Donny and The Death of Joe Zine

I was talking to Mark, one of the charter members of the Old Crow Book club. He was sitting on his usual sidewalk near the convenience store surrounded by his daily neighborhood haul of redeemable cans and bottle: roughly $25. We discussed the recent history of Oregon's famously unprecedented Bottle Bill, championed and signed into law by the late great former Governor Tom McCall in 1973. It was only in April of 2017 that the state doubled the deposit to ten cents and Mark remembers that day well. He claimed it was like going into “early retirement.” Just like that, the state doubled his minimum wage.

Mark and and I also discussed the survival economics of his living on the streets. Can and bottle money kept him in malt liquor and cigarettes. His food stamp card kept him in food. He has no other source of income.

A silver-haired man came around the corner. I recognized him but did not know his name. Several days earlier I had done a welfare check on him after encountering him splayed on the sidewalk in this same area. He had said he was okay and thanked me for my concern.

He greeted Mark and Mark introduced him as Donny.

When Donny heard my name he damn near exploded with excitement and fired statements at me:

Great to meet you.

I've been hoping to meet you.

I've got your book in my backpack.

I'm writing a book and I want your help.

We've got to get coffee so we can talk about the book.

I'm thinking of getting involved with a street ministry that might be opening up around here.

Maybe you can help?

And thank you for putting together the booklet about Joe. He was my friend.

Donny then sat down on the sidewalk and pulled out some bills and change and started counting it up.

I put it together. This was the Donny that had organized the wake and extraordinary roadside memorial for a homeless man named Joe who had been killed by a hit and run driver last September not far from where we stood. I was so moved by the memorial that I had written about it for the New American Diaspora newsletter and taken home, with permission, a piece of art about Joe from the memorial before a rainstorm destroyed it. Two weeks ago, law enforcement authorities had finally arrested the alleged driver after a five-month investigation and he was being held in the county jail awaiting prosecution. Joe's tragic death, the memorial, and the news of the recent arrest had prompted me to produce a four-page zine (without a byline) called The Death of Joe, an abbreviated adaption of my earlier piece about him. I printed 150 copies and had been distributing them in the neighborhood's many street libraries and had given one to Mark, since he was largely responsible for providing background about Joe and the memorial.

And now I had just met the man who had organized the wake and the memorial. At the time, Mark told me he was in rehab and had checked out or broken out to attend the event. He had bought the pizza and Mountain Dew.

Donny was rhapsodic about the zine, although he did note a few errors of fact. A critic! I told him it was inevitable that I'd get something wrong because everything I'd heard was third or fourth hand. Donny said it was fine. He also said that he'd taken a copy and gone to the library and printed out six copies for distribution to the local homeless community who knew and loved Joe.

That shook me up. Someone had expended substantial effort and spent dough. Someone was gigging the zine because it mattered to them and that someone was sitting on a sidewalk counting up his money.

Mark chimed in that he had given the zine to a woman in a nearby Starbucks and a few minutes later she had come up to him, crying, and said the story had really hit her hard.

I asked Donny how long he was going to hang around. He said about a half an hour. I told him I'd run home and assemble 10 more copies of the zine for him to distribute. Donny told me he'd really appreciate that.

So I ran home and did the assembling and ran back to the sidewalk an handed the copies to Donny.

Then we started talking about his life, how he was going to lose his downtown apartment in two weeks and didn't have any transitional housing in place, and that he might likely end up living on the streets in the neighborhood. We also talked about his book project and I gave him a few tips how to get started, but it all truthfully started with three words of advice: ASS TO CHAIR.

He asked for my number and I gave him my card. We'd be meeting for coffee soon.