The other day when I was thinking about the story where a rickshaw driver stops to help an old woman who falls in front of him as he is pulling along a man on his way to work. The man, the narrator, is in a hurry, the day is cold and windy, the woman isn’t even hurt (thinks the man getting a ride to work) He wears a fur-lined coat, and is impatient. He has a vision, is startled to realize how much he had been affected by this incident some six years ago now. He reflects on how he felt at the time, how he watched the driver stop, help up the old woman, guide her to the safety of a police station, all without a second thought.
To mull over this story is what we are to do. Think about how we might be like the narrator, or other character in the story. And so on. And to pay attention to details that we noticed.
The only way I could relate to such a story and situation, was to think about the times when I see homeless people along the roads, asking for money, or just walking along, pushing shopping carts, weighed heavily down with sloppy possessions, flapping maybe in the breeze, or wind-whipped somehow. Like the old woman’s clothing which gets entangled in the shafts of the rickshaw.
So I’m driving along 44th Ave in Lynnwood and I notice large flapping clothing along the side of the road. Its a man, probably fairly young man, fit, walking normal speed, with a large dark blanket wrapped around him, flapping in the breeze. Its clear the guy has recently got up from sleeping somewhere outside, sleeping rough as they say, and now he’s out and about and on his way. To where ever he goes for the day. Where the homeless and those living rough spend their days. Out to get food, a meal, some things needed, heading toward maybe some of his stuff is stashed.
Have you noticed the terrible situation of the homeless at Bitter Lake in north Seattle? Or Green Lake? Lack of leadership on the part of the city. Said someone recently commenting on how people are leaving Seattle these days in droves, getting out of town, so downhearted, so saddened by what is happening in their once-beautiful city, now made ugly by the smear of blue tarps and tan and grey tents, sold some ten or more years ago at K-mart or Sears or even thirty years ago at REI, now housing one or two people, under the trees along the sides of the freeways. A few corners like that last for a while here and there, even out here in the lily-white suburbs or what used to be such. How far out now are the tents along the freeway north of town?
When did I ever start seeing homeless people living in tents, and when did I ever care? Can’t remember.
Today driving west on 164th near Martha Lake, a corner just west across the street from the west side of the park, green grass or weeds, and trees, and bushes, and blue tarps, some trampled-down places, some garbage, some stuff and then some more garbage. Why do I even bother to notice?
Because one of my relative might be there. Not right now. But one of these days.