the day just kept getting stranger

Today has been a weird day. I woke up to two moose bathing in the coy pond in my backyard. Then I ran a difficult eight miles through the Chugach Mtns. Then as I walked from my truck to work, 2 kamikaze seagulls were dive bombing my head. I literally had to cover my head with my library book and sprint through the park!

Then things really got weird. While at work, one of my coworkers and I heard shouting on the street outside the art gallery. We looked out the front window and there was a couple yelling at each other. They were both probably about 20 years old and it was immediately obvious that they were both under the influence of alcohol or drugs. And they were absolutely screaming at the top of their lungs at each other, calling each other every name in the book. And I knew that we were probably going to have to break up a fist fight if things got any worse. The really scary part is that the guy had 2 buddies with him. I'm not going to lie, I was scared. At one point the girl ran at the guy and pushed him away. And I thought, "Oh $#@% here we go." But instead the guy walked right out into the street into oncoming traffic. How he didn't get hit or cause an accident, I don't know. A few minutes later he (and his buddies) left.

Another onlooker went up the girl and asked her if she was okay, if she needed help, if she wanted someone to escort her somewhere safe. She looked at this onlooker and told him in no uncertain terms where he could go. She was as abusive toward him as she was to her boyfriend. And my coworker said to me, "Well, now she deserves whatever she gets, since she won't even accept help."

I've been replaying this event in my head all night. That girl is someone's daughter, someone's sister, someone's friend. That guy is someone's son, someone's nephew, someone's brother. What series of events unfolded in each of their lives to bring them to this point; being strung out on some substance and screaming and swearing and abusing each other in the middle of the street? They couldn't always have been this way. What pain did they experience, what insults did they absorb, what lies did they buy into, what poor decisions did they make that brought them today to the sidewalk in front of where I work? All I can think of is my nieces and nephews and how heart-broken I'd be if they were homeless and strung out on drugs.

My coworker seemed to think that this girl deserved whatever treatment she might incur because she didn't accept help. But maybe she couldn't. Maybe she's been wounded or tricked or hurt so many times that when a genuine hand of concern is extended to her, she can't even recognize it. Maybe her only defense mechanism is to lash out.

I'm told Anchorage actually has both a pretty serious gang problem as well as a large population of homeless people. A lot of them, both street kids and the homeless, congregate in front of the bus station a couple blocks from where I work. And I'll admit, I changed the route I walk from my truck to work so I wouldn't have to walk by them. But that only served to compound the brick-in-the-gut feeling I have. This issue has been on my mind for a couple of weeks now. I want to do something...but what? How can I help? I'm just an aimless outdoorsy dude from the lower 48 who's housesitting for the summer. But at the same time how can I sit in church on the weekend singing about the love of Jesus and then turn a blind eye toward such suffering all week long? Its a scary thing, because its just so easy NOT to get involved. Its easy to rationalize it all away; that homeless people are freeloaders, that street kids are just punks who need some discipline. But I think those are hollow answers.

I don't know. I guess my next step is to see if the new church I started going to has a ministry for the homeless. But at any rate, I feel like today's events have hit me hard and I'm still processing it all. If you've made it through all my ramblings, thanks for reading.