I live in a rapidly growing city. Denver sometimes smells like urine and you probably won’t walk a block down our main drag without getting asked for change or a cigarette. My city is beautiful.
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I told you that so I could tell you this.
One recent night, I sat in a booth at my local Taco Bell. They were a little short staffed, and tensions ran high. The poor girl behind the counter had obviously been put through the ringer. I imagine all manner of drunken assholes had berated her and blamed all of their night’s issues on the fact that they had to wait for their XL grilled stuffed burritos. I observed the tense and disgruntled patrons as they gained a sense of camaraderie. They united in their mutual discontent of not being fed in less than thirty seconds.
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Somewhere between the patrons’ side-glances and nods of discontent, a woman walks in, her back hunched. She meanders between patrons as they stand in wait for their wax-paper packaged diabetes.
She stopped and whispered at each person individually. One by one they shook their heads solemnly. Several didn’t even acknowledge her existence. Staring blank faced at the wall, they blatantly ignored her as she talks at them.
Finally she sauntered up to me. We made eye contact, and she asked me for five to ten dollars. Her reasons were undecipherable, as they were buried in arbitrary grumbling and body shakes.
I declined. She said bless you, and walked on to a family at a table. The night went on.
As we all sat there, a little taken a back at a body walking directly into an establishment at 11:00 pm and asking for money, it seemed that we were all confronting our own feelings, sentiments and judgments about the scenario that had just come to pass.
Midway through a smug thought about how I had come so far I hear this snot nose little shit trill from the other side of the room. “CAN YOU BELIEVE THE AUDACITY OF THAT WOMAN. COMING IN AND ASKING FOR FIVE TO TEN DOLLARS.”
He looked around the lobby (because my Taco Bell has no dining room, it’s merely a lobby) for validation for his profound statement. He then pontificated, “WHAT NERVE. WHY? SO YOU CAN GO BUY CRACK ON THE CORNER WITH IT.”#meangirlsquotes
At this point, he stared me directly in the face, while I’m trying not to look at him for fear of what will happen next, and yet he persists.
So to stay true to the Taylor Mali quote “If you ask for it I have to give it to you.” I looked at him and laid bait. “I don’t see it that way.”
Dumbfounded, this young man responds with the question, “Why?”
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I said, “THE REALITY IS, A LARGE MAJORITY OF OUR POPULATION IS NOT HOMELESS AND PANHANDELING BECAUSE THEY ARE MERELY DRUG ADDICTED. THEY SUFFER FROM MENTAL ILLNESS THAT YOU HAVE NO COMPREHENSION OF. THEY FREQUENTLY USE DRUGS TO SELF MEDICATE ISSUES THAT WE AS A SOCIETY REFUSE TO HELP THEM FIX.” #socialgood
For many of our “homeless,” the lifestyle most of us enjoy was never presented as an option. As a forty-year-old black woman with a potential mental disability she is one of the most marginalized groups in America.
“THE FACT THAT SHE ASKED FOR FIVE DOLLARS AND NOT FIFTY CENTS, SAYS THAT SHE HASN’T GIVEN UP ON BEING A PART OF SOCIETY. BUT OUR SOCIETY HAS GIVEN UP ON HER.”
With that, everyone in the “lobby” stared at me and the young man. He awkwardly turned around to grab his bag of burritos, now chilled by time and tension and walked out.
I don’t feel I had all that much of an effect on him. And it’s not his fault, because in hindsight, I recognize that he most likely focused on the fact that he got dressed down at a Taco Bell by a stranger. But damn, it felt good to yell my opinions loudly in public!
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