My walk to the liquor store

My Walk to the Liquor Store

March 26, 2024, 

At 2 AM, I walked to the liquor store. 
I wondered why I went 
I wondered if I was going to relapse, 
I wondered if I was a piece of shit. 
I wondered.
On the way back home,
two buzz balls 
and a shot of jack, 
I came across this man, outside of a tent
He was on all fours, aimlessly scraping away at what seemed to be a wall, 
with who knows what. 
Something told me I had to say something to him…
As I approached him 
closer and closer, 
all I could think to say was…”God Bless you”
The man, 
who was on all fours,
came to a sudden realization,
if only just for a moment…
that he was on all fours… 
doing something that he never in a million years,
would’ve imagined he’d be doing. 
And in that moment of our shared uncertainty,
I continued walking home from Wilshire Blvd to my Korea-town apartment…
And my heart broke… 
Because when I said God bless you
an innocent soul stopped what he was doing, 
to say,
"Oh…thank you"
It wasn’t just any thank you… 
It was truly…the most genuine thank you…
One that spoke beyond the mental illness of a homeless man,
living in the harsh reality of waking up to a quiet, yet loud tent…
With feelings of self hatred, anger, confusion…
And the simple inability to comprehend how and when he got there in the first place… 
A simple, yet loud unknowing… 
And to that… I cried and begged God to change the world. 
That was it. 
That was enough.
I hate seeing people suffer.

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