Bruce

There's a guy who often stands at the end of the driveway disgorging people from my local Starbucks - the driveway is disgorging people, not the guy.  He looks somewhat healthy, not too old, capable-ish.  He has a sign proclaiming hunger and a desire to work, a sign festooned with the standard American flags and the words "God Bless," a curse or a command I can't say.  I toss him a buck or a handful of change every now and then.  I don't participate in the endless debate as to whether people like this are lazy scammers or truly in need.  I used to speculate - invariably deciding that I was being screwed -  but it made me more cynical than I normally am, and I'm fucking cynical.  I realize that there are folks that take advantage of the system but I also think that they're in the minority.  If I assume that the particular folk in front of me is a deceiver then I deprive myself of the opportunity to help someone who really needs help.  I don't think I'd sleep very well if I spent all my time looking at people suspiciously.  I've decided to just assume that whoever I'm dealing with is on the up and up.  That doesn't mean I always fork over the change but that I'm going to trend generous.  If I give out a couple of bucks a week and it all goes to bums and reprobates who cares, really?  The peace of mind that $100 would buy me, thinking that most of us are good, decent people would be . . . well, it would be so big I can't at the moment even calculate it.  Just because I spent my pre-recovery life as a big, fat liar on the make doesn't mean that that's SOP.

I started parking my car in the lot that puts this guy in-between me and my coffee.  I started talking to this guy.  Bruce.  First of all, he's mostly there but everyone's not at home.  I don't see too many jobs where he's going to thrive and not because he's lazy, rather that he's struggling with some human interaction issues.  And he does have a part-time job - Tuesday and Thursday with a landscaper - and would like to work there full-time.  I don't feel like some social engineer here, either, or that I'm a huge-hearted dude really making a difference.  I just don't want to be suspicious and paranoid, preferring to assume that we're all doing the best we can rather than ascribe under-handed motives to every Tom, Dick, and Harry.  Moreover, I've opined at length over the theory that the more I try to hold onto my loose change the more power it has over me.