May Day Reflection

May Day Reflection

A man died this morning. He died on a cement sidewalk in the clothes he was wearing. He was found a block from Market as you enter the Tenderloin. Perhaps he died in his sleep, his body and mind too sick to find proper shelter, if any was available. Did some unknown assailant kill him for an imagined slight or to take whatever money the man might have had? There was a blanket bundle in the doorway of the store, was that his bed? I don’t know the answers. I know that as I came up Turk, there was an ambulance, a fire truck, and police van sitting in the street to my left. As I crossed the street I looked down the sidewalk towards the vehicles, and there he was. Strapped to a gurney, one arm flopping out from under the yellow tarp the paramedics had pulled over him, the man was hidden from view. But the arm told me it was a man. Did he have a family that was looking for him? Would anyone come to claim him, bury him, and mourn him? Who would offer prayers for his soul? Who would remember him?

I pondered all this as I continued to my office, saddened by the loss of an unknown human. Was he someone I had seen before? There are so many on this block who remain unknown and faceless to those who scurry past, eyes averted to the tragedy around them. The block is home to addicts, their dealers, the homeless, and the mentally ill. There are a few that I greet because we ‘know’ each other. We are the regulars whose morning routines bring us into daily, if brief, contact. Those daily greetings may be one of the few moments of dignity they experience. In that moment they are recognized as human by another human.

I pondered all this as I read an article about a Palm Beach millionairess convicted of criminal tax evasion to the tune of $500,000. She has to sell her beloved Jaguar, which made her cry. The woman doesn’t understand why she has to sell her car; it was all just a mistake. The judge was unimpressed by her tears and added some jail time. Is it possible that this self-absorbed human, in love with her expensive toy, could ever feel compassion for someone whose home was a sidewalk? I hope so. That Jaguar could easily pay the rent for a family or two in San Francisco, but she doesn’t know that. All she knows, and cares about, is that her toy is being taken away.

A man died this morning, and I will say a prayer for him and remember him to God. And I will also pray for those who are too absorbed in their toys and themselves to notice the human community we live in, let alone fully live in it.