Just trying to make it better...

I can be an overly critical thinker at times.  I know this about myself.  I don't look at things and say, "Golly gee, this is wonderful."  Instead I say, "Well, X and Y are ok, but it could be better if you did Z."  If you ask my opinion, I will tell it to you pretty much just like that.  This does not endear me to those going through life in rose-colored glasses. I get that.

I blame my college English classes.  You want critical analysis? I can deliver! I also blame my dad. I remember being eight years old, and hand delivering my report card, all excited to show my my 95's and my 96. My dad looked at it and said, "Wow, Barb!  That's amazing--fantastic job!"  Just kidding. He did not say that at all. Instead, he said, "96?  Why isn't it 100? What do you need to do to get it to 100?"  He would go through my photos that I took at Girl Scout camp and critique the composition, telling me how I could use the light and shadows and the arrangement of the subject to make it better. So in the Lewis household, it was never "Look how well I did," but rather "How can I make it better?"

So I go through life doing penance for my overly critical brain by trying to do random nice things for people, hoping to even out the balance in some karmic way.  I've stopped and helped at terrible collisions, stopped to help a boy on a skateboard hit by a car, helped lift a man in a wheelchair up into his bus, given enough money to the little old lady kneeling in the snow begging so she can go home and get warm...just wherever I see a little need I try to "do unto others".  This I also learned from my dad.  How many times was the whole family piled into the car going somewhere when Daddy would pull over to help someone whose car was broken down?  I don't have fingers enough to count! So I try to "make it better" but this can be a problem in a country where you don't speak the language. You don't always know if it's culturally appropriate, if you will offend people, or what the expected behavior is.

Take just now, for instance. I was at the little butcher shop by my apartment when a man walked in. Although he was wearing a suit, he looked a little rough around the edges. He looked like someone old before his time, with a heavily wrinkled face and unkempt beard. His suit was old and worn, and his shoes had broken buckles and worn down heels. He first looked at the cheese, asked the shop lady something, and then went and looked at the bread.  Then he walked out without buying anything. I thought he had looked hungry, but it could have been my imagination.  As I stood in line to buy my hamburger meat to make some tacos for dinner, I couldn't stop thinking about that man, and feeling guilty that I would have a nice supper and I didn't know if he would or not.   I wondered about buying some of the cheese he had been looking at and some of the bread and just handing it to him as I walked home. But I didn't know which direction he had gone or if I would see him again, or again, if it would be awkwardly inappropriate.

You know, when people in the US think they are poor, they still have a television.  They still have a cell phone.  They still have regular meals--it might be beans and cornbread, but they get to eat. But in my years overseas, I have seen poverty of a very different kind. The kind where you go to bed hungry and wake up hungry and keep going from there. I kept thinking maybe I should try to find the man and give him some money for dinner. But it is awkward--what if I would offend him?  What if he didn't really need any help and I embarrassed him? I don't have the Russian language to politely say something like, "Hey, if you can't use this please pass it on to someone who can."

I kept an eye out for him as I walked home, and then I noticed him under a tree. He was picking up some very tiny pears that had fallen from the tree and was putting them into an old plastic bag. And again, I thought he might could use a little cash but maybe he was just a guy who wanted to gather some pears?  Then I watched as he picked up a half a pear that looked like it had been eaten by birds. He sort of considered it, looked at the slim pickings on the ground, and then put it in his bag. That was when I decided to risk the cultural faux pas and possibly look like an idiot. I walked over to him, having to pass in front of the people lined up at the bus stop and said, "I want you to have this" and handed him the 500 rubles I had folded really small so I could slip it to him discreetly. I said it in English, but he must have understood my intentions. He reached out and took the money and said "Спасибо".  It was not much--about $10--but maybe it would buy some bread and cheese.

There is so much need in the world and I know my tiny little drops into the great big bucket aren't much, but I am still thinking "how can I make it better?" That man will be on my mind for days.  I wish I knew his story--I still don't know if I did the right thing, but I tried.  I guess that's all we can do.     Matthew 25:40