Quite recently I was visited by a ghost from my past, long forgotten in a life I thought I had buried years ago. It came to me in the form of a wild-eyed vagrant outside my office at 700 in the morning.

When I was 19, I spent my first summer away from home working as a dishwasher at the Chateau Lake Louise. It was my first time away from my insulated, upper-middle class world of private school, early university acceptance and good sets of teeth. After 19 years of this, I was shocked by the people who worked at the hotel; to me they seemed like freaks in circus. I had never seen people so ugly, or stupid, or poorly dressed. I am not being cruel here, it was the truth. There were people there that could only have been inbred, at least I hope they were, as at least that would be an excuse for their bizarre faces and strange body proportions. Many of these had no hope in life but to work at a hotel in the middle of a national park, make minimum wage or above, and after years of dutiful service rise to the level of middle manager, taking home $40,000 (this seemed like a loft sum in 1990).

Of course for me, this job was merely a way for me to see the Canadian Rockies and party with other university-bound students. My shift at work was a way to pass the time between waking up and drinking, and the monotony of the job was perfect for a hangover. Once I had "mastered" the job, meaning that I could do it quickly and without having to speak with anyone, I simply went on autopilot, trying to fly under the radar and be left alone by the sadistic French sous-chef.

This led to boredom, and as I just could not get any sense of fulfillment from improving my work surroundings or empowering my colleagues (although I did teach one man to do long division), I turned to tormenting the coworkers who bothered me.

Rodney was one of them. He showed up one day looking for our manager. He knew my manager's name, as he had worked for him as a dishwasher previously, and now he was back here, unannounced, probably directly from prison, to get back on his feet working as a dishwasher. He was an unwelcome addition to our team of Asian students, French Canadians and newfies, so I sought to make him feel unwanted by ordering him around. Rodney constantly told us that he had 6 years of dishwashing experience under his belt, and that he didn't need me to tell him what to do. I liked telling him what to do, being an arrogant little fuck at the time, but he always shot right back at me with his "6 years of dishwashing experience".

I should point out here that Rodney was a wiry but sinewy man about 30 years of age, with black hair and and a black beard that made it difficult to visually determine just how greasy it was or how long it had been since he showered. His teeth had not seen dental floss since his early teens, and he constantly reeked of a body odour than can only be acquired through years of poor hygiene.

Convinced that attempts at patronizing Rodney were only strengthening his position and his resolve, I resorted to more effective and more cowardly tactics. I drew crudely rendered pictures inside the bathroom stall of Rodney in various forms of copulation with easily identifiable coworkers, all male. It didn't take long for him to catch word that his manhood had been taken in some form in view of hundreds of employees. Humiliated and enraged, Rodney burst upon our manager to find out who had made these drawings, threatening to "kill the motherfucker" who made them.

I was terrified once I saw the look in his eyes. I have never seen anything like it since. He had nothing to lose and was ready to go back to prison to show his coworkers that no one messes with him and gets away with it. I can imagine that you can only acquire such an expression after witnessing extremely disturbing events. Rodney would have no reason or mercy once he went off.

He was calmed down by the manager, sent home to chill, and the drawings were removed from the bathroom wall. I ignored Rodney from that day on, leaving him to live in his fantasy world of moving up the dishwashing ladder. Until one day, while I was on pot-washing duty (as opposed to the conveyor belt dishwasher- that took a team of 6), Rodney asked me to mop up the inch of water on the floor that was leaking into his work area. I told him to do it himself if it bothered him, threw my rag in the sink, and went off to look for my afternoon hiding spot to kill the time.

While I was gone, Rodney slipped on the water I had left behind, fell and broke his hip. He was hospitalized for 3 weeks. The next time I saw him he was in a wheelchair at the hospital in Banff, having a smoke outside, enjoying his newfound addiction to morphine.

I never though about Rodney again. Until one day last fall, I was walking to work when a bearded, long-haired vagrant approaches me outside my office. He asks for change, I say no, but I look at the eyes and realize it is him. I am still walking but frozen. He notices that I know who he is.
He says, "hey man, don't you know who I am ?"
No, I say, ready to throw my hot coffee in his face and run into the office.
"Want me to take my shirt off?" A bizarre offer, but he pulls up his shirt to reveal his prison tattoos.
I yell at him to get the fuck away from me.
He backs down, and goes slinking down the alley.

But the eyes; I could not get over the madness in those eyes.