This is another example of an interesting and tragic character from my early life experiences.

Harlie was a man of unconsidered opinion. Seldom did he let the facts get in the way of what he thought and what he thought was of little consequence to most people who had heard it all before. And having long since ceased their polite listening, they were not likely to notice any new insights he thought he had to offer.

Nonetheless, he interpreted the silent inattention of others as rapt interest in the truth that he alone possessed. He did not require a reply; in fact, he would have considered it an interruption.

Harlie spoke as if his truth required excessive volume and a punctuation of the profound with the profane and the obscene. “Every other word” is what people mostly noticed, if anything, and the rest of what he said was considered no more than filling in the blanks.

He would go the local restaurant where others were sitting at a long table having their morning coffee. He took his spot at the head of the table that everyone else considered the far end. If only the table was longer, they thought.

Ongoing conversation would come to protective halt so that he would not immediately interrupt and speak with presumed authority on the current topic. The silence served as an acknowledgement of his arrival and left space for him to quickly fill along with the empty chair he occupied. Sitting quietly and listening to others had never occurred to him as a way to be included.

Harlie’s ample girth forced him to sit back on his chair so that he could not comfortably reach his coffee cup on the table. Instead, he rested it, one pudgy finger barely fitting into the handle, on the upper contour of his bulging stomach. He occupied his other hand by feeding himself an oozing, fruit-filled pastry between noisy slurps of coffee with cream and three sugars.

“Who ordered this weather?” he said loudly, as he did almost everyday, regardless of the weather, and laughed each time as if it were the first time and actually funny. His coffee cup bounced on his belly laugh, slopping contents on to his shirt, still stained from yesterday, and probably the days before.

Harlie had lived his entire life with his widowed mother. She had grown old while he had never grown up. He remained a child, almost infant-like, in his appetite for attention. It was more than his mother was capable of satisfying and remained a deficit for him as the years passed. His mother simply wore herself out caring for him and left him looking grubby and neglected. He was also left behind and left out as his peers quickly outgrew him.

Harlie had never really done anything or been anywhere interesting that would have drawn the attention of others. The thoughts he expressed reflected the active fantasy life of someone who had been ignored into a life of social isolation. Harlie had missed much of the very socialization he needed to have a real life and be included by others. He craved that inclusion and at the same time he was suspicious of anyone who offered it.

“What do you want to know for?” he would often reply to a polite inquiry into his health and well-being, or most often, that of his mother. “It’s none of your (bleeped) business,” he sometimes added.

His suspicion and general naivete about the real world often fueled his flights of fancy into paranoia. Today, the clouds were probably the result of an experiment by the government to control the weather for yet to be determined but sinister reasons. Harlie clearly had an opinion on who had ordered that weather. He did not see the obvious benefits of impending rain that had been the topic of discussion by others around the table. His opinion was not considered.

Although people did not listen to Harlie, they noticed how much he ate, so he ate a lot to be noticed, with no apparent awareness of their revulsions. Like a child, he kept outgrowing his clothes as he expanded in size from trying to satisfy his longings.

Harlie especially liked to order a deep-fried half chicken with a double order of fries, pie and ice cream for dessert, and a grilled cheese sandwich to fill whatever space was left in his stomach. He completed his eating binge with a couple of diet pops, as if to purge all the calories he had just consumed.

“Got to stay in shape,” he would say with a loud laugh, patting his extended stomach.

Despite little exercise, Harlie was born with considerable physical strength. He liked to pull up his shirtsleeves and flex his biceps for anyone who might glance his way. In the body of a big, strong man, his craving for attention and suspicious temperament made him a potential threat to others. No one took him seriously enough to consider that possibility.

Harlie started lifting the fronts of cars up off of their suspension as high as he could as a demonstration of his strength. People, particularly the owners of the cars, took notice with some uneasiness. He was beginning to intrude physically into their lives.

And he began a curious twitching of his head and neck as he spoke, as if he were trying to rid himself of something going on in his mind.

“Have you been watching Harlie?” people began to ask each other.

One day, for no reason except what may have been apparent in Harlie’s mind, he put a chokehold on someone who looked at him as he entered the restaurant.

“What are you looking at?” was the only warning from Harlie.

The strangled reply of “nothing, nothing,” seemed to satisfy him and he quickly let go.

Harlie “went to Fergus” that day. It was what people said politely when anyone was taken away to the mental hospital in that nearby community. He went there in the back of the sheriff’s car, without a chance to lift it off of its suspension.

Harlie finally did something and went somewhere that really drew the attention of others. It was only for a brief moment in time. He never came back. The others went about their business. He was soon forgotten.