There is a homeless man that sits outside my writer’s office, late at night.
I make it a habit to look him in the eye. All because I was watching Oprah one day, and a lady who had been homeless said - "The worst thing about living on the streets is, people don’t look you in the eye. It’s like they don’t want to acknowledge you exist.”
And so, in a bid to acknowledge these people exist… I constantly find myself looking into the eyes of the sad and crazy.
I hope my eyes say: “Hey dude, I see YOU. You exist.”
But they probably say: “I feel guilty about not giving you money, and now I’m off to buy stuff, for myself.”
Lately, this particular homeless man has started to recognize me, and now grins at me saying “How about tonight, Sweetheart!?” as he holds out his cup.
Fuck! I feel so obligated to give him something. It’s like we’re neighbors, and he’s asking me for a cup of sugar… every single night. But if I give him a dollar tonight… am I going to give him a dollar tomorrow night?
This question will hang over both our heads, every night, for the rest of the year.
***
Fuck it. After writing the above, I gave him a dollar. I planned on giving him a twenty, in hope to buy his silence for the next month or so, but I fumbled and ended up producing a mere dollar, which I stuffed guiltily into his cup.
He was grateful, but the capitalist-jew inside me felt like he didn’t really deserve it. Should I have bought him a mouth organ?... or some water pastels to help him break out of this begging cycle? There’s a fine line between being generous, and being a sucker.
I will give money to anyone who so much as bangs a pen on the side-walk, to a beat. As long as they’re doing something. (Condescending much?) Once, with my good friend Glenn Iris, I bought a drawing from a homeless man who was off his chops on smack. We decided $15 was an apt price for such an effort to be entrepreneurial, at 1am in the morning, and it would make the perfect gift for our beloved mate, T-bird!
Post purchase, and on closer inspection, we realized the drawing was a photocopy, that we could barely touch for fear of homeless germs.
Bless T-bird, who put it up on the fridge in a gesture of gratitude… or simply to remind us of what suckers we were.
I guess nothing has changed.
This homeless man will continue to exist. And I will continue to feel guilty, until I cave, and buy him a saxophone, or a new car.
Oh it was a sincere gesture of gratitude! There's still a certain amount of craftsmanship in photocopying. Right? There's skill in that...there's an art to it. Certainly skill in working the one in my office. No I honestly treasure the piece! Only when reading your post however did I notice how ironic that I hung the 'photocopy that we could barely touch for fear of homeless germs' on the fridge. Aha.
ReplyDeleteLove ya to bits AK.
T-Bird
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Ha ha! T-bird, I'm so glad you honored it! Apparently most viruses can't survive outside of warm, moist environments, so the fridge was a great choice. And you're right about photocopiers.
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