There is a standard

I was walking from the train station this morning and saw a lot more homeless people downtown. As the weather gets nicer they do tend to come out and do what they can to make a buck or two. This morning there seemed to be a few more than what I had seen in the last three weeks. They are nearly swallowed up by the rush of human beings scurrying around them for the most part but one caught the attention of a fellow commuter and me.

I don’t know this other commuter; she was wearing a light pink jacket and pants combo and a pink scarf tied around her neck. She reminded me of a Pepto-Bismol bottle actually.  She was walking briskly from Union Station near Jackson Street and we both saw a homeless denizen holding a sign. I noticed that he was holding his, “Please help me Hungry”, sign upside down.  My fellow pink commuter noticed this as well and she had no problem approaching him and letting him know that his sign was upside down.

The homeless man looked at her as she walked away with something like incredulity on his face. I kept walking too. I didn’t wait to see if he flipped his sign over. I was more surprised at Ms. Pinkpants and her incredible correction of the homeless man. I thought, just because you are poor or homeless there’s no reason not to have a proper, right-side up sign. I guess Pinky thought so too.

I lost sight of the pink lady shortly afterwards but I kept thinking about her advertising/marketing correction of the homeless guy’s sign. I couldn’t help think it was perversely hilarious. I know poverty and homelessness are not laughing matters and it’s an extremely huge problem, but how often do we correct homeless people’s signs? I have seen so many over the years where the poor homeless try to make themselves look as desperate as possible by having the worst written, printed or spelled signs. I think this is to illicit sympathy in us by making us think, “Aw, that person is obviously too stupid to take care of themselves. I’ll throw them the change I have in my pocket.”

I think in some cases, this might be true. They may have had some learning disability that kept them from being a productive member of society or were failed by the education system. It’s all possible. But what if we gave them to tools to make proper signs? Cardboard and paints? Well, that’s just stupid. We should start at the root and turn the system that left them behind upside-down, maybe make some corrections there.

I wonder if the pink clad commuter could do that. If she would be willing to turn that keen editorial eye to a broader forum and help to correct the mistakes of an entire system of upside-down policies and social responsibilities. Do I?  Do you? Can it be that as a reality, there will simply always be homeless people and nothing any group or system does will ever be able to solve it?  Maybe telling a homeless man that his sign is upside-down is the first step toward a solution. Maybe he’ll see that his life, like his sign is within his control and he’ll begin a journey realizing his personal value.  Maybe this pink lady set a new standard after all.