I was walking on Larkin Street in downtown San Francisco at ten in the evening. At almost every block, panhandlers approached me. With the housing crisis and the continued decline of living quality in a big city like SF, even securing a space on the sidewalk seems to meet tough competition. In order to entice pedestrians to chuck out a dollar or two for them, they got to do something interesting instead of just begging.
One guy was belting out from the top of his head like Sammy Hagar. Was it because he was in real pain, or for show? Another guy was a tall, muscular guy. He crossed the street to meet me. With a big friendly smile on his face, he rolled up his T-shirt to show me his well-sculpted arms. He told me he was happy to be my bodyguard. I didn’t have enough to hire him all night. I gave him only a couple of dollars. Without losing his smile, he quietly walked away.
I’m sure some of you readers must have wondered like me, what twisted combinations of ill circumstances brought them to live on the street night after night. Some of them have been working diligently. Then they got sick. Unable to go to work, the paycheck stopped. No pay, no money for the rent or mortgage. They had no relatives or friends to depend on, so they were out on the street. This is a relatively new type of homelessness.
Some of other homeless people might have grown up in broken homes. Incompetent adults, who themselves lacked wisdom, might have dominated their lives. Some of them might have been regularly neglected and abused physically, mentally and socially. Alcoholism, drug abuse, prostitution are just a few of the outcomes of causations deeply rooted in their past.
It seems to me, changing the way we are takes more than our will power. We need to feel that our lives matter in a deep, concrete sense. The character in this song, “Just Pray For Me,” saddens me because she lacks the sense. Here are the lyrics.
She had lost faith in a conventional concept of God long time ago. All she fears is retribution for her wrongdoing. She cannot believe that her life has a meaning. Yet she prays that someone tells her it does.
I thought one day, “Maybe compassion means imagination.” What I meant was, the more vivid imagination you exercise in order to be in the position of others, the more you succeed in being compassionate. This song was born out of my attempt to have empathic imagination on someone’s suffering.
I’ve never met this person. But in a way I have. When you listen to this song, I hope you use your imagination as well. Let me know if you were able to create a great sequel to this story. I hope in your version, she gets to live a happier life.
