Mid-week Meanderings

Help!! My seatbelt is eating my face!
I was driving in to work Monday morning. When I am at the stop lights I tend to look around me and see who else is driving to wherever.
This morning I looked behind me and there was a man of considerable size with the seatbelt across his face. It was going from left to right and squished his face into a weird smile. His face was becoming redder the longer this went on.
He attempted to lean forward towards the glove box and the seatbelt would give him no quarter. It really looked like something on a hidden camera show. I was hoping to get Punk’d or have my ride Pimp’d but no camera crews came rushing out and the light changed. He finally got the seatbelt to the right spot after driving for a bit. What the heck was he doing? I love the things we people do. Life is the best situation comedy.

Paranoimia, Paranoimia – See Art Of Noise
Thanks to the state of the world today I fell into the “Be Ever Vigilant” trap. I was leaving the ramp and walked past a Beemer with the gas cap open and looking really weird. There was a strap holding the cap on, the gas door was mostly closed, but there was something else that looked like a wire that didn’t belong in the gas area so I let the Ramp Manager know to check it out.
It just seemed odd enough to say something and if I hadn’t I would have felt strange about it all day. I don’t think I am paranoid, but more apt to be alert to things that seem out of place. Last week I went to a movie (I know, big surprise) and I had my work bag/satchel with me. This would not be strange, but as I dug through it looking for the gum I thought I stashed in it, I started thinking about the London bombings and how the eyewitnesses said one of the bombers was looking through his bag before the explosions took place. I looked over at the guy a few seats away from me to see if he was watching me. He was enjoying the flick, not paying me any mind, but it made me wonder about stuff like that. I will admit that right after 9-11 I was a little on edge as were most people whether they will admit it or not. Being a bit on high alert during the weeks following 9-11, I was a little disturbed by a woman asking a guy to watch her bags while she went to the bathroom during a movie. It was about a month before Christmas and the Mall Of America was a place that was supposedly threatened at one point. It was hard for me to concentrate on the movie until she came back.
I started to think about how people live their day to day lives in countries that have bombings on a fairly regular basis. I can’t believe you would ever get used to it. I guess you have to live, so you do just that. You live.

"Get a f@#$ing job!"
That is what the driver of a car turning a corner yelled at the person with the sign soliciting cash from passers by. It was Saturday, It was stinkin' hot. It made me angry.
It's not that I haven't thought the same at times with less ferocity, but I would never try to debase another human being that way. I really thought the shouter was a coward. It's easy to yell things as you pass by from the safety of your car. It would have been braver to stop and hand the person a sandwich or keep your mouth shut and drive by.
I volunteered at St.Stephen's shelter for men for three years as an overnight volunteer. As an ONV I did a mail call, handed out towels, job duties and hung out. We spent our nights playing cards, talking, watching TV or reading.
During that time I came to understand some things about some of the homeless men there. Some are there because they made bad choices, some for addiction, alcohol and drug, some for mental disabilities and some because they were one paycheck away from the street.
What ever the reason, I never lost sight that each of them was a human being and wanted to be treated as such. The main rule at the shelter was "Respect Everyone"
It was hard to go to the shelter some nights and in the end I eventually burned out. It always serves as a reminder to me that anyone could end up there and things aren't always as bad as they can seem.
I try to think of that when I am whining about things, that my life could be different, I could be on the short end of the stick. I am glad I am not. I believe that everyone going through something tough is in their own private hell, be it larger or smaller than the next person. You just can't give up and you shouldn't ever lose sight that you will get through it.
I don't always give and I don't always act super friendly to people coming up asking for things, but I do remember they are a person. I still see some of the guys from the shelter here and there. Some are doing well. The shelter has advocates that work to help these guys find housing and jobs and check in on them.
All I am trying to say is that remember these folks are people too, no matter what. Don't take any abuse form them either. Don't think I am asking you to like all of them or hug them or anything like that. People struggle in this life for various reasons, why make it any harder than it can already be.

Motto - Langston Hughes

I stay cool, and dig all jive,
That's the way I stay alive.
My motto, as I live and learn, is
Dig and be dug, in return.