Meeting Ephthemia

Photo by Alfred Schrock on Unsplash

One of the first people who came to visit during Inner City Pastoral Ministry "table time" yesterday on the corner near Bissell Centre West was a small elder with shiny black hair, a huge smile (in spite of very few teeth), and the tendency to shout the odd word to emphasize it. 

She picked up a few snacks ("I like them HICKORY STICKS!"), thanked us, and moved on to collect hugs from a couple of Bissell Centre staff members that she obviously recognized, and they her. She stood in the middle of the sidewalk, arms outstretched, just waiting to be embraced, and she was not disappointed. Their encounter made me smile.

Pastor Quinn and I stood at our little table of shareable items for almost an hour,  having our own encounters with people who came for snacks, toiletries, dry socks and underwear (it had rained at least an inch overnight, probably more). 

I love table time for the interactions with the locals. One guy made me laugh when he said, "I'm from Newfoundland, so give me the tuna and crackers kit, not that chicken salad and crackers sh*t." Inevitably, there are jokes and stories exchanged at our table. Some of the stories are hard to listen to, but the tellers of those stories appreciate that we listen and sometimes pray for them -- if they request it. Inner City Pastoral Ministry is a ministry of presence, of just being with folks. We can't solve their problems for them, but we can listen.

After we had given everything away to people who had come to our table from nearby encampments and other dwellings, Quinn headed inside to see if any of our regular community members were taking advantage of the Bissell's services, as he usually does. I broke down cardboard boxes and folded up our portable table, watching for Quinn's return, because he's my ride home. He was gone longer than usual, but eventually I spotted him further down the sidewalk, chatting with the little elder with shiny black hair and very few teeth at the small garbage bin across from the entrance.

When I arrived, Quinn was using the lid of the bin as a table for a tape dispenser, and carefully taping the arm back onto the elder's glasses. She had a small bleeding abrasion on the side of her nose where the nose piece of her broken glasses had cut into her skin, and a lot to say about it. "That STUPID woman had to hit me for NO GOOD REASON!" she said. "I'm sixty-six and that TWENTY-SOMETHING B**CH thought she'd take a piece of me. COWARD. Now she's HIDING inside."

Quinn confirmed that he'd seen a younger woman "clock" the older one, and that he'd gone inside to ask the Bissell's nurse for help outside (better to keep the two parties apart), but the nurse was already swamped by people needing attention. So I waited with the little woman while Quinn went back in to see what he might do for the elder first aid-wise.

I asked her name. "I'm Effie," she told me. 

"But there's more to your name than that, I'll bet," I said. "What is Effie short for?"

"My full name is Ephthemia. It's Greek. Do you know what it means?"

"Greek!" I exclaimed. "It's a beautiful name. But how did you get a Greek name?" 

"My dad knew a Greek guy," she said. "Ephthemia means Beautiful Butterfly. That's me. I'm a beautiful butterfly."

"You definitely are," I agreed, and pointed to her t-shirt, which bore the image of a woman with butterflies in her hair. Delighted that I'd noticed, Ephthemia wrapped me in a hug. I asked where she lived, and she told me she had a place in a nearby seniors' affordable housing building.

Quinn returned wearing medical gloves, carrying gauze and a little vial of saline solution. He asked Effie's name and got the same story I did, but without the hug. He carefully swabbed the cut on her nose and told her to stay away from the young woman who had hit her and suggested that she go see the nurse anyway to get checked for concussion.

Effie said, "I'm not afraid of HER! I've gotten worse beatings from a KITTEN." She gave me another hug, I told her to take care, and Quinn and I headed back to the car.

"Did you see what actually happened?" he asked me.

"No, I was folding up."

"I saw the girl hit her, hard, but I'm suspecting Effie smacked the girl's uncle on the head first, or maybe poked her as she walked by. I guess we'll never know."

"With a name like Ephthemia, she's certainly one of a kind," I said. "I wonder if it means what she says it does. I've never heard it before." 

When I arrived home, I looked up Ephthemia/Efthimia, and it actually translates as "well-spoken." But if "beautiful butterfly" suits her self-image better, I definitely won't argue. 

Effie will have a shiner today, but hopefully it won't matter too much because Ephthemia knows she is a beautiful butterfly. In my books, and in God's sight, she is.