I've been in school here in downtown Atlanta and the homeless population around my university is relevantly high. Today walking back to my dorm room which is about a half mile hike from where I was finishing up a questionnaire on studying abroad, and I noticed something across the street through the maze of cars. I saw through the window of a sedan I was walking next to a homeless man on the other side of the street, who I had then believed slipped on the new fallen leaves on the sidewalk. When the car next to me drove forward, that wasn't the case at all. The man had fallen onto his side and started to convulse. I stopped dead in my tracks on the side of the road and watched and wondered if I should cut through the traffic and help the poor man. I stood too long in waiting and watched as a professional office worker ran through the traffic and to this man's aide. The professional didn't know the homeless man, but he rushed to him without a second thought when he realized what I was so caught up in. He didn't think twice about asking him if he was alright or if he needed to call an ambulance. He did a good deed, while all of us watched the sick homeless man convulse on the sidewalk not knowing if we should intervene or not.
We are all so caught up in ignoring the homeless when we are in cities or places they tend to gather. Do we really need to ignore them this selfishly? Where is the mercy in that? Shouldn't we act kindly and compassionately towards these people? Why did I walk away from the convulsing homeless man? Where was my compassion? What I am trying to tell myself is that there was nothing I could do. That's completely wrong, I know I have a cell phone, I could have given someone a call to pick the man up. I could have stayed by his side while he recuperated. No one deserves to be alone and I let myself be the victim of society.
Hopefully there will be no next time, but if I see something like this happen again, I have proven to myself the difficult situation isn't easy but it is necessary. That was my mistake of the week, and I intend to pay it forward in another way to make my community more of a community.
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