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Ten Dollar Bill

For two years now, I don’t leave the house without one or two ten-dollar bills in my pocket. Even though I have given up buying snacks or take-out food for myself, my budget is still very tight these days. I wander out into the pandemic world, curious if I might meet a miracle, or another goddess in disguise. Today it is a frail white lady with long white hair like me. Hesitantly she walks up to me as I am turning from feeding the parking meter. She starts almost inaudibly: “Can I ask you a question?” I move closer looking straight into her big pale blue eyes: “Sure.” Without thinking, I am already pulling out that bill – how could I not? 

She is about my age, late sixties. Just by pure luck, I am not in her shoes. She nods grateful, but says immediately: “Do you have another ten?” I don’t, but I find four more beat up one-dollar notes in my wallet. She asks me for my name, I ask for hers. Suzanne moves closer and confides: ”I’ll tell you something, I have been here for three hours, and you are the first one to give, they all just walk by.“ Trying to hide my ache, I sigh: ”Yeah, I know…”  Not that I really know what it is like to be out on the street like her. But I know rejection, not being looked in the eye, not being seen or heard. These are universal experiences, but some of us are lucky ones. Not hungry today. Some others starve to death. If not physically, then emotionally, or spiritually. And those who can’t help but look away are perhaps starved souls themselves.    Who am I to know ?!?    As I walk on, I sense a bottomless hidden need in this affluent neighborhood of Berkeley's Gourmet Ghetto. After all, we are still in the pandemic which tries to teach us – but we are too busy getting back to "normal" as fast as possible.


Comments

Unknown said…
I love giving a few bucks to people in need. How can we not? I mean all of us with a roof over our heads and food in the fridge...we have at least, little extra.
September 21, 2021 at 1:41 PM
Karina said…
I hope you look those people in the eye when you give! And listen to what else they have to say, spend a little time, if that's what's needed. Sometimes it is not. But for the most part we avoid our own uncomfortable feelings. We rush by, ignore, or avoid eye contact. Yet many people take time for happily making contact with dogs of strangers. I am always curious: why do we love giving to the poor? Does it make us feel better? not so guilty? or is to re-affirm that we after all are better off? The giving serves us, as well. All my life i have noticed how people who don't make much money are more generous, give more, they have been there, they are closer to this situation in their own bones... I myself have been as a child, and later too in my life, in this bottom place, and i remember vividly how one struggles to keep one's dignity, to be seen as part of the human family. Don't we all clamber for that? May we all have open hearts and hands.....
September 21, 2021 at 4:10 PM
Karina said…
Dear Anonymous, thanks for commenting, and for giving. Could you let me know what your first name is? does it start with A? Thanks, K :)
September 22, 2021 at 4:18 PM
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