"Miss Ribbon," Little Ray-Ray had asked her one day, back in those apartment days, sitting on her stoop, his top lip sticky pink with fruit punch. "So why you always wear that ribbon up on your head?"

"Because I like it there, little man."

"The kids say its 'cause you ain’t right."

“Ain’t right?”

“Yeah, like maybe you be crazy.”

“Now Ray-Ray, don't you think it takes more than a ribbon in someone's hair to make them crazy? Dear Jesus."

Ray-Ray said nothing, just shrugged his shoulders slightly and went on sipping his punch, and that was that, but it seemed since then, especially around young children, she found herself often wondering if folks thought she was crazy. Doesn’t a crazy person have to act crazy to be crazy? Lord knows, she just minds her own business and walks with her rolling suitcase and sits and reads and naps and hardly ever talks to anyone, mostly going unnoticed, she thinks. Since when did wearing a ribbon mean anything? She had always worn a ribbon in her hair, every day of her life, at least ever since she could remember. Her daddy had loved her ribbons and said she looked like a little lady when she wore them. Almost 50 years now, sweet Jesus, since she saw her daddy, but she still remembers that he just loved her ribbons, especially when her hair was puffed out and smooth, like a hat. Her favorite thing is to wear a thick white satiny ribbon, loves the way it stands out against her black, black skin and hair. “Black as night.” Her daddy used to tease. “In the dark you gonna disappear on me?”

Nowawdays, when she ties the bow up nice, in the sour-smelling bathroom of the shelter each morning, she feels like the ribbon somehow brings her from invisible to visible, that now, with a bright white bow on the top of her head, people might see her. Since she is not a panhandler, and refuses to beg for money like a common derelict, she quite enjoys from time to time when someone starts a small chat with her, that’s when she knows then the ribbon must be working.

In some strange way, she feels the ribbon keeps her in God’s view also. More than anything, she didn’t want to disappear from God’s view. Being out here, day after day, in this Texas sun that at times seems so ruthless and just plain mean, it's hard sometimes. She hates to admit this, because she knows God never gives us more than we can handle, but sometimes she gets quite lonesome and weary and she feels that heavy blueness come over her, heavier than the sun, or the heat; darker than the night. But at times like that, she simply thinks on her favorite hymn…

Why should I feel discouraged,
Why should the shadows come,
Why should my heart feel lonely,
And long for heaven and home…

And sometimes, when she really needs to, she sings it out loud, (though now she resists the urge to sing in her bed at the shelter, as many of the women are backsliders and sinners and yell at her to shut up) but while she walks, or while she sits on a church stoop or bus stop bench. When she has nowhere to go she sings, praying that God will hear her sweet voice praising Him, and see her heart, pure as snow, and maybe he’ll send a blessing or two her way. She sings loud, for all of the heavens to hear…

I sing because I'm happy,
I sing because I'm free,
His eye is on the sparrow,
And I know He watches me…

And she truly does believe this to be true, that He is watching. But, just so He doesn’t happen to lose sight of her, there's always the ribbon in her hair, with the bow tied perfectly on the top of her head, just like her daddy had liked.