She used to sleep in the Fifth Post Office. I could smell her before I rounded the entrance to where she slept, standing¹ up, by the public phones. I smelled the urine that seeped² through the layers of her dirty clothing and the decay from her nearly toothless mouth. If she was not asleep, she mumbled³ incoherently.

Now they close the post office at six to keep the homeless out, so she curls up on the sidewalk, talking to herself, her mouth flapping open as though unhinged, her smells diminished by the soft breeze.

One Thanksgiving we had so much food left over, I packed it up, excused myself from the others and drove to Fifth Street.

It was a frigid⁴ night. Leaves were swirling⁵ around the streets and hardly anyone was out, all but a few of the luckless in some warm home or shelter. But I knew I would find her.

She was dressed as she always was, even in summer: The warm woolly layers concealing⁶ her old, bent⁷ body. Her bony hands clutched the precious shopping cart. She was squatting⁸ against a wire fence in front of the playground next to the post office. "Why didn't she choose some place more protected from the wind?" I thought, and assumed she was so crazy she did not have the sense to huddle⁹ in a doorway¹⁰.

I pulled my shiny car to the curb¹¹, rolled down the window and said, "Mother … would you …" and was shocked at the word "Mother". But she was … is … in some way I cannot grasp.

I said, again, "Mother, l've brought you some food. Would you like some turkey and stuffing and apple pie?"

At this the old woman looked at me and said quite clearly and distinctly, her two loose lower teeth wobbling as she spoke¹², "Oh, thank you very much, but I'm quite full now. why don't you take it to someone who really needs it ?" her words were clear, her manners gracious. Then I was dismissed: Her head sank into her rags again.

Bobbie Probstein

Questions:

1.What kind of person is the woman?
2.What do you think about the bag lady refused the food?