Baby Face

     During Pope Francis's recent visit to the United States, he cancelled a fancy lunch with major Washington politicians to visit with some of the homeless population in the area. He also encouraged congregants (on multiple occasions) to have compassion for others in their community, who they may normally ignore or even look down upon. He invited people to open their awareness and their hearts. The following story is an early "ah-ha" moment for me in NYC-living, that I think speaks to Pope Francis's message in a small way.
     I grew up in a very small seaside town in Massachusetts. When I moved to NYC to study music theater, it was a huge shift on many levels. One of the differences for me was the increased presence of the homeless population: on the streets, in the subway, in the parks, everywhere, and in rather close proximity (as every facet of city life is marked by close proximity!). Every day I witness people struggling to get by, begging for money or food with different levels of desperation. It is heartbreaking, but also the constant presence of people in need is can be exhausting and frustrating, as I feel limited in what I can do to help. I believe much of the challenge lies in societal and systemic change that goes far beyond giving a dollar to a stranger. Some individuals are so far from functioning with basic resources that they are in poor health and beyond dirty, to where their presence can make an entire subway car unbearable with the smell. 

    

 Somewhere in the first year of living in New York, the shock of seeing people in such desperation wore off and I began to feel disgust. Others around me would move hastily away from homeless individuals, cover their noses, and sometimes show their frustration. At the time, I just thought this was what New Yorkers did, the authentic reaction of those who had lived here longer than I had. The collective reaction seemed to be, “Ugh, another smelly homeless person! God, just another problem to deal with.” I caught myself in absolute repulsion one day at a very dirty and smelly homeless man on the train. He had covered himself in tied strips of plastic bags all over, looking like a very scruffy Stay-Puf marshmallow man from the “Ghostbusters” movies. He made me feel such sadness. This trigger to the natural empathy I had suppressed over time, also made me feel ashamed of feeling so disgusted by other human beings, none of whom I knew personally at all.

     My natural response had always been empathetic, probably echoing the ethics my family had instilled in me as a child, to value respect and care for others. In acclimating to the hustle of the big city, I absorbed the behavior of those around me as a social lesson in how to function in New York. But at this moment, I knew this response was not in harmony with my personal values. I decided to create an exercise for myself to outweigh shock and disgust and stay connected to my capacity for empathy.

     My dirty marshmallow man on the subway barely looked human, but he was. How did this happen? How exactly did he get to such a state? I glanced at his face and tried to imagine him as a baby, new and pure. We all begin as little babies, like a blank slate with so much ahead on the journey. Whenever I see a person on the street, struggling in such desperation, I picture them as a baby and it lets me connect to them as a fellow human, to even love them a little bit. It lets me look them in the face, even if just to apologize for not being able to help them as I wish I could. It’s a small gift I know, but far better to feel empathy over disgust.