Remembering Hatoon

Remembering Hatoon

The community's reaction to Hatoon Victoria Adkins' death last Tuesday was extraordinary, but in many respects not surprising, given the number of people whose lives in one way or another intersected hers, even if only briefly.

Hatoon was a familiar figure at Knight Library, and nearly everyone who works in the building can recall conversations with her. Often she would tell you about a dozen or more things that had recently happened to her, including the disappearance of something valuable to her or essential to the security of our society, or she would give account of a handful of preternatural phenomena, whose relationship to one another the listener was expected to understand. She met the challenge of mental illness and homelessness with pluck and a good deal of charm. She thrived on contact with other people, and there are but few library employees who have not had exchanges with her.

I remember when I was pregnant with my daughter. Hatoon was delighted when she found out. One day she told me that my unborn child had a wonderful, shining aura and was "an embryo of God". I took this seriously and I was very moved by it. It was obvious that whatever else was going on with her, she nourished a woman's heart, and I found that to be our common ground.

—Lonni Sexton

— — —

On March 1, 2005, I was wandering the fourth floor stacks of Knight, and as I passed the women's bathroom my thoughts turned to a moment to Hatoon. I hadn't seen her for a while, except from a distance, and I could tell by the silence emanating from the bathroom that she wasn't around at the moment. When she was, there was always a little murmur of sound as she talked to whoever was with her, either physically or psychically, at the moment. Since unless I saw her Hatoon rarely entered my thoughts, it was uncanny to hear later the same day that she had been struck and killed by a car while crossing Franklin Boulevard against the light on her bicycle.

Although you could also see her around Knight reading or sleeping, Hatoon spent a lot of time hanging around the various women's rooms. She cleaned and groomed herself and made sure her makeup was looking good. She was very into fashion and appearance and would often comment on other's looks or clothes. She was also very concerned with child abuse and with keeping babies and children out of danger. This topic formed one of her main streams of discussion. Throughout the years I knew her she seemed to have several main themes of focus, covert surveillance, especially through technology, being another.

Like many others, I sometimes avoided Hatoon simply because I didn't have an extra ten minutes to engage with her, but when I did spend the time listening I often heard little "gems of wisdom" buried in the flow of stream-of-consciousness monologue. One gem I've never forgotten is "Anger is so aging".

I always wondered if she was just one step aside from the normal enough to actually know about things that we might think are just paranoid fantasies. For example, she talked about people making war with noise right before I first read about how very low frequencies could be used in just that way— did she "know" it or had she read it before me?

To me, Hatoon embodied the "holy fool", both inconvenient and wise, and it seems that others honoured her that way as well. Anger may be aging, but Hatoon's anger never seemed directed at anyone for ill. I'm guessing if she had been in control of her last words, they might well have been "protect the children".

—Harriett Smith

— — —

She frequently visited the Douglass Room, sometimes to talk to whomever was at the desk, occasionally to listen to music. One of our student assistants remembers one time when it was raining outside and Hatoon decided she needed to do something about the weather. She asked for a recording of "Summer" from Vivaldi's, The Four Seasons. It's hardly surprising that by the time she'd finished listening, the sun was shining.

—Terry McQuilkin

— — —

"Isn't that the pits?," Hatoon would say almost every morning after telling me about something being stolen from her the night before, or about the diseases that hurt the children, or about her having to throw away a piece of clothing because she didn't know where it came from—after all, it may interfere with her insurance papers. She always apologized for having to tell me these things, but it was very important that she say them out loud. She called me Joan of Arc—I was the only person she could trust, she would tell me, because I never appeared on any of her screens.

I have interacted with Hatoon on a daily basis for the last 20 years—starting with when I was the receptionist in the office. A reporter this week, after finding out how long I have known Hatoon, said I must have been a good friend of hers. I replied that I wasn't really a good friend, but that I was a good listener. Yes, it would get annoying after her 3rd or 4th daily visit to the office to see me, but I could never tell her to leave. If I truly was the only one she trusted, I couldn't take that away from her. If she noticed I was very busy with something, rather than interrupt me, she would pull up a chair and write down everything for me to read at a later time.

