I'm Trying to be the Shepherd

I've decided that it's important to acknowledge panhandlers. Ralph Ellison discussed invisiblity in "Invisible Man" and I think that if I was a bum on the street, I would at least want people to politely say "no" rather than ignoring me and not acknowledging my existence.

This means that if someone tries to talk to me, I will stop and listen to them. I'm not going to brush past them. I stop in order to find out if these people are begging for money, or if they might have something to say.

Today, a man approached me. I stopped, took out my headphones, and listened to him. He was, at first, surprised, and then acknowledged the fact that he was thankful that I didn't just zip by him.

Then he did something that I wasn't expecting... he offered his hand for shaking. I felt like a real jerk, even though I had stopped, because there was no way in the world that I was going to shake his hand. I'd washed my hands 4 times at work, and used alcohol sanitizer on them 5 times. In fact, I had done so not ten minutes prior. I wasn't touching this hand, filthy or not. I bet it's been in some very weird places and I wasn't going to take any chances. (I will discuss hand-washing in a future post... stay tuned cause this blog is just getting started! )

The man turned out to be selling subway tokens, but I wasn't buying. He was angry because he thought he had a mark in me, but it takes a great deal for me to give money to a panhandler; food yes, money no.

Nevertheless, I will shrug my shoulders and say sorry when I pass someone asking for change. Most of the time, I do have change, but I'm not going to go crazy here.