God sang to me for a donut

If you follow me on Facebook, you’ll know about a recent conversation I had with my dear Franciscan friend, Tim.  Tim spent a few years in Jamaica working among the poorest of the poor. 

Conversation with Tim is always rich.  We talk books, spirituality, and well, life. 

So, when he emailed me to hear how things are going, I told him. Not with a “fine, thank you” reply. This friendship is authentic and real. I told him- life is hard right now. Really hard. I explained a few of my challenges.  (And there’s certainly no shortage of those in 2020.)

His reply was classic Tim. He encouraged me to take an action that took me by surprise. Here are a few of his comments:

Theresa, another thing I did in Jamaica while living in solidarity with the poor that gave me comfort was to realize regularly that there are people in the world who really do suffer far more than we do. I started the practice of making sandwiches and walking around Kingston giving them away to one person at a time who were living homeless.

One day when I asked a beautiful (but filthy and smelly) thirty-something Jamaican man what his name was (as I handed him his sandwich... he chose ham and cheese... Jamaicans often did not want peanut butter and jelly), he said, “I don’t have a name. I used to have one, but not anymore.”

Theresa, I invite you today to make some sandwiches (at least two varieties) and walk the streets --TODAY--with the intention of sharing them with people who are hungry. You can find them in every city, every town, every village. We simply have to stop trying to find ourselves and put our energies into looking for the people around us who need real help. 

I didn’t have sandwich fixings, so I bought a few wraps and passed them out.  Yes, I felt better.  (And I’m a little embarrassed at the self-centered motivation of my good deed.)

This morning, I thought I’d buy some donuts and muffins and walk the streets.  Aaaaaand.... I only found one person. I was a little disappointed. 

Later, I picked up my daughter, Molly, and we walked around downtown. 

She carried the muffins, I, the donuts.  Still no takers.  In a college town like Tempe, it is sometimes hard to distinguish the homeless from the hipster college students. I look for expensive phones to help me discern.

Alas!  There on the street corner was a fellow busking with his guitar.  We approached him. “Would you like a donut or a muffin?” I asked.  He smiled, revealing a few missing teeth.  “But I want to sing for you first,” he said.

In a sweet tenor voice, he sang:

While he was singing, he locked onto my eyes, and I, his.  Except for that moment, when I noticed he had only one leg and his chair in which he sat was a wheelchair. 

I tried to keep my eyes from spilling over with tears onto my mask. The song felt like God him/herself was singing to me. 

At the end of his song, if I asked if he would like one donut or two.  “I’ll take two, that way I can give one away,” he said. 

He thanked us.  But it was clear who deserved the thanks.