I acknowledged the young man and he began to stutter then jumped into a spiel about a show that he had the next night. His friend hands me a bundle of tickets. The type on the tickets are off and words are missing. Due to the name of the club I can almost guarantee that no promoter would have allowed such shoddy tickets to be used for an event of this type.
They interrupt each other, laying it on thick. They're doing me a favor by allowing me the chance to have such a great discount. According to them, if I try to buy tickets at the door I would have to pay $10 per person.
I politely decline and tell them that I have plans for the following evening.
They're interrupting each other again, and the one I knew is doing a little dance. His eyes filled with excitement at the prospect.
Regretably, I had to decline again. This time because I had absolutely nothing on me.
As he walked away he told me about how successful in the music industry he had become. He was focusing on the spoken word type of rap and staying away from mainstream focus of money, cars and girls. I told him that was good to hear.
However, what really struck me was the question he threw at me right before he began to talk about his musical success.
That question threw me. It turned an already surreal conversation into a trip through the twilight zone.
This young man was a colleague of sorts. I would say hi in passing while rushing from one college class to the next. However, it was as I worked at the MultiCultural Center that I would see him most often. He attended every event put on by a fellow department that shared our office space. The director would offer him meals and acted as a mentor, as he had trouble fitting in with others for a myriad of reasons, including his stutter.
That was years ago, and honestly I never really thought about him. Now in retrospect I remember that he always had a rather rough look about him. However, he was always smiling. The eternal optimist.
Despite hard times he retained his positive spirit. Although, some might say I've mistaken delusion for positivity.
According to the Los Angeles Homeless Services Coalition, "3.5 million people will experience homelessness in any given year. 1 in 5 of these persons has a severe or persistent mental illness." *
Thinking about this young man I begin to wonder how many of those students I sat next to in class ended up in the same situation. Just wandering trying to find a way to make it though another day. I remember another classmate I had seen at a grocery store. We exchanged greeting and he then proceeded to ask me for any money that I might have to help him get something to eat.
As children we are told that as long as we stay in school and go to college, we would have no problems becoming successful in life. However, we were never warned of other factors that could result in a rockier path.
These forgotten are reminders that all the best intentions in the world may not be enough to keep us off the streets. Hardship does not discriminate between the educated and the non-educated, the determined and the slothful, the dreamer and the apathetic. Just as that young man wandered down the street at night, that could have very well been me. The stark betrayal that haunted my thoughts prior to that encounter suddenly seemed trivial and pathetic. Those tears I cried foolish. How dare I complain about not having plans for the weekend when I had a place to lie my head?
A wake-up call thanks to a meeting with a young man I had forgotten.
~~
*http://lahsc.org/wordpress/educate/statistics/united-states-homeless-statistics/
