Oh Where Oh Where Can He Be?

It took over a week, and several trips going to the army headquarters and the General or his aide coming to my park to sort things out. In the end, it didn’t get sorted out right for me. They decided that dead black man was my Mitch. Can you imagine that? And they transferred me Mitch’s pension, life insurance and death pay. What about the poor black man’s real family? They oughta know he’s dead. That money belongs to them.

It was so ridiculous. I told them Mitch was white when he enrolled in the army. He was white the last time I saw him. And that black man, he don’t look nothing like Mitch. They said, well, he’s 6’2’’, so was Mitch, he was 245 lbs, so was Mitch, he had brown eyes, so did Mitch, he had brown hair, so did Mitch, he enrolled in the army 10 years ago, so did Mitch, he had a wife called Mindy and a son called Jesse, so did Mitch. Like, all the particulars about this man were exactly the same as Mitch’s, except he don’t got Mitch’s face and he ain’t Mitch.

And here’s the thing, Mitch checked off “Caucasian” on his army enrollment application. That mean, white guy, right? But every picture they had of Mitch was of that black man. I don’t understand how this could be. When did they get this dead man mixed up with my Mitch? Know what else puzzles me? How come Mitch was in Iraq with no one from his old squadron? He got sent to Iraq by himself. No one knew him there. No one knew what he looked like before he went to Iraq. And now suddenly, Mitch came back a dead black man. How come the army didn’t chase that down?

Instead, they put in their file I was too shocked and upset about Mitch’s death and could not make a positive identification. They’re going with their own records and certifying that Mitch is dead and his body returned to his family. That poor black man, returned to a stranger’s family.

And the bank. They say Mitch never had an account with them. They knew nothing about the money that Mitch saved up over the years. They just know that every month, I was getting a deposit from the army.

And now, I got all that money in my account - $185,000! Because the government put it in there. I don’t want to spend any of it in case the dead man’s family shows up later. But I have no money. Mitch’s money for this month never came in. I gotta dip into that man’s money until something happens. I don’t know what I’m waiting for to happen though.

Sure, the army paid for the funeral, but I still had expenses. They made me go to the funeral and I had to buy a dress. There weren’t a lot of people at the service. Obviously, none of them knew the dead man; none of them knew Mitch neither. I didn’t want to bring everyone from the park, except Sam and Leslie. But they were there for my sake, to make sure nothing crazier happens. I didn’t tell Mitch’s parents either. I mean, c’mon, that’s not Mitch.

It was awful. People started giving me their condolences. I couldn’t say, Hell no, that’s not my husband, I never seen him before until he showed up dead, that’s just some stranger they mistook for Mitch. I didn’t want to sound like a bitch and cause a scene. I mean, whether he’s my husband or not, he’s still dead and don’t deserve to have a scene made at his funeral.

I haven’t told Jesse about any of this yet. What was I supposed to say? Oh, while you were in jail, your dad officially died. But it wasn't him. The government gave us a dead black guy for your father, but then they gave us lots of money too, even though I said the dead guy's not my husband. And because that money belongs to the dead guy’s family, I can’t use it to bail you even though it’s sitting in my bank. And your dad, well I have no idea what happened to him or where he is right now. Actually, that sounds good. Maybe I’ll go with that when I see him.

That is the biggest question, Where is Mitch? What happened to him?