Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, December 9, 1993 TAG: 9312080079
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Beth Macy
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
He was hobbling across the Wasena bridge, one of his legs clearly mangled. The way he looked at the people driving by him at 30 miles an hour - the way he peered mournfully into our cushioned, temperature-controlled cars - you couldn't help but feel for him.
His hair was black, all messy and humped up to the side. When he hopped up from the street to the curb, he missed the car in front of me by about two feet.
I pictured this poor little mutt in that room at the SPCA - a muzzle on his snout, the long needle going into him, the sudden slump from the euthanasia technician's arms down to the tattered linoleum floor.
Then I imagined my own mutt, Scooter - who is lying in the chair beside me now, his four perfect legs crossed over each other just so - in that same awful room, where an average of two dozen animals in the Roanoke Valley are put to sleep every day.
\ They put a notice in our paycheck envelopes recently. Called "Giving Change Won't Make a Change," the pamphlet is a Downtown Roanoke handout designed to encourage people not to give panhandlers money. Instead, it says, we should make donations to the social-service organizations that help street people.
"Not all of Roanoke's panhandlers are drug- or alcohol-dependent, but most are," it says. "The change you give them on the street is most often spent on more drugs or alcohol - furthering their addiction and dependence on you and society."
I couldn't help but think of that dog on the bridge when I read that pamphlet. And I couldn't help but remember the day last summer when I helped serve free lunch at Roanoke Area Ministries, then walked downtown for a $5 lunch of my own.
As I walked back to work that afternoon, I spotted a street person heading toward me, a camouflage satchel strapped across his back.
The stranger was singing loudly. He was singing mostly jibberish - though I could make out a distinct reggae beat. As he got closer to me, his swaying became pronounced. It wasn't so much a drunken kind of sway, but a happy - deliriously happy - kind of bounce.
From the corner of my eye, I watched his dreadlocks bob up and down as he walked.
Avoid eye contact and don't stop walking, Downtown Roanoke's pamphlet instructs.
As our shoulders passed, the man's jibberish turned coherent. He sang: "THERE'S THE LADY JUST SERVED ME LUNCH AT THE RAM HOUSE, AND NOW SHE CAN'T EVEN SPEAK."
I did as the pamphlet instructs. I avoided eye contact and kept on walking. And I felt an odd combination of fear and guilt.
Fear, for having looked just a little.
And guilt, for not having looked closely enough.
\ I'm not sure why we get more worked up over homeless dogs than homeless people. I wrote a feature story two years ago chronicling the struggles of the SPCA euthanasia technicians and the animals they have to kill because of overpopulation. It received more reader response than anything I'd written before.
Recently I spent a week at a writers' retreat in Sweet Briar, where I taped pictures of my dog, Scooter, to the wall and pretended petting him every day. This, after I'd begged them (unsuccessfully) to let me bring the dog with me - so I wouldn't get lonely.
"But he's my inspiration," I told the admissions director, only half-joking.
During a trip to visit relatives in Baltimore last February, my husband and I were shocked by the big-city begging scene. You couldn't walk a block without being approached for money - an advance my sister-in-law successfully thwarts by giving them her most recent doggy bag.
I'm not sure why I can't stand to look these people in the eye.
Maybe it has to do with seeing myself in their worn, lonely faces. The possibility that I could end up on the streets - that I could end up one of them - is too painful to imagine, let alone confront face to face.
Not that I think dogs should be valued more than human beings. It's just that they're so innocent - and, by extension - so much easier to love.
They don't turn on us. They don't back out on their AA meetings. They don't get fired from their jobs for showing up drunk or late, or not at all. They're easier to help. And when we help them, we feel good about ourselves.
I thought of all that when I saw that poor, sad-sack of a dog on the bridge the other day and felt that same combination of fear and guilt.
Fear for the dog, for being there - and looking so lost.
And guilt for myself, for looking into his eyes - and feeling too much.
by CNB