"SAL THE STOOP OWL"

 

 Sal, Oh Sal... was one of the many lost street spirits that wandered and lingered in our little micro-world in lower Manhattan.  Sal always wore a wool suit even in the heat of the summer and carried a walking cane and an old weathered briefcase.  He looked like an old office clerk who got lost after work ... like lost for ten years after a binge on skid row.  Just like many of the other actors in this novel no one knew where Sal was born,  where he grew up, or anything about his past life at all before he turned up in the area, to remain for many years before his passing.  It was all just one more typical unanswerable mystery and status quo for the area at that time.

   Sal always had a small coffee to go cup and a cigarette in each hand (pall mall filterless).  He really looked like a little, chubby, dishevelled Screech Owl with his bushy, tufty brows, and huge blinking eyes.  Sal also had a stout round physique and would sleep sitting bent over like a collapsible chair.  He looked and sounded like character actor Eugene Pallette or better yet Eric Blore.  Everyone in the area knew Sal and he became the little mascot and sentinel of our street.  It wasnt long after he appeared that we all grew to love old Sal and his curious but charming habits and ways.  Sal also kept a small suitcase with him on which ever stoop he was roosting at, at that moment.  He kept changes of clothes, old books, newspapers, writing materials and other personal items in it.  I remember seeing Sal at the corner laundromat in only shorts and a t-shirt while washing his wardrobe, which would then be put neatly back into his suitcase.

 Sal refused to go to a shelter even in the harshest winter weather and so we would all take turns letting him sleep in our top hallways in make shift beds, during the coldest nights of the year.  Unlike most of the other character "actors"  in this "blog-book", Sal was always a constant spirit that haunted our street...  he never disappeared only to reappear and then disappear again like Alice, Merlin or Cosmos (from my other book blog "Acting Out") and yet, despite this I knew even less about him than any of the other "ghosts" in my novel here.  Sal could not seem to remember anything about his own parents or even where he had been born or where he had grown up.  He was a charming enigma.  I saw him over the years almost daily, until I had to sublet my apartment to take care of a family member in Niagara.

  Sadly after almost 10 years of living on our block, poor Sal passed away after a brief illness.  I thank the Lord though that Sal left this world in a warm hospital bed, amongst friends.  The neighbors even had a memorial for him.  It just wasn't the same when I returned that Autumn... our little Owl was gone.  Sometimes, late at night especially in the winter, I think I see Sal sitting on someones stairway in the distance but its just an illusion.  Many of the locals in the area still believe that the ghost of our little stoop Owl is always haunting our doorways and the corners of our street at night.

Sal ......   passed on dead of winter 2002    last seen ......on a stoop in lower Manhattan

Copyright  © 2014 by Fritz Von Ludwigslust.  All Rights Reserved.