Chester ©2014 Susan Schaefer
The Last Cigarette
I felt privileged to have had a slice of time with the man
in the top hat and tails who has been a West Bank fixture for years, and my
neighbor. Today, returning from a photo shoot at Mill City Farmer’s Market I
felt an uncanny pull as I walked by his infamous encampment directly next to my
building, Riverview Tower, tucked under the 10th Avenue Bridge. Had
I done as my entire being was directing me, I might have become the last person
to see the man so many Twin Citians know as Chester alive. But I didn’t follow
my instincts. And tonight, after an evening out with friends at Seven Corners,
I returned home to find law enforcement quietly conducting their business
exactly at Chester’s outlier campsite home. I knew without even asking that this
man whom I photographed was no longer among us.
I am sure the formal details will emerge, but it seems he
died of natural causes.
According to our building’s evening attendant, his female companion
of years, Marcia, asked to call the police, explaining that she had found Chester
“cold and motionless”.
Most old timers in our building had a great fondness for
this enigmatic outsider who rode a bicycle throughout the West Bank and
Dinkytown, most often soliciting change from passersby. But the afternoon I
snapped my portrait on a Dinkytown corner, Chester had just given his last
cigarette to another homeless young man. That’s the only Chester I knew. I hope
there’s a peg in heaven for his top hat.
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