By Mitakuye Oyasin - DJRaspy.com
I would like to share a story with you all...
I was at work last night, and there's been this old guy hanging around there. He's got to be at least 60, maybe even in his 70's. Because of his situation in life, it's kind of hard to tell his actual age. His circumstances have probably aged him quite a bit. 
You TOO could be a winner in the "Lose it all" Sweepstakes. Be kind, if you ever want anyone to be kind to you.
I saw him sitting there on the bench in the room with the pool tables, with several plastic shopping bags sitting next to him. Whenever he would get up and move, his bags would always go with him. And well they should, for though I am far too polite to have ever peeked into them, I am almost certain that I know what was in them. Those bags likely contained everything that the aged gentleman owned...
You see, the Gentleman of which I speak is homeless, one of the many, many people in this country that are, every year, forced by economic circumstances into that lamentable lot in life. As the few rich that are left get richer, and the billions of poor get poorer, and the middle class is completely wiped out by Laws and Codes, international and national, that are designed to help only a small segment of the population to prosper, while the rest are largely abandoned by the State...there are so many, so very many like the Gentleman of which I speak. So many that perhaps, at times, they almost seem invisible...
Yet they are not invisible to me. I have in my time been in that Gentleman's shoes. Not only that, but I will be again. Probably soon, and my heart was breaking with every moment that I looked at him, sitting in an establishment where people customarily go to be merry. They were there to get drunk, to dance, to mingle, to have a good time and listen to the music and and meet each other and form friendships. But he...he just sat there on the bench...alone...invisible...and he was not there to be merry. He was there because it was cold outside, and sitting in there for a few hours would provide him with a few hours of warmth, before he would be forced by necessity to go back to his spot under the bridge downtown...to sit in the cold, the dark, the loneliness, left alone with his thoughts, and no doubt wondering how life had ever turned out the way it had for him...
I remember offering the elderly Gentleman my bag of potato chips (my supper, pretty much). He asked for nothing, and when I offered him my food, he politely declined my offer. I knew right away what his situation is, but I couldn't bring myself to say it in words to him. Why would he want to be reminded of it? He would be reminded of it all too well in a few hours, when the bars closed and there was nowhere really left for him to go for the rest of the night. He would have plenty of time to think about his situation when he was back sitting under the bridge...alone...
I was pretty sad about the whole thing. If I but had the ability to do so, I would build him a house and let him live in it. I have a tremendous amount of respect, in general, for my elders, and the elderly that have struggled their way through life for so many years deserve a place to call home and a place to spend the declining years of their posterity. It is the least society can do for them...but society does not, at present, do so.
When I was a child, I would travel about with my Mother, who has a very great and a very kind and a very gentle heart. And we'd be driving down the street, when we'd see at this corner or that corner people holding signs saying "Will Work for Food". We'd see people missing their arms or their legs sitting there too, also with similar signs...
So many people would drive by these poor abandoned souls without so much as a second glance. But my Mother would always stop and either give them money (though she was not exceptionally wealthy at all. She was poor herself, though not nearly as poor as they), or she would find out from them what they would like to eat if they could do so, and she would go to the store and get them food, and bring it to them.
I remember asking my Mother why she always put herself out of the way to help these people on the street corners, whom she didn't know. I was a child at the time, and I had listened when people had said, "Oh, they're just trying to score enough money to go get themselves drunk." In retrospect, I found that those people were wrong, and my Mother was right. When I asked her why she helped people she didn't know, when they might take advantage of her, she always told me, "It doesn't matter if they do, Derek. It doesn't matter if they do. What matters is that I saw someone who needed the help, and I helped them. What they do with it is their choice, but it was my duty to help them if I could."
I asked her, "But Mom! There's no law that says you have to give your hard-earned money to people, particularly those who will never pay you back."
And she told me, "Yes there is, Derek. Yes there is. It's a law that you'll never find in any courthouse or any law book, but it's a higher law than those laws."
Looking back on it, I found that she was referring to the Highest law of all, the Law of Humanity. The Law of Compassion. A Law which none enforce, but all would be wise to follow. Because they too, someday, might require the compassion of others to help them get through the day. I look back at what my Mom did, which, in more selfish days, I did not understand, but as I've grown older and wiser, I have come to understand it completely, and to wholeheartedly agree. It didn't matter to my Mother one whit if she would ever be paid back. It didn't matter one bit if those people she helped would go get drunk off her kindness. It mattered to her that she had done what she could to BE kind to them, and if they happened to use her help to get back on their feet or at least to go get themselves things they needed, like a meal or clothes or maybe a motel room to live in for even one night, then so much the better. My Mother is a tremendously kindhearted person. I love her more and more with each passing year.
But the elderly gentleman at the bar last night...he did not have my Mom around to help him.
I was, as I have said, sad about the whole thing. But something happened then which stirred within my heart a great feeling. A restoration of faith in humankind...
An old friend of mine from years back, who is a regular at that establishment, came in, and I was talking to him about various subjects while standing at my door watching the crowd. And all of a sudden, he dropped his voice to a low whisper, and asked me what was the deal with the elderly gentleman sitting behind me with the three plastic bags sitting next to him. I whispered back, straining to keep my sadness from being audible in my voice, that the guy had no home to go to. Then I turned my back and went to look once more at the crowd in the bar, acting like it was absolutely necessary for me to look in that direction at that time, because I needed to get myself composed and calm...
And my friend went over to the elderly gentleman while my back was turned, and gave him some money to go get a meal. (I peeked when I heard my friend talking to the man). My back was still turned at the time, though, so neither the old man nor my compassionate friend could see it, but I was grinning my face off, and my eyes started to get that misty feeling to them that you get right before you start crying...THAT'S what it's about! Helping people! Helping those in need to keep alive and to keep hope! My faith in the humanity of humankind is restored to full by such incidences of compassion for those who cannot give back. It doesn't MATTER if they can give back. It matters that we're human enough to help them anyways, because they need it more than we do!
We live in a society that places much emphasis upon possessing objects. Upon accruing things...mere things...that we don't need. So a lot of us forget, sometimes, that possessing crap we do not need is a luxury...it is a privilege, not a right. That aged Gentleman, no doubt, considered himself lucky just to be able to eat a decent meal that evening, while many others among us dream of buying a second automobile...or a gold chain with our name on it written in diamonds...
We are all family. There are billions in the world who might not want to see it that way, but whether they want to or not, it is true. Every single human on the planet is family. Every single MAMMAL on the planet is family. And if we saw our own Brother or Sister, our own Mother or Father, our own Aunt or Uncle living in deprivation, would we be quick to let them starve, let them be homeless, let them go without the basic necessities of life?
What is the point of this story? Well, besides getting the story off my soul and into words, there is also another point. And that point is to say, "Be kind to your fellows, no matter who they are. Be compassionate to them, even if they are in no position to return the favor. Because someday, you may very well BE them, and if you are not kind and compassionate to them, who will be kind and compassionate to you?"
Mitakuye Oyasin - We Are All Family.