotional and physical abuse, divorce, single parenthood, and the survival stories of one living on a very low income.

“So what was the ‘long story’ today?”, I finally ask.

Annie extinguishes yet another cigarette, and stares deep into my eyes. “You know that guy I was seeing a while back?’

“Um, yep.”

“Yeah, well, I miscarried his baby while I was in town today”.

I offered what support I could to Annie, and for the most part it was as simple as being a 16 year-old active listener who gave a shit.