Finding LIFE.

There is a little spot on the far edge of Skid Row that I always say I’d live if I were to lose my home….what? You mean you guys haven’t mapped out where you’d live if homeless? That’s weird.

For the last several years a man whom could pass for Santa’s brother has been occupying this space underneath the overpass with his rambunctiously sweet dog. I have seen this man take in others, giving them a place to sleep in his home and watched as he has swept and tidied the place. I don’t know this man by name, but each morning on my way to work as I pass in my car, we smile at one another as his dog playfully barks at me. [read: I am a sucker for any and all dogs. I have rescued 5 from the local streets….one of whom now lives with me. Yes, I’ve accepted my fate as the Crazy Dog Lady. Oops?]

This space, this man, brings me peace.

Yesterday morning I passed and to my surprise my friends were gone. This picture was in their place.

Is it a sign? I don’t know, the mystic in me says yes.

Either way, today I will remember the importance of smiling at strangers and the incredible gift it is to find LIFE in an often desolate world.

 

“An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.”
Martin Luther King, Jr.