I will never forget her smiles or her tears. She spent every day decoding the negativity surrounding all of us. She was intent on reversing the aging process, eliminating diseases that affect children, and making the sun shine on the valley every day. When she accomplished all of this, she was going to travel the world.

I'm sure that those of us who regularly interacted with Hatoon received one of her compliments at one time or another. She had a very good sense of color and would always let you know if a color looked good on you—whether it be your sweater or your hair color. After I had put on a few extra pounds one summer, she told me that she would have to decode who or what was "blowing me up!" She wouldn't accept that maybe I had just eaten too many chips or chocolates. Just last week she told me I looked 16 years old, except for the grey sweater I was wearing!

There were times when her presence was annoying, but I will never regret having shown her kindness throughout the years. Knowing her has made me a better person. I know that Hatoon is truly at peace now—no more voices arguing with her or telling her what to do.

—Sheila Gray

— — —

THE MIND OF A LIFE
by Nancy Dahlberg

The library landscape: a Safeway cart,
blue plastic-covered, parked daily
next to rhododendrons, white field daisies,
art deco lamp-post—the bag-lady's
bundled belongings and Hatoon herself
perched on the low brick wall, writing,
hunched over lined paper writing, pen
scrawling furiously to keep up with her leaping
thoughts. I can't avoid her. She knows my name,
knows where to find me. And she will;
but I have no answers for the riddles
her paranoia poses, that knows someone
at a computer is keying in the word baby,
keying in her sister's name, keying in the word
bullshit so that her ankles are swollen with it,
with elephantiasis and that's how
they do it, ruin beautiful women. She has seen
me in her eyelids and warns me never to go
to Africa, even though my dress is lovely
jungle colors. I listen and say nothing, knowing
anything I say she will use against me,
use and misuse to cause her pain.
Today, Hatoon comes to my desk because she's lost
French Toast, a little boy's tee shirt,
a little boy so cute you'd want to keep him,
she says, but you'd better not. She's afraid
whoever finds him might use him
to harm all the babies in her baby love file.
She tells me again, when a child falls,
it's because someone has been using her
research on their computer. She can see it,
her brain's linked to a file Ann in cataloging
controls. Anyone can do damage, commit child abuse,
key in the words arm or armed or guns and the children
will be shot, ready or not. Innocence means in no sense
do the babies have protection. How can they when she
has all the data that the computers in the library invade,
changing the meaning, be mean like that young man
she's in love with, a baby really, the age of your son maybe
but she's hooked, she says, can't help herself
against baby love even at her age. Do you have a son?
I knew that, I know him. I'll bet he likes French toast
and maybe he took the tee shirt, that cute little boy;
you're sure he's not in your drawers?
She has expanded the life of the mind
beyond my imagination,
driven as she is by the rush
of electronic synapses, her brain
wired to the university's computers,
their monitors glaring abuse
only she can decode. Only she has the insight
to interpret the child, the child falling,
linked unaware to the holocaust database,
the books on reserve that feed her
mental inferno—child development
thwarted and we're all at the mercy
of the nazis in administration. Everyone's
involved in this madness, no safe way out
and when she sees me inside her
eyelids, she appears at my desk to report
the latest intrusion on her privacy
in the upstairs bathroom stall
where she cannot urinate, cannot move
her bowels with the camera on her,
everyone watching. Nancy, she pleads,
can't you do something about this? Everything
is backed up to here; and she puts her hand
on the lump between her breasts, hidden
stash of her valuables, while I breathe
my reply, I am so sorry, Hatoon,
I am as helpless as you.

The University of Oregon Daily Emerald also had an article about Hatoon's passing: Losing Hattoon.

To Harriett's Work Page.

To Harriett's Home Page.

To Dreaming at My Desk