My Pike Place Experience

My friend and I went to a conference on Microsoft's campus up in Washington last August when we decided to go to downtown Seattle one night. As soon as we parked the car, a man came up to us and asked us for money.

Truth be told, I was a little annoyed. I made some small talk with the guy to try to stall, and although I thought I had been perfectly fluent, he surprised me by saying, "You know, I have a son that stutters."

Well, that got my attention!

Before he said that, I had written this guy off completely. I was barely paying attention to him or to what I was even saying, because I was ashamed of the whole situation. I was ahamed that somebody would be homeless, ashamed that he would ask for money, and was ashamed that although I had the means to give him plenty, that I would only plan on giving him a dollar or more - and only to get away from him.

But suddenly, I wasn't just talking to some guy trying to get money out of me. I was talking to a person.

So we started talking. He asked me about my family, and I told him. I asked about his. He had a son who's a computer programmer. I said I was a computer programmer. He thought that was interesting - like maybe people who stutter try to compensate for not being able to talk fluently by taking up a job where the main task doesn't involve talking.

Pretty astute, for a guy bumming money off the side of the road.

I learned some more about this guy, who I think was named Rufus. (My friend and I didn't agree on what his name was - I thought Rufus, he thought something that didn't sound anything like Rufus. But since this is my blog, I get to be right!)

Rufus had Lupus, which is a disease where the immune system can't tell the difference between good cells and bad cells, and basically just attacks everything. I worked with a guy at my last job who had Lupus, and so I realized that what this guy was faced with was pretty tough. Rufus had a job, but didn't have health insurance, and he needed to buy some creams for his skin to help with some of the blemishes caused by his Lupus.

So I gave him some money. Much more than I normally would have.

When Rufus left, I realized that I had probably done to him what others have done to me. I had completely written him off at first glance. I had formed an opinion of him before I had a chance to know him.

I'm not suggesting that you stop and have a long chat with every person who asks you for money. But maybe there's a person at work or in school that you haven't given much thought or time to. Now's as good a time as ever to introduce yourself to that person and get to know him or her. You never know what you'll find!