Vacation Day 10 – Marching to a Different Drum
This week, in Regina, I have been to the garbage bin behind this apartment building more than anyone. It happens when you are moving everything. There was lots of stuff that was stuck in the closets and cubby holes around the apartment that wasn’t needed anymore. Comments on the elevator by the older folks, “Are you still working at the move?”
The interesting thing is that when I put something out of any size – it is gone in about 15 minutes. I placed an old desk beside the bin – and it was gone in 10 minutes. The same happened to the old card table that was very rickety. As I came back from time to time small things would be gone as well. Over night it was even more extreme – whole garbage bags were opened and rifled through.
Last evening I met the ‘bin shopper” – this one was a woman dressed in a good winter coat and carrying white shopping bags already filled with prizes from the bins down the way. I had stopped to allow her to cross the street when I pulled the car in at about 11:00 PM. There were things from Mom’s apartment that I threw out at 6:00 PM that she was plucking from the bin. I wanted to take a photo of her but it may have caused a scene at 11:15 PM – waking some of the residents of the building.
Earlier in the day I was at the Liquor Store to get more boxes. As I approached the doors a scruffy looking man approached me. I waited for his appeal for some pocket change to get something to eat. Some of his teeth were missing and his clothes were dirty. The best way to describe him is that he appeared like the normal ‘street person’. This time however the man was inquiring if I would like to buy some food from him… I told him that I wasn’t interested.
After getting my boxes into the car I headed to the grocery store next door. There was the same man at the check out next to the one I was at. He was buying over 20 pounds of hamburger meat – just meat. He shoved an official form to the lady -it appeared to be maybe a government document of some sort. The cashier looked it over carefully and then had the man sign it. He walked away with all of his meat. I followed him to the parking lot… where another man met him. The new man gave him some money and he passed the meat over. The meat seller’s next stop was the Liquor Store next door.
The two people that I watched today disturbed my thoughts all last night.
A few years ago in Regina I watched a man approach the garbage bin with a shopping cart with a child riding inside. He stopped in front of the bin and then lifted the child into the garbage bin. The bin is deeper than a man can reach into while bending. The edge strikes you mid chest. Then he instructed the child to dig deeper through the trash. The child retrieved objects as instructed.
This is not a third world country. This is the “Queen City”, Regina, Saskatchewan. The beautiful prairie city with clean air and farming roots has trouble. Like all other communities in our country it is filled with ‘the haves’ and ‘the have nots’. The difference is great. The people I met yesterday were coming close to ‘the haves’ and were getting what they could without too much effort. The feeling of discomfort by ‘the haves’ as they tend to look away when a ‘have not’ approaches them – or simply let them riffle through their own garbage without incident.
The ‘Haves’ and the ‘Have Nots’ march to a very different drum. Their world’s are so far a apart and yet they live right next door to each other.
I guess I get used to these sights in Peterborough. The ‘have nots’ collect spare change on the streets downtown and shuffle along when someone complains. Our garbage is picked up the day that it is put on the street – not waiting for someone to riffle through it.
I am processing what I have witnessed last evening and over these past few weeks. How do I help? Why should I care? Is any problem like this my problem? Has the system I believe in failed… these folks and maybe even me? But as long as I ‘have’ – I am not a ‘have not’.
How far away is the ‘have not’? Hmmm.
~ Pastor Murray Lincoln ~
PS – The moving van has been and gone. It went well. I only forgot a few things when I didn’t open one closet… shish!
The interesting thing is that when I put something out of any size – it is gone in about 15 minutes. I placed an old desk beside the bin – and it was gone in 10 minutes. The same happened to the old card table that was very rickety. As I came back from time to time small things would be gone as well. Over night it was even more extreme – whole garbage bags were opened and rifled through.
Last evening I met the ‘bin shopper” – this one was a woman dressed in a good winter coat and carrying white shopping bags already filled with prizes from the bins down the way. I had stopped to allow her to cross the street when I pulled the car in at about 11:00 PM. There were things from Mom’s apartment that I threw out at 6:00 PM that she was plucking from the bin. I wanted to take a photo of her but it may have caused a scene at 11:15 PM – waking some of the residents of the building.
Earlier in the day I was at the Liquor Store to get more boxes. As I approached the doors a scruffy looking man approached me. I waited for his appeal for some pocket change to get something to eat. Some of his teeth were missing and his clothes were dirty. The best way to describe him is that he appeared like the normal ‘street person’. This time however the man was inquiring if I would like to buy some food from him… I told him that I wasn’t interested.
After getting my boxes into the car I headed to the grocery store next door. There was the same man at the check out next to the one I was at. He was buying over 20 pounds of hamburger meat – just meat. He shoved an official form to the lady -it appeared to be maybe a government document of some sort. The cashier looked it over carefully and then had the man sign it. He walked away with all of his meat. I followed him to the parking lot… where another man met him. The new man gave him some money and he passed the meat over. The meat seller’s next stop was the Liquor Store next door.
The two people that I watched today disturbed my thoughts all last night.
A few years ago in Regina I watched a man approach the garbage bin with a shopping cart with a child riding inside. He stopped in front of the bin and then lifted the child into the garbage bin. The bin is deeper than a man can reach into while bending. The edge strikes you mid chest. Then he instructed the child to dig deeper through the trash. The child retrieved objects as instructed.
This is not a third world country. This is the “Queen City”, Regina, Saskatchewan. The beautiful prairie city with clean air and farming roots has trouble. Like all other communities in our country it is filled with ‘the haves’ and ‘the have nots’. The difference is great. The people I met yesterday were coming close to ‘the haves’ and were getting what they could without too much effort. The feeling of discomfort by ‘the haves’ as they tend to look away when a ‘have not’ approaches them – or simply let them riffle through their own garbage without incident.
The ‘Haves’ and the ‘Have Nots’ march to a very different drum. Their world’s are so far a apart and yet they live right next door to each other.
I guess I get used to these sights in Peterborough. The ‘have nots’ collect spare change on the streets downtown and shuffle along when someone complains. Our garbage is picked up the day that it is put on the street – not waiting for someone to riffle through it.
I am processing what I have witnessed last evening and over these past few weeks. How do I help? Why should I care? Is any problem like this my problem? Has the system I believe in failed… these folks and maybe even me? But as long as I ‘have’ – I am not a ‘have not’.
How far away is the ‘have not’? Hmmm.
~ Pastor Murray Lincoln ~
PS – The moving van has been and gone. It went well. I only forgot a few things when I didn’t open one closet… shish!
posted by Murray Lincoln at
Thursday, March 22, 2007
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