judgmental

On Fridays at work, it is normally just in underlings. I think the Youth Pastor works Fridays to supposedly keep us in line (or maybe they just want a pastor on duty), but there's no other department head there.

About an hour before going home, my co-worker and I were hanging posters when someone started knocking on the glass doors. I looked up and there was this very rough looking man. He looked homeless. Linda goes and starts to open the door, and I whispered, "Linda, NO!" She laughed, then replied, "He goes to church here." I felt so ashamed. Yet at the same time, even though there were two of us and I've had a self-defense class a while back, I didn't feel safe letting in a creepy looking man with just me and a a sixty something year old woman. In retrospect, would I have reacted the same way had he been young and clean cut? Or a teenager?

It also reminded me of the homeless man at the corner of 1010/401 - the one who holds the Disabled sign but looks healthy. One day last week he was wearing shorts, and I about gasped in horror. His ankles were the same size as his calves, and his feet were so swollen they were about to pop. When he turned to face the next lane of traffic, I saw a deep gash on the back of one calf that had clearly been bleeding some. I wanted to sob, pack him up, and take him to the hospital. Yet I gave my normal wave and kept going. Bobby's always reminding me that not all handicaps are visible to the eye (like when someone takes the only wheelchair accessible parking spot and walks to the door without a limp). I don't have any answers for the right way to deal with such situations, but I don't think they're going to go away anytime soon.