The Cold, Dark Night

I heard a rumor that boneless, skinless chicken was on sale at the grocery across the street, so I decided to find out for myself. On the way, I saw an obviously homeless man sitting on a low wall in the parking lot of our apartments. He was leaning forward and swaying back and forth a little, clutching a water bottle in his left hand. I couldn't see his face because he was leaning so far in, and the hood on his jacket was covering his face.

I wondered what I could do for him. It was cold outside already and getting colder by the hour.

I didn’t know what to do, so I kept walking. The grocery had closed early, so I turned around and came back. I thought that maybe I could figure out some way to help him in the meantime. Beyond giving him cash, I couldn’t think of anything.

It didn’t matter ultimately: he was gone by the time I got back. So I went on down the parking lot to get some things I had left in the car. As I was opening the trunk, I heard a familiar slow, metallic “tap, tap, tap.” It was the sound of a metal cane on a hard surface.

I looked farther down and saw him. And his cane was splayed out like the man I wrote about here. I wondered if it was, so I started following him.

He had a head-start on me, but I saw him turn onto one of the sidewalks leading to the interior of the property. When I got to that sidewalk, I could still hear the slow “tap, tap, tap” ringing in the cold, dry air.

But then I lost him.

I walked around for a while in the trying to find him, but all I found was two little raccoons playing. I watched them for a while, all the time wondering where the mystery man had disappeared to.

And I don’t know what I would have done had I found him. Give him money? Since he wasn’t soliciting for any, would that insult him? Give him a blanket and then let him sleep out in the cold?

Things like that baffle me on both moral and spiritual levels. My ingrained beliefs tell me to help when I can, but there doesn’t seem to be a way to do that, far too often. It frustrates me.

We’re sitting here watching TV in the relative lap of luxury. No servants, but a roof over our heads and a refrigerator full of food. Central heat that will stave off the cold night. A car that is less than 2 years old with less than 10,000 miles on it that gets amazing gas mileage. Health care. DSL. Magazine subscriptions. Books everywhere you look. And a warm, very comfortable bed.

It’s New Years Eve, and there’s an old man out there in the cold, dark night slowly tap-tap-tapping his way to a destination I don’t know. I wonder if he realizes that a new year starts in less than two hours, or if he even cares. He’s probably more worried about survival.

I can only hope that he does survive. He went out of my earshot and into the care of God. I hope and pray that God watches over him this cold, dark night.