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Kim Stanley Robinson's Fourty Signs Of Rain talks about the new Fregan movement; they're dedicated to living off the capitalist fat of the land by rescuing excess food and goods from the dumpster or warehouse; they also organize feed-the-homeless drives. I met two of them yesterday.
I was standing in line for coffee and overheard a young, scruffy-looking but eloquent guy full of tattoos ask the counterguy for directions to an internet cafe. The counterguy was rude -- I asked the kid if I could help. His name was Nick, from Indiana, about twenty-three. He and his friend John ('Grip'), from Michigan, same age, are currently travelling to Yosemite with Nuckis, their three-year-old male pit bull. I offered up some internet access at my building -- they loaded up into my truck, and off we went. They looked fierce as hell -- Nick carries a sword in his pack, and Nuckis looks like Death On The Paw; they turned out to be something different altogether.
Their story is this: Nick and John were the proud owners of a bus that travels around the country to high-density-homeless centers, feeding people. It is their Mission In Life. They had stoves onboard, giant pots, woks -- they would approach local businesses and restaurants, collecting donated bags of rice and beans and vegetables, and then cook up huge batches of stew, which they would then ladle out to appreciative crowds of homeless. Nick is a trained mechanic; it's how they kept the bus moving. They are both intelligent and thoughtful young men.
One day, the brakes on the bus caught fire on a steep canyon switchback. Nick tried to hold it on the road, but they skidded off the edge and rolled several times, John demonstrating how he somehow stayed on his feet by running around the inside of the rolling bus, 'Like in the Matrix', as he put it. They were unhurt, but the bus was stuck down the ravine on its side.
They hiked to the nearest town, to try to find help to drag the bus out. By the time they returned, the bus had been pulled out by local authorities and impounded ($3000), along with all their equipment, clothes, and food. They had to give it up. So they found an internet cafe, emailed friends and did some searching -- they found a bus, for free, in Yosemite. All they had to do was make it there. And find away to re-equip and resupply it. Without money.
I fed the dog and petted him while they used the computer. The sweetest, calmest, happiest pit bull I have ever encountered -- a beautiful soul in that dog -- I could feel it. It spoke volumes about these young men. My sales manager, highly skeptical at first (as always), talked with them a few minutes -- they became fast friends, since he had worked with Food Not Bombs. The two were very familiar with that culture -- rattling off all the travelling kitchens, the feed-the-homeless communities, etc. I know some things about that world, but I'm not in it. It was an impressive display of knowledge and dedication -- they were quite real, and they called themselves Fregans.
After awhile, they asked if I could drive them across town to Folsom. I was honored to be able to help. I dropped them off next to an onramp, and they hopped out. I offered some money -- they took it, and thanked me. I petted Nuckis vigorously -- we had become quite good friends. Nick and John said that they were unused to such trusting treatment -- 'two ugly guys and a pit bull make it tough to get rides sometimes', they said, and so I suggested that they make a sign with one big word on it: 'SAFE'. Because they were. I thought it might help.
Off they went. I wish I could have helped more. I'm too old for that life -- one needs to be young and strong to survive such challenges. They made me feel strangley hopeful -- as if those little, barely-surviving activist communities, working away at their Utopian dreams, could change the world more than any Democratic Candidate with Big Money could. I'm a sentimentalist, y'know.
I suggested to them that, in a better world, the local authorities who had impounded their bus would have pulled it out, repaired it, and sent them on their way with blessings and fresh supplies. After all, who could possibly disagree with their cause? Talk about your Christ-Like. Spirtually, I think, the men who made the decision to impose such a fee on these young men have committed a catastrophic error. They may go to church on Sunday, and they may be just following the law -- but they've just spread the darkness a little further. It made me angry to think about that -- I believe that it is JUST THAT ATTITUDE which curses this nation. All the well-meaning do-gooder bleeding hearts dragging along the huge weight of the Stone -- by which I mean the men who will march happily down the path to murder and chaos because -- it's just how things are done. They Don't Know No Better. Forms must be signed. Fees must be paid. Darkness spreads -- but they see not, and know not, and argue intelligently against all Truly Right Action. Stupid. Brutal. Assholes. It pisses me off.
Long Live The Fregans.
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