All great change in America begins at the dinner table.
~President Ronald Reagan
He stood by the entrance of the grocery store looking ragged and weary. His clothes were dirty and tattered. His beard needed to be trimmed, and his long, greasy hair was sticking out underneath an old black ball cap that said “Vietnam Veteran.”
I’m ashamed to admit that I only noticed him because there were three teenage boys harassing him. They were calling him names and telling him to get a job. One of the boys knocked the hat off his head. I walked over, picked it up and handed it back to the man. The boys scattered the moment I intervened. I had given them my best angry mom scowl. The man gave me a shy smile and put his hat back on his head. Immediately, I noticed how frail and thin he looked. He asked me if I had a couple of dollars to spare. Unfortunately, I always use my debit card, and I didn’t have any cash on me.
I started to walk away, but something inside me made me go back. I asked him if he was hungry. He looked at me puzzled. I told him that I lived a block away. We were having a barbecue, and I would love for him to join us. He stared at me in disbelief. I promised him that I wouldn’t hurt him and told him that I just thought he could use a hot meal. He joked that most people were afraid he would hurt them. He tried to turn down my offer, but I persisted, and eventually he got into my car. He told me that his name was Joe, and I told him that my name was Tiffany. After that, we sat in silence for the three minutes it took to drive to my house.
When I parked the car, he still looked a little uneasy. He insisted on carrying my groceries into the back yard. My husband was standing at the grill, and my sons were running around in the grass with their friends. Everyone stopped to look at my dinner guest. Joe clammed up and stood there uncertainly at the gate. I beckoned to him to come and meet my husband. My husband told him to make himself comfortable, so Joe set down the groceries and had a seat at our picnic table. He asked if there was anything he could do to help. I told him to just relax and brought him a glass of lemonade.
My younger son immediately came up to the picnic table, sat down and started to ask Joe a bunch of questions. He wanted to know his name, his favorite color, if he had any kids, what his hat said, and if he liked hamburgers or hot dogs better. My son never asked him about his appearance. Kids overlook things like that. In the kitchen, my husband questioned me about where I had found my new friend. I told him what had happened, and he agreed that Joe probably needed a hot meal.
When the food was done, everyone squeezed around the picnic table. The children continued to ask Joe questions, and he seemed genuinely happy to answer them. He told them how he had three sons who were all grown up now. He told them about a tire swing he had set up for his sons when they were the same age as they were. As he ate and talked, his uneasiness lifted. He really appeared to be enjoying himself, and everyone at the table was enjoying his company. I noticed him jump when a trashcan got knocked over by the neighbor’s dog, and he avoided being touched by other people as much as possible. When everyone was done eating, he helped carry dirty plates into the house and thanked us for having him over for dinner.
He told us that he needed to leave and started to walk out the door. My husband told him to wait. He went and made a backpack with some clean clothes and food. He brought it to Joe. When Joe looked inside, he started to cry and told us that he couldn’t take it. He said that we had already been so kind by sharing a meal with him, and he didn’t want to take advantage of us. My husband insisted that he take the backpack. Joe thanked us again. I offered him a ride, and he turned it down. He said that it was such a beautiful summer night that he really would rather walk. Joe walked out the gate and into the night, and we never saw him again.
Friends and family members were horrified that I invited a homeless man to our home for dinner. They told me that he probably had some sort of mental illness, and he might come back and rob and kill us. In reality, he was a very nice man who for some reason was down on his luck. I believe that one of the most wonderful things about America is that there are so many people who feel a sense of community. They help other people when they are down, simply because it is the right thing to do. All the time, I see people doing random acts of kindness — paying for the coffee of the person in line behind them or putting change in an expired meter to help someone avoid a parking ticket.
My favorite holiday movie is It’s a Wonderful Life because I love how the community bands together to help George Bailey. Things like that still happen all over America. Communities work together to help families stay out of foreclosure when a neighbor’s child is going through cancer treatments. Strangers will pay for diapers for a single mother when she comes up short of money at the grocery store. And amazing men in uniforms put their lives on the line every day to protect people they have never met before. The kindness and compassion of the American spirit can’t be beaten by fear, cynicism, and hatred. Even when bad things happen, we rise up together and continue to help each other — because that is the American way.
~Tiffany O’Connor
