I received an e-mail from a friend today. It was about optimism and hope. I felt that I should write about it, a response if you will, partially because I know she’ll see it, and mostly because her writing forced me to take pause in my day to day. That’s an amazing thing, if you stop and consider it (ha!).
How often, in your daily life, do you drop everything for even a second, and strive to absorb every word of something that someone is trying to tell you? I’d wager that it is rare for most of us. To stop someone in their tracks, even for the briefest of moments, is like touching their soul.
In a part of her letter, she spoke of helping the homeless. Having been homeless, I felt I could provide a decent amount of insight to the hope that she spoke of. Instead of writing something new, I’m including something I wrote when I was homeless. I’ve never shared it with anyone, as I’ve always been reluctant in letting anyone know most of what happened to me then, but I feel comfortable enough sharing this piece.
I made it to St Louis today, and have found that it’s exactly like any other city. People are hateful and close minded to those that they don’t understand, and especially those that they see as “lazy”. How surprised they would be to read my writing, hear my music, or see the life I lived no more than three months ago. How shocked would they be to find that I was making more money then, than they probably are now? And why is that important?
But now I am reduced, I am faulted to this. Ragged and unhealthy, being spit on and yelled at from cars. I could go home, I could leave this place and leave this nothingness behind, but I fail to see what that would accomplish. I’ve come to see life and learn from it, and I’m learning, even if the lessons are not what I’d hoped for.
It is amazing to me that, the most giving people that I’ve met on the road have been the people who have the least. Those at the bottom rung of society, who are struck by pedestrians, laughed at and insulted, are those that will give the shirt off their back.
Should it be a required lesson then, for those that live well, to experience what it is to live with nothing?
It’s sometime in the afternoon, and I’m sitting in a park downtown. I look homeless, to be sure, but I get curious looks from those that pass by. I doubt they’ve seen a homeless man write before. There’s another gentleman about ten feet from me, wrapped in a ragged old sleeping bag. His face is red under the sun, and I can see that he’s not sleeping. He’s just tired, hungry, and doesn’t want to move anymore.
That’s an old trick, actually. If you don’t stand up, your stomach won’t hurt quite as badly from the hunger pains. It’s the standing up that kills you; the fetal position is your best bet.
In a way, that’s kind of symbolic of my entire experience out here. I can understand how, once you’ve been to the street, you never really come back. You slowly dwindle, struggle, fight, but eventually, you succumb to it. You give up. Eventually, you’re stuck. Nobody hires a guy who smells like excrement to wash the floors.
And what do you have left but the hope for kindness from strangers? How do you, without help, recover from the street if you have no one to save you?
I’ve shared meals, drinks, and stories with total strangers, in alleys and under bridges. We’ve talked about life and love, who we were and how we got here. Nobody was much different from me. They’d just made a wrong turn in their life, somewhere, and found themselves here, living in the dark underbelly of a hateful city.
All manner of society, programmers, executives, janitors, vietnam veterans, and the mentally ill. We’re all living out here, sleeping under the bridges that others drive on, hoping and wishing that the next day might be just a little bit different.
I always believed that the money that was handed to someone would go to alcohol or drugs, and the truth is that, yes, it happens. Certainly. But I’ve seen it go to so many good things, too.
If only people would wake up. If only people would see that, in turning away, there’s not even the chance of helping someone. It is a lost opportunity to make another life better.
And that’s the hope in me, the idealistic side. You can give your money in hope; what happens with it is not your concern.
All it takes is for one person to help one other, and that is a hard truth. If I helped someone, and you helped someone, the world would be better. If everyone helped everyone else, what would there be left to fix?
I have to go now.
Sadly, the reason I had to go so quickly was because some teenagers were harrassing the old man.
I recently went through a lot of my writing from those six months, and honestly, I’m better for remembering it. I’ve burned a lot of my writing recently, but these have stayed in my binders to remind me of that important and fundamental thing: hope.
Just like my friend, I give and I hope. I may not always be optimistic, and the things I see (and say) may not always be good, but there is beauty in everyone. I’ve seen it. From the bottom, all the way to the top, I’ve seen it.
Look for it wherever you go, and you will never be alone.