Hot Dogs For Homeless

Ahhh Thanksgiving!  A time to give.  Give what, you may wonder?  A time to give thanks.  A time to give love.  A time to give hot dogs.  

For today, after getting rejected from multiple soup kitchens and homeless shelters, I did the latter.  It is wonderful to see these Baltimore non-profit social service organizations saturated with help during the break, but I wondered if there was another niche to fill; and that’s when it hit me.  Realizing not all homeless folks are mobile or drift into shelters, I decided to combine two of my loves in life to tackle this hiccup...hot dogs and cycling!  So after cooking up a grill full of dogs, wrapping them in aluminum foil armed with condiment packets, packing them into a handlebar bag and backpack, I pedaled into the streets!    

And this is how pathetic I am...for the first 20 minutes, I couldn't get one homeless chap to take a hot dog.  Not one.  Absolutely zero interest.  Never mind they were still hot.  Never mind they were organic.  Never mind that I had become the person begging them to take my food.  Then I recognized I was cycling around the heart of the soup kitchen district and everyone had already eaten lunch.  Sweet.  The problem was in my location.  So off I went further west and further north. 

Alas, it took no more than 45 minutes to get rid of 30 hot dogs.  I chatted with some amazing people who live a lifestyle so foreign to most of us that it is hard to relate.  It is in this difficulty relating that detachment from homelessness occurs.  Without the ability to see myself in their shoes, I cannot develop empathy.  Without empathy, I lack the motivational mechanism to help.  Without...well, we can see this spiraling already.  Exit soapbox stage left.  Oh, and most shocking site of the day award goes to the two homeless individuals playing videogames on their Playstation 2 atop cardboard boxes.  Baltimore…what a city.  We are all, to some extent, products of our environments and after 3 months I find myself delighted at the caliber of people who contribute to this daily Baltimore/Hopkins circus show!

Now…can I interest anyone in a hot dog?