Five-Minute Friday: Look

Today I’m linking up with Lisa-Jo at The Gypsy Mama for Five-Minute Friday.

Join me!

The rules: Write for five minutes. No editing, revising, overthinking, or backtracking. Just write.

Today’s Topic: Look

I’ll never forget the day.

The day that I. Just. Couldn’t. Look.

We’d been downtown shopping for jewelry supplies. It was the rougher part of town…the part where you’d see far too many children begging and the people who’d miraculously survived debilitating conditions…and he was one of them.

This man…the one I couldn’t bear to look at.

We’d just finished our purchases at the final store and were heading back to catch the city bus.

He was sitting…somewhat slumped…against the edge of a cracked and rotting pillar.

I’m sure I gasped audibly, for he was damaged. Scarred for life. Perhaps a fire or explosion. Whatever the case, it was bad.

And I just couldn’t look…couldn’t allow myself to see past his scars.

It broke my heart and made me question my Father at the same time.

Why him? Why? WHY, WHY, WHY???

He needed money, and my heart ached…shame mingled with sorrow…as I passed him by.

Not allowing myself to look.

I prayed for the next week, unable to shake his image from my mind.

For some reason we were back in the same area of town the following Saturday. I knew he would be there.

And he was.

And though it hurt and made the tears drip as I allowed myself to look at him, I reached into my purse. Took a bill large enough to feed him for the day. Gave it to him, making sure that my hand made contact with his. Whispered, God bless you. In English, not Indonesian.

A quiet, terima kasih, uttered from his lips.

And that was it.

A small moment of time, but a very powerful lesson.

The lesson that no matter who we are, where we come from, or what we look like, we all deserve to be noticed. Loved. Cherished.

I hope all of these things for this man.