Shoeless

Dear Cathy,

I think it’s time that you and I had a chat. Let’s talk about that young girl you met on the way home from work that day, all those years ago. You know the girl I’m talking about. I know you still think of her occasionally, most recently today.

When you left work that day, you trotted down the concrete stairs of the building like you did every evening. You rushed to the corner, turning your gaze in every direction to make sure traffic was clear before crossing the street to catch your train. North, south, east, west... that’s when you saw her.

On the sidewalk not thirty feet away, a young girl lay. She seemed to be high-school age. Her denim-covered legs were bent tightly against her chest, a hoodie pulled loosely over her head, her hands stuffed in the pockets, nothing on her feet. No shoes. No socks. Nothing.

Working in the centre of the city, you saw displaced people on a regular basis; in the subway, on the street corners, in the alleys between the buildings, and even curled up on the sidewalk like that young girl. Sometimes you gave them money. Sometimes you said hello and wished them a lovely day. Sometimes you ignored them; simply rushed past or even stepped over them.

Some days you did something. Some days you did nothing. Sometimes they got to you. Sometimes they didn’t. But at no time did any of them get to you like that young shoeless girl. You stood on the sidewalk, almost frozen in place, except for your eyes which were once again looking in every direction, but this time for someone who might know this girl. There was no one.

At first you wondered if it was some sort of game she was playing with her friends. She didn’t look like your typical picture of what a homeless person should look like. Her clothes were clean and in decent shape. From what you could see of her, she seemed to be clean and healthy. But yet, there she lay, barefoot, on the sidewalk in the middle of the city in late October.

You walked over to where she was laying, bent down, and asked if she was okay. She weakly mumbled something that you didn’t understand and pulled her hood tighter around her face, as if she were trying to hide. From what, you didn’t know.

You went to walk away but stopped. You looked toward the coffee shop on the corner and handed her a twenty-dollar bill, suggesting she go inside and warm up. She raised her head, smiled, and thanked you. You left. You wanted to get home before the approaching storm.

You walked across the street to the station, and when you looked back for the final time, she smiled and waved at you. You waved back, then disappeared through the doors and never saw her again.

It wasn’t enough.

That’s what you told yourself all the way home on the train. It’s what you told yourself later that evening when, from your cozy apartment, you looked through the window at the storm raging outside. It’s what you told yourself all those other afternoons when you left work and turned to the west to see if she was back there on that sidewalk. It’s what you tell yourself even now, nine years later.

You should have asked her about her bare feet, you think. You should have taken her to the shoe store a couple of blocks north and bought a new pair (we both know you couldn’t afford to). You should have gone into the coffee shop with her and stayed with her until…

Until what, Cathy? Until what?

I know you feel you didn’t do enough, but at least you did something. How many people at the busy intersection, that intersection that has vehicular and pedestrian traffic 24/7 did anything? In the brief time you were with that young girl, how many others stopped to help? How many saw her from the coffee shop window before you even left work? How many put down their cups and walked outside to ask if she was okay?

I am not suggesting you judge other people for what they didn’t do, merely asking that you stop judging yourself for what you didn’t do. Because you did something. Even if your gesture was small, it was something. It showed you cared, and by the smile on that young girl’s face when you waved goodbye, I could tell she appreciated you. It’s time you learned to appreciate yourself. It’s time to cut yourself some slack and accept that your action may not necessarily have changed that girl’s life, but there’s a chance that it did.

Neither you nor I know what happened to her after we disappeared into the subway that day. Neither of us could predict her future. All we can do is bide by what we allow our imagination to tell us. We can choose to believe the negative possibilities, or we can choose to believe that she turned out okay; that she has a family that loves her, that she has a career that makes her happy, and that she has more pairs of shoes than she can fit in her closet.

Ah, I see you’re smiling. I see you like that vision, that version of her future. Hold onto it. Believe that you had a part in shaping that vision, even if it was just a small part. Believe that it was enough.

Love,

Your Conscience