Last week I traveled to San Francisco to attend a physics conference; I thought I would start a new series 'thoughts from places' to let you know what I thought...when I was at that place.
I dreaded the question 'so how are you liking the city?' which luckily I was able to stave off with a Jane Austen-esque insult of 'well...it is a city isn't it!' and left it up to the interpretation of the asker what that actually meant. But in the safety of my own blog, dear reader, I'll tell you what I meant.
I’m sure there are good parts of the city; I’m sure there are museums and galleries that I didn't see but I can not think of them without thinking of everything that I did see. I can’t focus on the possible beauty without thinking of the wild eyes of the man who shoveled food straight from the trash can to his mouth. I think of the father who was trying his best to quietly distract the raving woman, her mind gone from drugs, broken from a life harder than she deserved. She crowded closer to his child, the toddler wrapped around his mother’s legs, his hands covering his face. Then without warning she changed focus, plunging out onto the street with no care for the cars, already waving and yelling at the empty air in front of her.
I look out on the streets and I see despair, I see souls who are lost. I see lives that are immeasurable difficult and I see humans whose beds are made of concrete. I step around their prone bodies in the morning, the only sign of life a pair of shoes sticking out awkwardly from under the dirty blanket.
The bustle of the city is supposed to be inspiring, it supposed to be exciting. But all I see is a problem too large for me to even fathom a the existence of a solution.
The first night a man wrapped in a fluttering white comforter stumbled down the sidewalk, pulling a ratty suitcase behind him. I quickened my pace, automatically seeking out safe routes. What if, what if, what if… He jolted into the streets without a glance to either side, crossing over to my side before striding past me; he was no more substantial than a drifting ghost. I wondered what he saw; I wondered where he thought he was.
You see, he used to belong to someone. He was someone's son. He sat in first grade with every other kid, he was promised that there was a world of future ahead of him.
Or, worse, he was never belonged to anyone. He grew up in the cracks of the society, his parents gone, no one there to help him learn how to navigate the world he was born into.
That night as I lay down I marveled at the soft bed beneath me, I breathed the smell of freshly laundered sheets and I wondered how I ever got so lucky.
The stench of weed, cigarette smoke, and unwashed human bodies cling to the streets leaving me praying for a change of wind. And sure, I walked down sidewalks where the crowding stores sold clothing more costly than months worth of my rent. There was money, there was abundance, but there was also a stark absence of it.
I was glad to get on the plane. I was glad to say goodbye to the beautiful shimmering of the ocean, to the warm sunlight bouncing off summer-green leaves. I was glad to return home, not because there is no poverty or homelessness in my community but because the scope of it feels like a problem that one day can and will be solved.
((I did a little research and donated to a charity that helps homeless youth in San Francisco-- they're called Larkin Street Youth Services. Obviously I need to do more research to help out my own community but hey, we all have to start somewhere, right?))
((PS yes I shameless stole the 'thoughts from places' from John Green so thank you John Green for the idea?))
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