Bloom

Dear Simone,

How do we decide who is “deserving?”

I always gave everyone that asked for money, my change. I think only men. I don’t remember having women ask me for money. I wonder why that is? When I moved to Georgia there were always people at a gas station asking for change. That was the most intimidating. A.A. used to tell me not to give them any money because they were (enter Arabic cuss words here) and ungrateful. I didn’tunderstand what he meant until i tried giving a man a water bottle and the next person a sandwich. They always tell you that they’re hungry. So in my head, I would solve this problem by feeding them for the moment…wrong. I got yelled at and called “broke” and one even said that I was useless. I stopped giving them money. Some people call them “beggers”, some people say “hoomeless” and Jeh Nays dad calls them “filth.” Now I only give to those that “seem” to need it, like vets or disabled. Not the ones that clean the fog lights on a car. They scare me. They’re bold. Why are they touching my car?

Recently, there was this man on the exit of a freeway, with a sign “Anything helps. God bless.” And I felt some type of way because he had wireless ear buds. Later on I thought “I don’t know this man’s situation or who gave him that.” But then I thought about the earbuds having to be connected to something…like a phone, right? I was confused afterwards.

Who is deserving? And who gets to decide?