Reality Check

I was walking through campus one day, on my way to lunch with a friend, when I realized I was about to walk past the homeless guy that asks for quarters all the time.  I’ve been told that he’s not really homeless, but he sure looks like he is.  Before I was aware of what I was doing, I diverted past the Grant Street Garage so that I could bypass him.

Why did I avoid him?  Was it because I was uncomfortable with his asking for money?  Maybe it was his unkempt appearance and smell?  Was I in a hurry and didn’t want to stop?  Or did I just not want to give him anything and so avoided the whole experience?  I’ve given him quarters before.  A couple of times I only had dollar bills and so that’s what he got.  I remember thinking that I didn’t have any cash on me that day, so maybe I was feeling guilty because even though I’ve given him money in the past, that day I wasn’t going to.  I was on my way to a lunch I really didn’t need and he was there in his usual spot panhandling for whatever money he could get.  He certainly doesn’t look over-fed while I’ve been overfed for at least 20 years.

I don’t really know anything about this guy, other than his propensity for panhandling and his ability to make all kinds of people really uncomfortable.  I’ve often wondered why I don’t follow through on the spur of the moment things I think of when I’m out and about.  I see a young mother with a small child and it’s raining but they don’t have an umbrella.  I want to give them mine but I don’t.  I see a scruffy man at an intersection with a sign asking for work or money as I sit in my car, munching on something completely unneeded while I wait for the light to change and I don’t give him the $5 I have in my purse that I would never miss.

Sometimes their pain is more than I can bear.  My heart aches for the teenager who is convinced that she has ruined her life by getting pregnant.  My stomach hurts when I see the guy with the sign at the intersection, no coat or hat, offering to work for food.  I cry for the child in the grocery store who is clearly exhausted and crying, while his mother – equally exhausted and almost crying – drags him up and down the aisles because she has no money for a babysitter and no food in the house and not enough in food stamps.  But I don’t really do anything.  Why is that?  I know that I can’t fix it all, so I don’t even start.  Not even a good excuse, but it’s all I’ve got.  I think it’s time to start now.

I wonder if that’s part of what’s behind the Occupy movement.  People coming together because they can’t keep ignoring the bad in life anymore.  It’s not so much about a specific goal or demand, but about knowing things are not good, and knowing something needs to be done, and feeling so helpless at making that change.  I know I need to do something, anything.  I just don’t know what.  I think a lot of the people participating in the Occupy actions are in the same place.  For awhile I’ve told my husband that a change is coming, I wonder if this is the change – regular people saying we want things fixed.

First there was the Arab Spring.  Amazing things have happened there, but there’s still such a long way to go.  Now it’s America’s “Arab Spring.”  I want to be part of it, but I can’t Occupy Wall Street because I have to work.  I can’t Occupy Chicago, or Los Angeles, or St. Louis.  I want to be part of the conversation, though.  I don’t know what I have to say, only that I want to say something.  I found a possible venue – occupy cafe.  It’s an online occupy movement.  I don’t know if it’s the answer for me, but it’s a start.