Had a moment a bit ago where I seriously wanted to both keep on keeping on and at the same time hide under my shawl.
Bus driver was more than a little judgemental of an older guy with no money. Something was hanging out of the far pocket and the driver assumed the guy must have money for "that" but not for fare so he could just get off and stop trying to get a free ride. I don't know what "that" was, it was out of my sight. The turbaned driver would not stop lecturing the guy.
I stepped up and asked loudly, "Is there a problem with the fare?" and started dropping money into the farebox. The older guy moved to the back of the bus and hid his face. The driver had to be prompted to give me the transfer I had just paid for. I looked around and walked the distance to the back and handed the guy his transfer. As I walked up back to my seat, a few people grinned and one young gent started calling out that "that is what this world needs! More people like you! Good on ya!" Others muttered more of the same loud enough to be heard.
When I realized how many people were paying specific attention to me, I realized the statement I had just made with my act and just how "loud" and public it was. I was both feeling good and yet very shy and exposed. It bothers me that someone asking for help is so pre-judged as being lazy, wasteful and useless, a thrown away piece of offal to be thrown to the streets and the garbage heaps. It is an offense to me against my humaness (not humanity....humaness...that which is so very human) that a person is judged for having a pack of cigarettes with them (could have been given!), or that they should ask for a few dollars for a beer while poor. Why shouldn't they? Why should a person of priviledge be allowed to escape the day's stressors and pain with a drink or ten, but a person whose entire life is a struggle to just survive be denied an hour of relaxation, a touch of pleasure? Are they not human, too?
How dare we judge or pre-judge another when there is not one of us that is more than a single accident, illness or misfortune away from suffering the same fate? In this economy, that is all it takes to drive us into poverty. How dare we allow another to suffer for the sake of a dollar or two when we have beds to sleep in, food to eat and the priviledge of the occasional drink or smoke or whatever other vice we might have? How dare we judge the many by the one or two that do scam?I have given up. I have given up the chance that this or that person might be one of the few scammers. No more. I will not risk not giving when it is needed on the rare and off chance that the person *might* be a scammer. The scammer can learn, too and that also is a chance I'll take. What if the person is a crook? I don't care any more. What if they are not? It is far far more likely that the person is in need that I will not gamble that they are not.
I don't care what religion you practice, I don't care if you're atheist, christian, hindi, buddhist or pagan. I don't care if you believe in heaven, hell, the summerlands or nothing at all. All these are trappings and decoration for the one thing that matters. The one thing that has the only value in life. The one thing that if you have it, you have everything. It is called LOVE. It doesn't matter if you're rich or poor or somewhere in between. Feel free to believe or not believe whatever you want but the one thing that has the power to change this entire era around is LOVE.If they have the gumption to ask, I have the gumption to give what I can.
If someone has the gumption to outright ask me for a beer, I'll walk them over to the liquour store and buy them a freakin' beer! And I'm not being fascetious.
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