. . . MICHAEL ANDRETTI. The 28th annual Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach became history April 14th, 2002, as the Andretti family won another race.
I walked through Long Beach, CA April 11th. The Goodyear Blimp was already circling overhead awaiting the four races scheduled for April 12th - 14th. The media, with their TV trucks and satellite dishes, were numerous and preparing for national broadcasts.
The Queen Mary looked splendid docked in its usual place. Many fancy condominiums and restaurants were on my walking road (Ocean Boulevard) that morning. The Long Beach Aquarium and the Long Beach Performing Arts Center were all spiffed up. Toyota cars were on display all around the Arts Center. Joggers, bicyclists, walkers, and roller bladers were doing their thing next to the Pacific Ocean on the bike path.
Ocean Boulevard was being cleaned immaculately. City crews were even out with little squeeze bottles cleaning the light poles of bird droppings. Wow, me on race weekend all the way from West Virginia in California!
And the loser is . . . the person in my photo to the right. That is this person and many more.
The photo was taken 9:30 in the morning as he/she was asleep on Ocean Boulevard one-half block from the Performing Arts Center. It's he/she because the person's gender, age, color, nationality, and name are unknown to me.
I've had very few opportunities to photograph the homeless as I've not wanted to embarrass anyone or make a scene. Maybe if I'd ask it would be okay, but if I wasn't feeling good about my life situation. I probably wouldn't want to be photographed in a hopeless state.
Although my homelessness can end anytime by calling the Church of the Brethren office in Illinois, I still am able to feel society's rejection of me many, many times each day. It's a lonely world out
here on the streets without family or friends.
Today in Tracy, California I walked my 1500th mile. Today in Tracy, CA the fifth person in the last month gave me money as I was bending over picking up pennies along the road. The first 1300 miles all I received were insults, pity, curse words, and objects thrown at me. The money I pick up doesn't go to me, but to the world's poorest folks. Why do we insist on judging a book by its cover?
Over the 1500 miles I've picked up $124; $121 in coins and $3 in bills. Over the first 1300 miles, the public didn't part with any money. The last 200 miles they have to the tune of $14.57. Praise God!
Awhile back after walking almost 150 very difficult miles in 6 days I asked God to help me as my "tank was empty." I sat down and Michelle (8) and her brother Sebastian (6) rode up on their bicycles to this old white-bearded drifter and ministered to me for 15 minutes.
Shortly thereafter, a man drove by in his pickup and gave me a 33 degree bottle of water on that 90+ degree day.
Fifteen minutes later, a man, a black man even, walked with this beat white man for an hour. We found out our birthdays were 17 days apart in 1950. We shared about our relationships with the Lord. It was very good. And the winner was us all.
Till next time . . .
In Christ's love, Don
P.S. The first human contact I had after mailing this to Meeting Ground was someone who drove by and yelled, "Get out of here, you bum!" Of course, I obliged, because I had many miles to walk.
When I first started walking, I would tell people I am walking for peace, for the homeless, the environment (God's creation), justice, equality, and a lot of other reasons. Now I know the true reason why I walk. One is to humble myself for the Lord's sake as I stoop over and pick up money, money that goes for feeding the hungriest on the earth, and a more important one for humanity, to get us to wake up and take the words of Christ seriously. Peace is more than just the absence of war. Greed, selfishness - these are the opposites of peace.
We need to look inside ourselves and recognize that the problem is within ourselves. 'Us' are the problem, not 'them.' Whether it's husband and wife, nations, or people on the highway, none of us walk this earth perfectly. Once we alcoholics/stuffaholics/sinners recognize this, there's huge hope for our growing and for peace.
Let me tell you a little story. I realized three weeks ago that many of the bad ways I have been treated on this walk have been by a certain ethnic group, and with this realization I could feel my heart starting to harden. Rather than get bent out of shape about that, I asked the lord to soften my heart, work on ME so I wouldn't see things that way. I had no idea what to expect. Over the next five days, people from this ethnic group gave me water bottles, money, offered me rides, and said cheery things to me. I didn't ask the Lord for others to change. Since then, there has been a wonderful upsurge of people treating me better, most of them from this ethnic group.
Peace begins with me. It's not about changing the community first so I can change. It's about softening my heart, being willing, myself, to change. That's what makes peace possible.
It's a wonderful gift we have that one of the best ways God's love can be shown is from one human being to another. It doesn't happen all the time. There's days when I'm walking out in the world - no one gives me water, people are cursing me out, I'm full of pain, I want to give up. This is my opportunity to grow and ask the Lord's will to be done in my life and not my own. God is always there for me. Invariably peace comes out of that. Does the pain go away, or people start treating me good? Maybe, maybe not, but peace invariable comes out of that.